Майкл Коннелли - Fair Warning

There was an accident ahead. My SUV gave me a view over the rooflines of several cars in front of me and I could see smoke and a car turned sideways blocking the fast lane and left shoulder of the freeway.

I knew I had to get to the right before I was stopped dead in the backup. I hit the turn signal and almost blindly started pushing across four lanes of the slowing traffic.

My moves brought a chorus of horns from angry motorists who were trying to do the same thing I was. The traffic slowed to a crawl and the spaces between cars compressed, but nobody on the road had the kind of emergency I had. I didn’t care about their frustrations or horns.

“Jack?” Rachel said. “I hear the horns, what is — I know you can’t talk. Try to text. We got the info you sent. Try to tell me what’s going on now.”

I did what most L.A. drivers do when they are alone in their cars. I cursed the traffic.

“Goddamn it! Why are we stopping?”

I had one lane left to get over to and I believed it would be the fastest way around the accident backup. I didn’t trust the mirrors anymore and was turning half in my seat to check my competition through the windows, all the while keeping the phone to my ear.

“Okay, Jack, I get it,” Rachel said. “But ride on the shoulder, do whatever you have to do and get down here.”

I coughed once, not knowing at this point if that meant yes or no. All I knew was that I had to get around the backup. Once I got past the crash, the freeway would be wide open and I’d be flying.

I had slowly passed the Highland exit and could see that the accident scene was a couple hundred yards ahead and before the Vine Street exit. That was where traffic came to a complete halt.

Now I could see people getting out of their cars and standing in the freeway. Cars were moving inch by inch as they passed the smoking wreckage. I could hear a siren coming up behind me and knew the arrival of first responders would shut things down even further and for longer. I also knew I could go to those first responders with the deadly cargo I believed I was carrying. But would they understand what I had? Would they capture him?

I was considering these questions and the last mile I had to go to Sunset Boulevard when there was a loud thwack from the back of my car.

I turned around fully and saw that the spring-loaded cover to the rear storage area had been released and had snapped back into its housing like a window shade.

A figure rose from the space. A man. He looked around as if to get his bearings, then must have seen through the rear windows that the siren he had heard was from a rescue ambulance making its way to the crash site.

He then turned and looked directly at me.

“Hello, Jack,” he said. “Where are we going?”

“Who the fuck are you?” I said. “What do you want?”

“I think you know who I am,” he said. “And what I want.”

He started climbing over the rear seats. I dropped the phone and pinned the accelerator. The car lurched forward and I yanked the wheel to the right. I clipped the right corner of the car in front of me as the SUV veered onto the freeway shoulder. The wheels spun on the loose gravel and litter before finding purchase. In the rearview I saw the intruder thrown backward into the space where he had been hiding.

But he quickly reemerged and started climbing over the seats again.

“Slow it down, Jack,” he said. “What’s the hurry?”

I didn’t answer. My mind was racing faster than the car as I tried to think of an escape plan.

The Vine Street exit was just past the accident site. But what did that get me? My choices seemed simple in that adrenalized moment. Fight or flight. Keep moving or stop the car and get out and run.

In the back of my mind I knew one thing. Running away meant the Shrike would escape again.

I kept my foot on the pedal.

With less than a hundred yards before I would clear the traffic backup and get off the shoulder, a beat-up pickup truck filled with lawn equipment suddenly pulled onto the shoulder ahead of me — at a much slower pace.

I yanked the wheel right again and tried to squeeze by without losing speed. My car scraped sharply along a concrete sound barrier that bordered the freeway and then rebounded into the side of the pickup, pushing it into the cars to its left. A full chorus of horns and crashing metal followed, but my car kept moving. I straightened the wheel and checked the mirror. The man behind me had been thrown to the floor of the back seat.

Two seconds later I was past the traffic backup and there were five lanes of open freeway in front of me.

But I was still a half mile from the Sunset exit and knew that I could not hold off the Shrike for that long. The phone was somewhere in the car and Rachel was presumably still listening. I made what I thought might be a last call out to her.

“Rachel!” I yelled. “I—”

An arm came around my neck and choked off my voice. My head was snapped back against the headrest. I reached up with one hand and tried to pull it off my neck, but the Shrike had locked his arm and was tightening the pressure.

“Stop the car,” he said in my ear.

I planted my feet and pushed back into the seat, trying to make space against his forearm. The car picked up speed.

“Stop the car,” he said again.

I realized one thing: I had a seat belt on and he didn’t. I remembered the salesman droning on about the safety and construction of the car. Something about rollover protection. But I had not been interested. I just wanted to sign the papers and drive away, not listen to things that would never matter to me.

Now they did.

I felt the car automatically lowering into its high-speed profile as the digital speedometer clicked past eighty-five. I let go of my attacker’s forearm, put both hands on the wheel and yanked it to the left.

The car jerked wildly to the left and then the forces of physics took over. For a split second it held the road, then the front left wheel came off the surface and the back left followed. I believe the car became airborne by at least a few feet and then flipped side over side before impacting and continuing to rotate, tumbling down the freeway.

Everything seemed to move in slow motion, my body jolting in all directions with each crashing impact. I felt the arm that had been around my neck fall away. I heard the loud tearing of metal and the explosive shattering of glass. Debris flew around in the car and out the now glass-free windows. My laptop hit me in the ribs and at some point I blacked out.

When I came to, I was hanging upside down in my seat. I looked down at the ceiling of the car and saw that I was dripping blood on it. I reached to my face and located the source: a long gash on the top of my head.

I wondered what had happened. Had somebody hit me? Had I hit somebody?

Then I remembered.

The Shrike.

I looked around as best as I could. I didn’t see him. The rear seats of the car had broken loose in the accident and were now tilted down to the ceiling, obstructing my view.

“Shit,” I said.

I could taste blood in my mouth.

I became aware of a sharp pain in my side and remembered my laptop. It had hit me in the ribs.

I put my left hand down on the ceiling to brace myself and used the other to release my seat belt. My arm wasn’t strong enough and I crashed down to the ceiling, my legs still tangled with the steering column. I slowly lowered myself the rest of the way. As I did, I became aware of a tinny voice calling my name.

I looked around and saw my cell phone on the asphalt about four feet outside the front window. The screen was spider-webbed with cracks but I could read the name “Rachel” on it. The call was still active.