James Patterson: Run For Your Life

Meyer was quiet for several seconds. “I hate to admit it, Bennett, but you make a good point,” he finally said. “That’s another favor you’ve done me, so I’ll do you another one back. We’ll leave her here. It’s just you and me now.”

Outside the car, my sweat felt even colder, maybe because of the fresh air or maybe because I seemed to be running a fever now. On top of that, my stomach told me it wasn’t completely done heaving up its inventory.

The roar of another plane screaming skyward drowned out everything else for a few seconds. As its echo faded, my heart was cut by the sound of Chrissy, crying in the backseat.

The Port Authority cop stepped out of his booth and came walking toward us. His hand was on the butt of his pistol and his face looked wary.

“Just got off the phone with the sarge,” he said. “He’s on his way over here.”

I was opening my mouth, trying to come up with another quick lie, when Meyer shot him. No indication, no warning – just boom. The bullet hit the officer in the cheek, blood sprayed out the back of his head, and he dropped like a soup tureen that had been pushed off a table.

“No shit,” Meyer said, crouching to take handcuffs off the downed cop’s belt. “What did the sarge say?”

“You son of a bitch,” I yelled, and I leaped on Meyer, swinging. It was an incredibly stupid thing to do, but I didn’t think, I just reacted. I hit him as hard as I ever hit anyone in my entire life, a right hook to his ear that knocked him off his feet and sent him rolling over the cop’s body onto the asphalt.

But goddammit, he got up with his gun clenched in his hand. I was shaking as he placed the still warm barrel in the soft spot under my chin, but he seemed amused instead of angry. He was actually grinning.

“Not bad, copper, but that’s the only one you get,” he said. “You gonna behave now? Or do I have to go back and see how your little girl’s doing?”

“Sorry,” I muttered, lowering my eyes.

“No, you’re not,” he said, then gave me a vicious kick in the rear, aiming me toward the private airport’s main building. “But you will be.”

The reception area inside looked like the lobby of a four-star hotel. Walls paneled with gleaming wood, leather furniture, marble coffee tables fanned with Fortune, BusinessWeek, Vanity Fair. The tarmac was visible beyond the windows.

A pretty, obviously pregnant receptionist was talking into a phone, but when she saw us she froze in place, gaping. The phone dropped from her hand, clattering on her desktop.

“Sorry to barge in unannounced,” Meyer said airily, pointing the gun at her swollen belly. “We’re just going to head out to the tarmac, okay? Don’t bother us, and we won’t bother you.”

There was an empty executive waiting room through a door on the left. More leather chairs and a hundred-inch wide-screen TV blaring ESPN’s top ten.

I jumped about five feet in the air as Meyer suddenly swung his gun around and blew a hole through the screen.

“Why should Elvis have all the fun?” he yelled, shoving me into another corridor. “-Fifty-seven high-def channels now, and there’s still nothing on.”

He kicked open a door marked PILOTS’ LOUNGE. We passed workout equipment, showers, a small kitchen.

Then the cold hit us again as we went through another door into a brightly lit hangar. Wind whipped through the building, across a steel walkway and stairs. There were tool carts, a portable crane, a mobile scaffold, but no people, thank God. Was he looking for a plane? There were none of those, either. Thank God again.

“Move it, Bennett,” he said, yanking me out the huge double doors toward the string of blazing runway lights.

“We’re going out there?” I said. “Looks kind of dangerous.”

Meyer sneered. “Come on, cop, show some balls.”

Striding toward the runway, we saw a plane approaching slowly down the taxiway from one of the other private hangars – a small orange-and-white Cessna, with a loudly buzzing propeller engine on each wing.

“Give me your badge, quick,” Meyer ordered me. “And stay here. You move one step, your daughter’s dead.”

He tore the badge out of my hand and jogged toward the runway, shoving his gun into his belt. Standing in front of the plane, he held up the badge and waved his other hand frantically, like an enraged traffic cop. I could see the pilot behind the windshield, a young man with shaggy blond hair. He looked baffled, but he stopped the plane, and Meyer came around the wing.

A few seconds later, the pilot opened the door and Meyer stepped up into the plane. I couldn’t hear what they said over the noise of the propellers, but I saw Meyer snake something out of his pocket and flick his wrist. A telescoping steel baton shot from his hand like a huge switchblade knife. He must have taken it off the dead Port Authority cop along with the handcuffs.

He blasted the kid across the side of his head twice, with a force I could almost feel. Then he reached in, unclipped the pilot’s seat belt, and dumped him, unconscious, out onto the tarmac, with blood streaking his blond head.

“He says we can borrow his plane, Bennett!” he yelled at me. “How’s that for luck? Get your ass over here.”

I stood in the icy wake of the roaring propeller blades, wondering if there was any chance I could run back to the car and make a getaway with Chrissy. But Meyer had his pistol in his hand again. I saw the muzzle flash and felt the snap of a round whip past my left ear. Before I could blink, another round ricocheted off the tarmac between my legs.

“Come on, Mikey, I want some company. Pretty please?”

I sucked in my breath and headed toward the plane.

The inside of the Cessna was as tight as a coffin. And less comfortable, I thought, trying to squeeze my long legs underneath the sharp console on the front passenger side. It didn’t help that Meyer cuffed my wrists before strapping me tightly into my seat with a lap belt and shoulder harness.

I stared at the bewildering array of complicated-looking gauges and buttons on the huge dashboard. But Meyer’s fingers moved across them with assurance. The propellers seemed to scream more loudly as he pushed forward one of six floor-mounted levers. Then he brought the one next to it up as well, and we started slowly moving.

We were making the turn onto the runway when we saw the fire truck – humongous, bright yellow, lights and siren blazing as it barreled down the middle of the runway to block our path. I recognized it as the Port Authority’s Aircraft Rescue and Firefighting Unit. What was their nickname again? Something and Hoses?

A blistering spray of automatic rifle fire suddenly bloomed from one of the truck’s side windows, and the tarmac in front of us exploded with puffs from the warning shots.

Holy crap! Guns and Hoses, that was it. Those guys were a crazy hybrid of firemen and cops who dealt with both plane crashes and hijackings.

Aim for the pilot! I mentally messaged them, scrunching down in my seat as far as I could.

Although at this point, I was willing to get shot if it meant finally stopping Meyer.

He did something with the foot pedals, and we made a quick U-turn back onto the taxiway. Then he jammed the throttle level up as far as it would go, and we were suddenly rocketing down the lane, dangerously close to the row of hangars.

My breath stopped when I saw the deicing truck that was parked squarely in our way. There was no chance we could miss it. At that speed, trying to turn the plane would have sent it into a violent, out-of-control spin.

Silently I said my last prayer as we raced forward to ram it broadside.