Dr. Death by Nick Carter - [Killmaster 100] Read Free Book Online Page A

His driver had a stunned, wild-eyed expression.
    They pulled up a few car lengths behind, and held the distance. I swung off onto New York Boulevard at the same speed. They stayed behind. Other cars came up behind and passed, five, ten, fifteen. The Frenchman made no effort to pass.
    They might be simply trying to follow us to our destination. On the other hand, they might be holding back, waiting for a quiet, dark place to attack us.
    Time was passing. Valuable time.
    I decided to call their hand.
    I went another two miles and took a right turn onto Linden Boulevard, going toward the Naval Hospital. Halfway there, a furniture warehouse, unused at night, took up almost a block. I pulled up in front of it and waited. It was an ideal place for an ambush.
    The Lincoln pulled up fifty feet in back.
    I waited.
    No one got out.
    I waited another moment, and when the Frenchman and his driver still didn't make a move, I gave Michelle her instructions. To her credit, even if she was still trembling, she simply nodded, her eyes sharpening with readiness.
    Then I got out of the BMW and strolled back toward the Lincoln. When I got close enough to see over the remaining headlight's beam, and into the car, I watched the look of shock on the Frenchman's face gradually fade into an expression of wary alertness as I came nearer. His driver, coming down from his trick-driving high, simply looked surprised and stupid.
    I leaned over the hood of the Lincoln and tapped on the windshield, directly in front of the Frenchman's face.
    "Good evening," I said politely.
    The driver glanced uneasily at the Frenchman. The Frenchman continued to look straight ahead, uneasy, wary, saying nothing.
    Michelle should be sliding into the driver's seat now, as my head and body obstructed the view from the Lincoln.
    "That's a fascinating two-way radio aerial you have here," I said, again smiling politely.
    Michelle should now be putting the still-idling BMW into gear, waiting for my next move.
    "But it's getting a little rusty in spots," I continued. "You really should have it replaced."
    And a split-second later Wilhelmina was in my hand and firing. The first bullet ripped the radio aerial off the car and sent it spinning into the air, the second shot out the remaining headlight, and, as Michelle sent the BMW into a screeching U-turn, flicking on her high beams as she bore down on the Lincoln to blind both the Frenchman and the driver, my third and fourth bullets shot out the two tires on the right side of the big sedan.
    It was the next maneuver I was worried about, but Michelle handled it beautifully. Barely yards away from the Lincoln she braked just enough so that my flying leap enabled me to grab through the open window on her side and hang on to the inside of the door. Then she was accelerating again, lights out now, in a swerve around the Lincoln and up over the curb it was parked against, hiding my crouching body at the far side of the BMW until, on the sidewalk, we reached the end of the street. Then, again, a screeching right turn, my body completely blocked from view, and we were tearing up New York Boulevard, my hands clinging to my precarious hold like twin leeches.
    A quarter mile further she slowed to a stop. In one smooth movement, I was in the driver's seat, she in the passenger seat, neither of us saying a word.
    It was another mile before she spoke.
    "That was… too risky," she said. "They might have killed you when you came up to their car. Aside from the danger of your acrobatic leap onto this car."
    "It was a calculated risk," I said. "If they had wanted to attack us, they wouldn't have just sat there when we pulled over to the curb. As for what you call my acrobatics — if I weren't ready to take risks like that I'd be ready for retirement. Which I'm not."
    Michelle simply shook her head. She still looked shaken. I silently spun the wheel and headed toward Manhattan, going by local streets where it would be easy to spot another tail. But I