“Like track us down and put a bullet in our heads?”
“Are you volunteering?”
A black truck swung out behind them as they crossed Harris Street. Lila whipped her head around as another street brought another truck. The second nearly sideswiped them in its haste to join in the chase, and a few people on the sidewalks jumped back, flattening themselves against the buildings. One brave soul didn’t flee. Instead he cheered, hooted, and laughed. When Lila looked in the rearview mirror after they passed, he’d begun to gesture lewdly at the Wilson cruisers with his brown paper bag.
The trucks that joined them were the same make, model, and color as theirs. Neither had license plates. Tristan flicked a switch near the radio. Lila heard a tiny motor flip on in the bed of the truck.
“You flipped the plate?” she asked. “Your black truck fetish makes so much more sense now.”
“It’s about time. Duck.”
“What?”
“Duck!”
Dixon grabbed her head and shoved it into his lap, then huddled over her. Their heads disappeared below the seats.
Lila found herself in a very interesting position.
“This only works if they get confused,” Tristan explained, retrieving a baseball cap from the dash and shoving it over his head.
The drivers of the trucks, all wearing the same cap, played hopscotch down the street, swerving into each other’s lanes and scrambling their positions. After a couple of streets, one of the trucks broke off to the left as Tristan turned right. The last truck continued straight.
The militia struggled. The drivers were too slow to realize what had happened and sort out who should go where. Two cruisers went straight.
Only one turned right after them, tires squealing, back fishtailing before righting itself, catching, and trudging on.
Tristan floored it. “Two down, one to go,” he said, jerking the wheel. The truck flew down an alley.
The cruiser followed.
A dull plink sounded against the tailgate.
“They’re shooting bullets now?”
“They wouldn’t dare. It was just a GPS tag.” Lila reached inside her front pocket and switched on her jammer, hoping it could scramble the device. “I turned on my jammer, but I—”
Tristan spun the truck into an alley, nearly clipping a fire hydrant. The cruiser following them wasn’t so lucky. It raked against the hydrant and clipped the wall of a lowborn shop.
The frame dented as it struck. The engine stalled.
Tristan punched the gas and flew into the next intersection. “Dixon, did you get Toxic’s laptop?”
He gave a thumbs-up.
“Good. We’re coming up on the garage. When we stop, take the laptops and head to the bikes. I’ll take Lila and the others back to the shop.”
Tristan slowed down in front of a four-story parking garage. He braked, hopped out, and raced to the back of his truck, squinting at the tailgate while Dixon ran for the bikes.
Lila cursed and jumped out as Tristan knocked the GPS off the truck.
“You don’t just leave them. Make them work for you,” she said, kicking the tracker into the sewer, hoping it would carry the chip away in a stream of sludge.
Tristan skirted the truck and yanked open the driver’s-side door. “Get back in, hurry!”
“It’s better if Toxic and I aren’t found together. She’s a hacker. It wouldn’t be a stretch for someone to put two and two together if we’re both caught.”
Tristan stopped and spun around. “Get in the truck, you stupid woman. What are you going to do? Run away on foot?”