Amelia held him tight and let herself be guided, forgetting her own identity for a moment, and wishing that she didn’t have to remember who she was anymore.
His vigour turned into sweetness, until Mike moved his lips away from her. “You’re distracting me and right now this isn’t a good thing at all,” he whispered to her in a low voice. “Do you realise that?”
“Sorry,” she replied in a sigh.
He smiled and gave her a last little kiss on her nose. “Recover your weapon, officer.”
Reluctantly Amelia had to renounce the embrace and bent down to take her gun.
When she straightened herself again, Mike had one hand on the steering wheel and the other on the ignition key. He sighed noisily. “We can’t stay here forever.” His face was concentrating again, but he was still short of breath. He activated the dashboard, and was about to turn the key, but then he stopped. “You’re putting me in a difficult situation.” He was staring at an indefinite point in front of him. “The more I stay with you, the more I can’t help but worry that something will happen to you. And this stops me thinking in a lucid way.”
“So let me help you to think. There are two of us in this situation, so let’s try to solve it together.”
Mike cracked a nervous smile and started the engine.
The off-road vehicle moved off, making its way through low bushes, whose thin branches fell as it advanced. The terrain was full of dips and holes and the car proceeded slowly. There was something wrong with the traction. It struggled at times. At least one tyre had to be flat. It had probably completely deflated during their stop.
“Why don’t we replace it?”
“We should, but we need a level surface and light, and we don’t have the former available, and we must avoid the latter.” He cast a glance at the internal rear-view mirror. “The fact we don’t hear and see them doesn’t necessarily mean they have gone. They could hide in the shadows as well and wait for us to make the first move.”
They went beyond the shelter offered by the vegetation and found themselves in an open space surrounded by trees. Mike made for turning to the left, but then he stopped and pointed the vehicle in the opposite direction. Oh, yeah, the most logical thing would be to return to the beaten track, but perhaps it was exactly there that their pursuers were waiting.
The quite regular surface allowed the vehicle to proceed more smoothly, but it was evident that he was struggling to keep it straight. A slight change in the terrain was enough to make the car swerve unexpectedly. The more they went on, the more he was shaking his head, accompanying his driving with grimaces.
All at once the sound of the motorbike engines emerged from the woods. Amelia turned to one side, then to the other. She tried to look forward and backward, but couldn’t see them. “Where are they?”
“Around here.” He leant forward with his head. “Their headlights are off, too.”
She repeated his movement and tried to narrow her eyes, in an attempt to distinguish something, but she couldn’t really see a thing. She’d already been surprised with the ease with which he could see her in the dark. In addition to being a former spy, did he maybe possess superpowers?
Mike’s lips extended. “Attack is the best defence.”
What?
She didn’t have the time to ask the question because he accelerated. Enraged, the engine responded, giving power to the wheels, and in spite of the imbalance, they made the vehicle rocket forward. Amelia could see most of the various obstacles coming against them. Roots, bent branches, boulders protruding from the ground. They were travelling downhill and that made things easier for the traction, but they weren’t on a path, least of all a gravel road; it was the wet bed of a channel, which just a few hours earlier, during the deluge, must have hosted a little stream and now was crossed by long miniature chasms, in random patterns, where the lighter component of the earth had been brought downstream. The result of advancing in those conditions was perhaps similar to what you feel in a kayak in the rapids of a river. This was pure supposition on Amelia’s part, given that she’d never been in a kayak in her life. But the sensation of being at the mercy of the fury of water was strong.
She was holding tight to the handle over the door and tried with her feet to counterbalance her tendency to fall forward. Why hadn’t she fastened her safety belt again? Stupid. Now she couldn’t even think how to do it. She felt only nausea as she listed in her mind the sequence of necessary actions.
A hard hit from below ran through her spine, taking away any strength she might have had to curse.
“Fuck!” Mike shouted in her place.
And then she saw it. She saw what he’d seen. A motorbike in front of them was travelling along the same steep path. And unbelievably, it was escaping from them. It was alone, and they were bigger. “They separated to find us!” She laughed, because it seemed really funny. They would crush it like it was a bug.
With a snap, Mike reached out into the door storage pocket and pulled out his gun, then returned his hand to the steering wheel, which he had difficulty in holding now. It was hard for him to drive. The vehicle kept swerving to the right.
Trying not to fall, Amelia put her gun in her belt, let the handle go and reached out to him, seizing the steering wheel with both hands.
He lifted his gaze from the path for a split second and nodded at her, then moved his left hand to the right side of the steering wheel and put the other arm out of the window, aligning it as much as possible in the direction they were travelling. There was a gunshot. The motorbike swerved, losing ground. Mike shot again. A little dust cloud formed beside their prey and was then run over by the off-road vehicle. But the motorbike was still moving. “Put a hand on the right.”
Oh God, he wanted to give her full control of the steering wheel so that he could aim. With her heart in her throat and her body shaken by the recoils of the car, Amelia leant completely on Mike, as he took a better position to shoot, sticking his head out of the vehicle. Now she was driving, except that she didn’t control the pedals. It seemed like they were going too fast. Each jerk caused her to shout, while the world fell against her.
