Alez Kava - One False Move

"Leave the car running." Jared lifted his kerchief over his nose and mouth.

Melanie looked from one to the other. Didn't they realize how ridiculous they looked? Then suddenly she decided she wanted this over with, the sooner, the better. Of course, she'd leave the car running, and she reached to turn off the A/C.

"We don't need the engine overheating at a time like this."

"Good idea, Mel," Jared muttered through the cloth, and his rare compliment actually seemed to soothe her a little.

Jared hesitated, checking out the parking lot, craning his neck and looking in all directions. They were out of sight from the traffic and no one had gone in or out of the bank since they had parked. But how much time had that been? Melanie tried to remember.

"Let's go," Jared said, and Charlie didn't hesitate at all.

She watched them in the rearview mirror cross the short distance to the front entrance. Her fingers drummed the steering wheel. Her right foot tapped uncontrollably. Maybe Charlie had gotten that habit from her. She looked away from the bank's entrance for five or ten seconds. Glancing into the rearview mirror, she noticed that her lower lip was red and bruised from biting down on it. She tucked a strand of hair back up into the cap. And that's when she heard the first blast, muffled but loud enough to make her jump. She sat forward, searching the surroundings, hoping to see a car backfiring. The next shots came fast, one after another, three, maybe four. She hadn't counted. She couldn't breathe, how could she count? Before she could react, she saw Charlie and Jared racing out of the bank's entrance, their figures filling the rearview mirror. She sat paralyzed, unable or unwilling to turn around and watch them out the back window. Instead, she stared at the mirror, pieces of them rushing closer.

Jared jumped in beside her. "Go. Go now. Get the fuck going."

"What happened? I heard shots."

"Just get the fuck out of here."

Charlie flew into the back seat as she shifted into drive and floored it, not even noticing the back door was still open until she saw in her side mirror that Charlie was hanging out, struggling to close it. She automatically slowed the car.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Jared slid across the front seat and slammed his foot on top of hers, pushing the accelerator and sending the car fishtailing around the access road. She swung wide to miss a semitrailer as she ran a stop sign, garnering a blast of his horn. The noise startled her and she jerked the car to the other side, throwing Jared up against his door. It took his foot off the accelerator.

"Up ahead." Jared pointed. "Back behind Sapp Brothers. I left a car for us, so we can dump this one." But before Melanie could get to the intersection, she heard a siren. And before she saw the black and white in the rearview mirror, she knew it was coming for them.

4:33 p.m.

Melanie wished she could wake herself up. This had to be a fucking nightmare. Things couldn't possibly have gone so wrong, so fast. Even her vision seemed blurred, the buildings and landscape a swirl of concrete and green speeding past the car windows. Only the buildings and landscape weren't moving. She was. Fast. She was overwhelmed by a sensation of slipping and sliding as if out of control on black ice.

Jared's voice came to her in a muffled monotone. She could make out one or two words: "faster," "turn." It was difficult to hear over the whining sound that filled her head. Difficult, and yet she could hear Charlie retching in the back seat. He must still be on the floor. She couldn't see him in the rearview mirror. All she could see were red and blue flashing lights and the cruiser's grill so close that it looked like shark's teeth ready to bite and swallow them whole.

But through all the chaos she could still hear Charlie, her poor Charlie, retching and gagging. The sour smell of vomit filled the car, and Melanie felt her own stomach lurch. It wasn't the smell of vomit that nauseated her. It was something else…warm and rancid yet almost sweet.

"Get back on 50," Jared yelled at her. "Get the hell out of this maze."

She took a sharp left only to realize it was another parking-lot entrance and not an intersection.

"Fuck," Jared screamed at her. "There. Turn there!"

Where he was pointing looked like another parking lot. She missed the turn, jumped the curb and heard the sickening crunch of metal as the bottom of the car scraped the concrete. But the sound wasn't as awful as Jared's continued commands. He kept yelling at her to get back on Highway 50. She had no idea which way that was. She had lost all sense of direction. All she could see were buildings and parking lots and access roads. She twisted the steering wheel until the screech of tires told her to stop. The force spun the car around, almost a U-turn. And there on the other side of the cruiser barreling down on her was the traffic of Highway 50.

"Jesus Christ," Jared muttered, but he no longer dared to reach for the steering wheel or attempt to step on the accelerator.

Melanie held her breath. She wanted to close her eyes. She wanted to become invisible. She wanted to get the fuck out of here and go home. The black and white began to skid, avoiding hitting her by mere inches, the cars so close she could see the officer's face under the wide-brimmed hat. He was young. That much she could tell. And she thought he looked more surprised than angry. She heard another crunch of metal and squeezed her eyes shut, expecting to feel some impact, some repercussions. When she opened them again, Jared was twisted in his seat, staring out the back window.

"You did it, Mel. You fucking did it."

She didn't turn around. She didn't look in the mirror. She didn't want to know what she had done. Instead, she stepped on the accelerator and headed for the intersection. At the stoplight she hesitated.

"South," Jared told her. "Turn right. We want to leave Douglas County, remember?"

She glanced at him and only then did she notice the front of his coverall was wet and stained. That was when she recognized the smell that filled the car. It wasn't just Charlie's vomit. It was blood.

4:46 p.m.

Platte River State Park

"So you think I have no life?" Andrew revived the subject as he shoved aside his plate and drained his second bottle of Bud Light. He rarely finished one.

Tommy sliced another chunk off his filet and stuffed it in his mouth. He had left his cell phone out on the table after losing the connection and trying to call back whoever had called him. He had pretended the phone call had been no big deal. Yeah, right. That's why he kept glancing at it as if expecting it to ring. "I'm just calling it like I see it, Murderman."

"Murderman." Andrew still smiled at the nickname Tommy and the other Omaha detectives had given him. Actually he liked it enough to use it for his e-mail address. That they had even bothered to give him a nickname had been a sign-an odd one, but still a good one-that the group approved of him.

He sat back in the wrought-iron chair, part of the bistro set on the screened-in porch. They had chosen to eat out here despite the stifling humidity. Andrew glanced at the sky. If only it would just rain and get it over with, but the thunderheads kept their distance, preferring just to threaten. The wind, however, had picked up, and the breeze was refreshing. It brought with it the scent of pine needles and the lulling sound of cicadas.

Andrew watched his friend devour a forkful of deli potato salad, following it with a bite of the garlic bread he had grilled alongside the filets. One thing Andrew had learned through his friendship with Tommy was that cops could eat no matter what the circumstances or surroundings were. He had watched Tommy chow down on a blood-rare porterhouse steak while showing Andrew Polaroids of a dismembered corpse.