Tailed by Brian M. Wiprud

option.
    Under such circumstances, it’s not enough to merely jam the accelerator forward. In the Lincoln, you needed to punch it and then bring your knee forward and pivot the accelerator pedal to the floor. That’s what puts the spurs to the V8 and transmission.
    Gotta love a powerful old car—she paused a split second before the 460 roared gleefully to life, my tires screeching. All 340 whinnying horses bolted into full gallop. The truck skidded up close behind me, but the Lincoln lunged forward like Seattle Slew out of the gate and narrowly avoided a collision. The turbodrive transmission slammed into second, making the truck shrink harmlessly in my rearview mirror.
    But I could see the moving van skid sideways—the truck’s brakes must have locked up. I felt a
whump
and saw the van tip onto its side across the road.
    So much for the nice quiet exit.
    Now the problem was how the hell—literally, for a change—to get out of there? The roads into Hell had been so confusing I’d only gotten there by chance. I had intended to ask for directions back to the main secondary road.
    My knees were trembling and my armpits ached, but I took the corners as fast as the Lincoln would allow, the tires complaining as we swayed this way and that along the little two-lane road. The canopy of trees raced away behind me as I kept an eye on the rearview mirror for the Air Force sedan.
    But it never appeared.
    Either the truck had blocked the road entirely so Lanston couldn’t follow.
    Or Gibraltar was taking over.

chapter 11
    I f you’ve never driven around the center of the country, it is quite remarkable how geography shapes land use. Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Michigan are largely a succession of red barns, silos, crops, Bob Evans restaurants, and an increasing number of cheese curd outlets. I didn’t know what a cheese curd was, and wasn’t sure I wanted to.
    But almost as soon as you pass Omaha,
Green Acres
is replaced by
Bonanza
. Crops give way to cattle—twelve hours of cattle if you drive straight through to Denver. It is the wellspring of Big Macs. Unless you stray near the Great Lakes, that is, in which case you’re likely to encounter oases of industry instead.
    My destination was firmly in
Green Acres
territory as I meandered north into Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, to a town with the unlikely name of Vargo. I had spoken with a man named Vargas. That’s right, Vargas of Vargo. Once I told him Nicholas was calling in a favor, he became very quiet, and in a heavy Spanish accent gave me directions to my destination.
    What kind of place was Nicholas sending me to? I dared not wonder. I was imagining a remote trailer park, or some Bates Motel look-alike. I only had a name: “Look for the sign that says SHELLY’S.”
    It was late in the day and I had been driving all night, taking back roads and hiding out. The setting sun an orange coal on the horizon, farmlands and white farmhouses glowing cerise on either side. Despite my predicament, I was enjoying the sizzling summer air rushing around me in the Lincoln, the convertible top down.
    A stand of stalwart sycamores lined the top of the next rise; old trees were a certain indicator in that landscape that a house lay ahead. The only trees not cleared in farm country are those where crops aren’t planted. Sure enough, built into the side of an embankment was a sprawling gray compound of wood structures with low, slanted roofs. Planted in the ground at the driveway entrance was a wagon wheel, and hanging from a post above it was the sign: SHELLY’S STREUSEL STOP.
    I piloted the Lincoln down the drive and ground to a halt in a cloud of dust.
Streusel?
Or did they mean
strudel
? Whichever confection, it smelled like pies baking.
    Well, of all the places I imagined for a safe house, a streusel stand was way down the list. For one, I’m not what you’d call a dessert person—I idly wondered whether