Another shot. There was a spark on the motorbike chassis. He’d hit it, but not on a vital point. The more versatile vehicle was gaining ground now, helped by the slope, but a moment later the decline decreased and then inverted abruptly, favouring the car for a little while, as it could still take advantage of its inertia. Mike withdrew inside the compartment, putting a hand on the steering wheel again, and right after, he accelerated. The motorbike grew closer and closer. The impact was unavoidable.
The biker lost his grip on the handlebars and fell backwards, hitting the windscreen.
For a moment Amelia had the impression he was going to break it and end up on her. She shouted. The windscreen was criss-crossed by cracks, but it resisted.
The man extended his arms, in search of a handhold.
Mike braked hard.
The car skidded on the uneven terrain, throwing up splashes of mud, then came to a halt. The biker slipped over the bonnet. Amelia’s body was pushed forward. But her hands were firm on the steering wheel. She hit the dashboard with a hip, then fell on her knees, and a moan escaped her mouth.
Her partner was already opening his door. He left and aimed his weapon.
In spite of the pain, she raised herself up to see through the windscreen. The other man had stood up and, although limping, was escaping.
Another gunshot.
The biker’s knee seemed to explode when the bullet reached it. He fell to the ground, shouting. Mike’s silhouette appeared in front of the windscreen. He was running towards his enemy.
As she saw him going away in the pale glare preceding dawn, Amelia was overcome with anguish. For a split second her mind imagined someone coming out from the shadows and shooting him. Even if the pain in her hip intensified at each breath, she could open her door and leave the car as well.
Mike stopped at a few pace
s from the wounded man, keeping his gun levelled at him.
The other man was holding his leg and shouting non-stop. His hands were oozing blood.
“Take off your helmet,” the courteous voice of the former said.
The biker didn’t seem to hear him.
She walked closer to them, holding her gun with both hands. She couldn’t take her eyes off that crushed knee. In spite of the low light she could see it all too well and couldn’t help imagining the suffering of the man.
“Remove his helmet.”
She needed a few seconds to realise that Mike was speaking to her. She looked at him, imploring. Did she really have to approach that wounded beast? A gesture of his head confirmed it to her. She took a deep breath and, still aiming her weapon in front of her, she walked around the biker, keeping at a safe distance. She put herself behind him. She wasn’t really scared of him. It was more that she was dreading that knee. She’d seen more than one person die in the lodge, but it had been a clean job. All that blood, together with his cries, made her stomach clench.
“Come on,” Mike urged her, nipping her retching in the bud.
She put her weapon in her sweater pocket. She needed both hands to carry out the order. What the heck, she just had to take off a helmet. It couldn’t be difficult. She released a nervous snort and decided to move closer. The biker didn’t seem to notice her, as she unfastened it. In that very moment she could see his leg closely, where a gush of blood was coming out at regular intervals. She was caught by a shudder and turned her gaze away. She grabbed the helmet and by leveraging on her feet she could remove it. Then she backed off a few paces. Enough to not see the wound, because it was now hidden from her sight by the man’s back.
“Hm.” Mike had given a groan of dissatisfaction. “Is Jeff still alive?”
“Go to hell!” the other yelled at him.
“Lead the way.”
Mike pulled the trigger. A gunshot echoed in the country, as the biker’s head bent backward, then his corpse collapsed.
Amelia’s body winced at that sound, but at the same time she was relieved that the agony had ended. She raised her eyes from the dead man and turned them to Mike, who was looking back at her. He’d lowered his weapon. She caught worry in his expression. It wasn’t certainly on account of the man he’d just killed.
A sound of distant motorbikes drew his attention. He looked back. Then resumed gazing at her. “Let’s go.” He gestured to her with his free hand.
Amelia nodded. She glanced at the helmet she was still holding, then threw it away and started running from the horror. She overtook Mike, keeping her head low, and hurried inside the vehicle. She slammed the door. She fastened her safety belt with an automatic gesture, then held her arms tight to her body, leaning forward a bit and staring at her own knees.
She heard him entering the car and closing the door. “Are you all right?”
She waved a hand. A part of her wanted him to keep away; even his talking to her seemed too much. “I’ll be better in a minute.” After all these events, she would become insensitive to anything. Or she would spend the rest of her life in therapy. She didn’t know which of the two options she preferred.
She could feel his gaze. She was expecting him to start the engine up and drive on. She didn’t fancy any further confrontation. But he didn’t do that.
“Now I know what you meant, when you said that you can’t think in a lucid way because you are worried about me.” Words helped her to calm down. “You weren’t referring just to my physical safety.”
His silence was more eloquent than any reply. Yet the fact that she could glimpse a soul in that man, under his shell of rage, was comforting her. She was still clinging to the details, because she didn’t want to accept that she had ended up in that situation by chance, that there wasn’t a bigger plan behind it, an undeniable opportunity. She would rather stay in that position, because looking at him now would be worse.
At last Mike started the engine.
“We can’t just go away, can we?” It was a rhetorical question. She knew full well that they had to eliminate the remaining two.
“I’m sorry.” He had resumed his resolute tone. The war machine had taken over again.
