Chapter 38 - The Ambush in Kinsale
We hadn’t even reached the outskirts of Bristol when the convoy’s lead scout car radioed a distress signal.
"Vehicle approaching at high velocity from the rear! Black Range Rovers, unplated!"
Before the driver could react, a heavy impact jolted our armored SUV from behind, sending the vehicle skidding across the rain-slicked highway. Through the tinted rear glass, I saw three reinforced SUVs closing in on our flanks, attempting to pin us against the concrete meridian.
"Hold on!" our driver shouted, slamming his foot on the accelerator. The engine roared, tires screaming against the asphalt as we fought for control.
"They're not trying to arrest us," Hayes said, his voice terrifyingly calm as he unholstered a compact tactical firearm and racked the slide. "They know the police can't hold us without a formal charge before midnight. They're trying to roll the vehicle to create a massive pileup."
A second black Range Rover slammed into our passenger door with bone-jarring violence. The window glass cracked into a spiderweb pattern, though the reinforced ballistic polycarbonate held firm. Out of the front passenger window of the pursuing vehicle, a masked operative emerged, raising an industrial magnetic breaching tool designed to blow open our door locks.
"Not today," Hayes snarled.
He rolled down his window an inch, leaned out, and fired two precise shots directly into the front tire of the pursuing vehicle. The tire exploded in a cloud of shredded rubber. The Range Rover violently violently fishtailed, spun completely around in the middle of the motorway, and smashed into the second pursuing vehicle in an explosion of metal and shattered glass.
The remaining pursuer accelerated, attempting to cut across our front bumper, but our driver spun the steering wheel, executing a masterclass PIT maneuver that sent the last SUV careening off the shoulder into an embankment of mud.
"Clear!" the driver yelled, his hands white on the wheel as we sped back onto the main artery toward London.
I pulled Alistair upright from the back floorboard where he had sheltered the brass cylinder with his own body. The old man was gasping for breath, his glasses crooked, but he clung to the Sterling charter like a mother protecting her child.
"Are you all right, Alistair?" I asked, checking him for injuries.
"Never felt better in my life, my dear," Alistair gasped, a wild, victorious gleam in his eyes. "That was the most exhilarating legal proceeding I've attended in forty years! What is the time?"
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I glanced at the dashboard clock. It was eight-fifteen in the evening.
"We have three hours and forty-five minutes," I said, looking out at the distant lights of London glowing against the stormy night sky. "Julian Vance is waiting in his high tower. Let's make sure we don't disappoint him."
