Chapter 254
Two Ducati motorcycles were secured inside the van.
“Aron and Davy, with me,” Kegan ordered. “Cailin, you and Elia ride with Ashley.”
Ashley was already in full leathers, straddling the second bike, helmet buckled. She gave Cailin a sharp nod.
“I cannot ride on the back of a bike dressed like this,” Cailin said, gesturing at her form-fitting dress.
“Improvise,” Kegan said, tossing her a helmet and a tactical harness.
Cailin muttered under her breath, grabbed the hem of the designer dress with both hands, and tore the fabric at the seam up to her thighs. She fastened the harness across her chest, then strapped Elia against her, pulling every strap brutally tight before double-checking each buckle.
“Hold on tight, baby,” she whispered.
“I’m scared,” Elia whimpered.
“Be brave. Like Batman.”
Cailin climbed onto the back of the Ducati and locked her arms around Ashley’s waist. Kegan took the boys on his — one in front, one behind.
They roared up onto the sidewalk, weaving between stalled cars and startled pedestrians.
Sirens wailed in the distance, growing closer.
“He knows we’re moving,” Cailin shouted over the wind.
They hit the West Side Highway. It was a parking lot. Ashley drove down the center line, the mirrors clipping the sides of motionless cars on both sides.
The George Washington Bridge rose ahead of them.
Blue and red lights strobed at the entrance. A police barricade stretched across the road.
“He tipped them off!” Cailin yelled.
“We can’t stop!” Kegan called back.
“Follow me!”
Kegan didn’t aim for the toll booths. He aimed for the maintenance ramp on the far side — a steep gravel incline. He hit it at sixty miles an hour. The bike launched into the air and landed hard on the pedestrian walkway of the bridge. Ashley followed without hesitation.
Cailin felt the bike leave the ground. For one suspended second, she was weightless. Then — slam. The suspension groaned beneath them. Elia screamed.
They were on the walkway.
Far below, a black helicopter descended through the dark, its searchlight sweeping across the gridlocked traffic. It touched down on a closed-off section of the bridge approach. Hilliard jumped out before the skids fully settled. He grabbed a megaphone from a nearby officer.
“CAILIN!” His voice boomed out over the water. “STOP! IT’S TOO DANGEROUS!”
He wasn’t ordering her to surrender. He sounded terrified for her.
Cailin didn’t look down. She pressed her face against Ashley’s back and held on with everything she had as they accelerated across the bridge, the lights of New Jersey swelling ahead of them.
Toward freedom.
Hilliard threw the megaphone to the ground.
“Get the helicopter back in the air,” he told Gavin. “Meet them at the airport.”
The wind whipped Cailin’s hair into a frenzy as they tore down the New Jersey Turnpike. The airport was five miles ahead.
Without warning, headlights blazed from the right.
A massive semi-truck lurched out of its lane, cutting directly across their path. It wasn’t an accident. The truck was aiming for them.