The following is an excerpt from the upcoming novel The Night Detective, coming June 2022.
THE WOMAN IN THE BLUE CAR
Eleven minutes past midnight.
This job never got easy. Agent 21 was bleeding profusely from his right shoulder as he tried not to crash into the oncoming traffic and evading the silver coupe crashing into the back him, making a mess of the car that he jacked from some poor sap few minutes earlier. He wasn't a bad guy. He wasn't particularly good either. Agent 21 did what was required to complete the assignment. He always focused on the task at hand. Now wasn't the time to reflect on whether he needed to repent. Now, he needed to get to the portal to get back home. The last time he missed the portal, he spent an eternity in hell. But that silver pest behind him wasn't making it easy.
The agent could make out two figures, a driver and a passenger who was loading his semi automatic and leaning out of the window and taking a good aim at his head. The agent saw the muzzle fire from the machine gun through the rearview mirror before feeling hot bullets hiss pass his left ear and shattering the windscreen. Now, he was both deaf and blind and barely missed an oncoming van.
The agent was fast running out of time, less than three minutes in fact. The silver coupe was hell bent of stopping him from making it to his destination. The bullets kept on coming, but somehow, he wasn't dead and somehow, his car kept on going at hundred kilometers an hour. And for that he was thankful. The agent never took anything for granted. He vowed to minimize making enemies if he made it out of this alive and that was a big if.
The silver coupe smashed into the agents mangled wreck and was attempting to push him into the oncoming traffic at high speeds. The agent braced himself for imminent death and closed his eyes. Everything became quiet. There was no escaping this. He had a good run.
Suddenly, without a warning, a high performance car came out of nowhere smashing into both cars and making the silver coupe topple and roll and finally slamming into a parked car. The agent also rolled and slid upside down into a wall. The agent came in and out of consciousness. He saw everything happen in slow motion as he drifted off into sweet death.
The blue car came to a screeching stop and a woman exited. She cocked a machine gun as she walked towards the silver coupe. Without hesitation, she unloaded on the occupants and threw in a grenade in the cabin just for good measure. Needless to say the silver car won't be causing the agent any more trouble.
The woman then made her way towards the agents toppled over mess. She was carrying a device that he didn't recognize. It resembled a camera with three retro lenses. She quickly looked at it and adjusted a dial and pointed it squarely at the agent. At this point, nothing surprised him. He looked at this cracked watch. He was out of time. He figured that she must be here to help him, otherwise she would have shot him dead already. The woman stopped and stopped for a second before firing the device.
A great big flash popped, blinding the agent. At that moment, he knew exactly what that gizmo was. He was going home.
TO BE CONTINUED...