Shadows of Sherwood (29 page)

Scarlet perked up, though her eyes remained skeptical. “What way out?”

Robyn hesitated. If she told Scarlet the plan, what was to stop her from getting in her own truck and just following Robyn's lead?

“You'll have to follow me, and trust me,” Robyn said. “Just like I have to trust that you'll actually share what you know with me once we're away.”

Scarlet nodded. Robyn reached for the doorknob. The coast seemed clear, as if the chaotic search had moved to the other side of the compound. But no sooner had Robyn stepped onto the gravel than a small figure went running full speed past her.

“Laurel,” Robyn blurted out, unable to stop herself. “What are you doing?”

“Run!” Laurel cried, her small eyes bugged wide. “They're coming!”

 

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

Pedal to the Metal

“Follow me.” Robyn led the way straight across the lot back toward the truck. There was no point in sneaking—the guards were onto them now. From various points around the lot they shouted to one another, clearly racing around searching for the intruder. Laurel or Key must have been spotted, or one of them tripped some kind of alarm.

Robyn opened the driver's door. “Get in.”

Scarlet and Laurel clambered in quickly and scooted along the bench.

“Get down and hold on,” Robyn suggested, pushing Laurel's shoulder. The other girls hunkered down in the cavity beneath the dash, curling their fingers into tears in the cloth-covered seat.

Robyn grasped the ignition wires and took a deep breath. She had learned that staying ahead of Crown's military police force required a perfect balance of stealth and brazenness. The stealthy part was over. Time to be brazen.

“Where's Key?” Robyn asked, pausing.

“You don't have the key?” Scarlet said. “We have to go. Now!” But Robyn just looked at Laurel.

“I don't know,” she answered. “He should be waiting at the gate.” But their careful plan was foiled. With intruders on the compound, surely there was no way Key could get the gate open for them without giving himself away.

Robyn eased herself forward on the seat. Perched on the front edge, with both legs stretched out, she could reach the clutch and accelerator comfortably. She wouldn't be needing the brakes.

Robyn drew another deep breath. Three. Two. One. She tapped the wires together. The truck rumbled beneath her, vibrating to life with a noise that meant they were no longer silent intruders. The headlights snapped on, cutting a white swath across the gravel, illuminating the fence. Robyn clutched and shifted into drive. The truck lurched forward. It was not her first time driving, but the truck was huge. It felt like a beast with a life of its own beneath her.

The guards began to shout. They didn't sound too near, but Robyn was sure they would be in a minute. She aimed to be long gone.

She accelerated, steering the truck out of its row and onto a long open stretch of gravel. She maneuvered the giant steering wheel until the truck lined up facing the distant exit gates. The gates stood high and tall, topped with barbed wire, connected by chains and padlocks. Robyn took a deep breath. There could be no hesitation. Out the passenger-side
window, Robyn saw two guards sprinting toward her. The popping sound of long guns rang out.

“We've definitely worn out our welcome,” she murmured.

Robyn slammed the pedal to the metal. The truck lumbered forward, gaining speed with every rotation of the enormous tires. Not the greatest pickup, but understandable, considering it was weighed down with a full load.

“Come on,” she shouted. “I need more speed.”

She got it. The truck churned up gravel, heading straight for the gates. They showed no sign of opening. What had happened to Key? He was supposed to be near the gate. She had thought he'd be in sight by now. So she could see he was okay.

Robyn steered the truck at the gates anyway. No wavering. No apologies. Beside the gate, the door to a small guardhouse opened. A tall MP darted into her path and waved his hands overhead.

“You better move, guy,” Robyn called, though there was no way he could hear. Her heart raced. She didn't want to hurt anyone. Her fist wrapped up in the dangling chain, sounding the truck's horn.
Beep. Beeeeeeep. Beeeeeeeep.
Her foot on the pedal didn't let up.
Beep. Beeeeeeep. Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

Oh no.

The truck was a matter of feet from the fence before the guard dove out of the way.

At the moment of impact, perhaps unwisely, Robyn closed her eyes. The entire truck shook. The metal on metal contact gave a sickening crunch. The truck slowed. Scarlet shrieked. Robyn opened her eyes, fearful that she had failed. But the
fence snapped and twisted, and in seconds, Robyn's stolen truck was whipping down the paved thoroughfare.

She hated leaving Key behind, but that was the plan. After opening the gate, he was supposed to drive the bike back to Sherwood. With his MP uniform disguise, he had a better shot at getting out on foot than any of the rest of them. They couldn't afford to wait.