The two motorbikes had to be close. Amelia tried to check around, although she avoided turning to him. She couldn’t see any light, but it wasn’t necessary by now, even if the sunrise was still a long time ahead.
“I need you to be all right,” he continued. It was almost an order. “Understood?”
Meanwhile the car had resumed moving at a walking pace. It was going up the incline. On the higher zone the woods thinned out, allowing them to see better, and to be seen. But now there was no reason to hide. It was almost an equal game. And she had to be part of it, somehow. She had to shake off that sensation. Her life depended on it.
She forced herself to straighten her back, extending her arms again. “Yes, understood.” And she looked at him, trying to keep control of herself.
Mike nodded. He seemed satisfied.
Once they reached the top, he slowed the vehicle down, stopping after a while. An annoyed snort interrupted his silence. Amelia looked at him again. Instead of checking whether there was somebody around, his eyes were turned to the dashboard.
“What’s going on?” She couldn’t hear the motorbikes anymore, but she had the clear sensation that they were watching them.
Mike was about to say something, when the wing mirror on his side exploded in a thousand pieces. “Fuck!” He activated the closing of the window winder and accelerated. “A precision rifle!”
It was a good thing that the shooter hadn’t been very precise.
They entered the trees again, going downhill. The dull sound of another shot scored on the bodywork, penetrating the car. It was gaining speed, even if Mike braked from time to time, making it jerk. And he kept shaking his head. He downshifted. The engine growled, but didn’t slow down its run.
“Would you tell me what’s wrong?” Amelia had decided to try funnelling her horror into rage. And it worked.
“The brakes don’t respond as they should. Perhaps the calliper on the flat tyre is damaged or there’s something wrong in the braking system.”
All of a sudden the light of a pale sun on the horizon reached Amelia’s eyes, and she placed a hand before her face. The plants were giving way to a clearing. How was it possible that you could already see the sun? She could barely phrase that question in her mind as she realised the new situation. They were descending a decline without obstacles. The horizon had become very far, because the ground ended abruptly. There was a huge drop over there. A precipice.
Mike was pressing hard on the brake, getting a minimum effect in return. Then he reached out to her and unfastened her safety belt. “Take the rucksack!”
There was no time to ask questions or to retort, and so Amelia turned to the backseat and grabbed it.
“Get out of the car!”
“What?” The space in front of them was about to end, but they were travelling too fast for her to simply get out.
Holding the steering wheel with a hand, he leant forward in front of her and opened her door. “Go!” he shouted, pushing her. Then he pulled on the handbrake. The rear wheels blocked. That wasn’t enough to stop the vehicle, which swerved and started running sideways, but slowed it a bit. “I said go!”
She felt herself pushed harder and was forced to go along with the movement, holding the rucksack tight to her chest. It was like flying, but when she touched the ground, pain seized her. She tried to curl up, as the world rolled before her. She felt her head hitting something hard. While she kept moving without control, she caught a glimpse of the car that was reaching the edge of the gully. For a moment it looked like it could continue its travel as if the ground was still beneath it.
Then Amelia didn’t see anything anymore.
7
She had insisted on taking her child with her that morning. For weeks Gavin had been t
rying to convince her to leave him at home; he kept repeating that she would have to detach from him sooner or later, that her attitude was becoming almost morbid.
Amelia had harboured a grudge, had interpreted those words as an attempt to call her crazy. Was he maybe insinuating that she was on the edge of a breakdown? There was nothing abnormal in her desire to take care of her son as much as possible. She could. She was an associate in a firm equipped with a nursery, so she could leave him there while she worked, and as soon as the occasion arose, she could show him that Mummy was there, that she wasn’t one of those super-busy mothers who forgot about the existence of their children, leaving them with the first nanny that came by. Like her colleagues, like her mother, with the difference that the latter hadn’t been a working woman. She was just busy and any commitment seemed more important than her daughter. No, she wouldn’t be like them.
“I don’t have a morbid attachment,” she had inveighed against him. “I don’t spend all the time with him. I’m certainly not with him, when I’m working.”
“But he is still to stay in the same place as you are!” Her husband had always showed patience with her, but at that point it seemed he couldn’t help it anymore. “You can leave him here. I’m working from home the whole morning and I’ll call Claire in the afternoon. He can stay with her until you’re back.”
“You have to get on with your work, you can’t keep an eye on him.” She had been holding him and then Joseph had started crying. “Here now, do you see what you’ve done?”
“Me? You are frightening him with your shouting.”
She hadn’t wanted to hear more and had left, slamming the door.
Only now that a paramedic was almost tearing her child from her arms, Amelia understood. She understood that Gavin had been right to worry about her. She had become too apprehensive a mother, frightened by everything, spending every single moment thinking about her son. She wasn’t doing well at work either. Many times her boss had suggested that she had a holiday, but she’d insisted that she didn’t need it, and so he’d kept her away from the courtrooms. He’d been right, too. She was not doing well at all. And things with Gavin had been worsening a little more every day. Their sex life had disappeared. She was always too tired, worried, stressed. Joseph was the centre of her existence; he didn’t leave room for anything else.
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