Robyn glanced in the rearview mirror. The gate guard stood among the fence wreckage, leaning against the twisted metal poles. The other two were still running along the road after her, but they were losing speed and breathing heavily.

“Winded already?” she scolded, as if they could hear. “That's what you get for smoking, boys.”

Laurel giggled.

“By the moon,” Scarlet groaned, clambering out of the foot well and strapping herself into the passenger seat. “You sound like an after-school special.”

At that, Laurel laughed even louder.

“Look at them. They can't run worth a lick,” Robyn said. Not that she was complaining.

Scarlet said something in response, just as sirens began to wail in the distance, drowning out whatever little quip she might have offered. Robyn stamped on the accelerator, hoping against hope that they would make it to Sherwood alive.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

Who Needs a Driver's License?

Ahead, the road split into a Y with a narrow left option and a wider one on the right. The left-hand road appeared to head straight into the woods. It would probably dump out in Castle District. So Robyn took the right-hand turn. The road ran close to the edge of the woods. Nothing but a three-foot concrete edging wall separated the boulevard from the tree line.

Robyn was sorely tempted to pull the truck over and make a run for it among the trees, but they had to get back to Sherwood or they'd be walking for hours. And there was no way Robyn was going to lead her pursuers to the edge of the woods. The last thing she needed was to clue them into where she might be hiding.

“Where are you taking us?” Scarlet asked, her voice rising in alarm. “I want to go to Sherwood.”

“We are.” These might have been unfamiliar roads, but as long as she kept driving in the correct general direction . . . and Robyn had a pretty keen sense of direction.

“Not this way,” Scarlet cried. “This is the skyway. It goes straight to Notting District!”

Robyn would have shrugged if she hadn't needed all her upper body strength to keep control of the massive wheel. “So, I guess we'll go to Notting and double back.”

“Bad idea,” Scarlett shouted. “Get off this road. Get off it now!”

The urgency in her voice left Robyn with little desire to argue. She yanked the wheel hard right, skidding through a gravel access driveway labeled Emergency Vehicles Only. It sure felt like an emergency, and the appropriate vehicles would surely be coming up fast and furious, any second. The truck's real wheel missed the driveway altogether. It bounced over the curb and down onto the frontage road with a tire-squealing skid.

“Whee!”
Laurel cried, bouncing around on the seat. The little girl seemed to be enjoying the ride. Robyn could not say the same. The frontage road was pitch-black and narrow.

“Why aren't there road signs?” Robyn cried, peering into the dark.

Scarlet clung to her seat-belt strap. Through gritted teeth, she muttered, “There ARE.”

But Robyn felt helpless to do much but watch the road and maneuver the wheel. The truck steamed down the frontage road at a breakneck pace. To her left, the concrete median grew taller and taller, until it stopped being a wall and became massive concrete pilings holding the
skyway aloft. The pillars continued as far as she could see, eventually obscured behind the tall buildings that rose alongside.

“The skyway is thirty miles, end to end,” Scarlet explained. “If they're smart, they'll have a barricade waiting at the other end.” She reached suddenly for Robyn's backpack, resting in the foot well. The zipper had come open and a wire from the Barclay box poked out.

Scarlet nudged the gap wider and pulled the box free. “By the moon,” she murmured. “Where did you get this? Does it still work?”

“I don't know,” Robyn answered. Her voice shook as the truck jounced along. “What is it?”

“You don't know what it is?” Scarlet said. “It's a modem. Very old. Could be very useful . . .”

“How?” Robyn asked, eager to know what value lay in this thing she'd been carting around for days. It had felt important when Barclay gave it to her, but—

“Uh-oh,” Laurel exclaimed.

A couple hundred feet ahead, the road dead-ended in a
T
. Left or right?

Robyn slammed on the brakes. “Read me the signs,” she said. “I can't see them. Kinda busy over here.”

Scarlet jammed the modem back into the backpack. “City Fairgrounds to the left, downtown Sherwood to the right. Go right!”

But Robyn stepped on the gas and hung a left. “Fairgrounds it is.”

“If you're trying to spite me, this isn't really the time,” Scarlet grumbled. “We're going to end up in the middle of nowhere.”

“This is the plan. They won't be expecting it,” Robyn said confidently. She hope, hope, hoped the MPs were far enough behind them that the girls could get everything useful out of this truck in time.