He was young, no more than twenty-five, tough and stringy-looking. Definitely not the first team, Syd thought-strictly benchwarmer material. Whoever assigned him lookout duty figured it was something even he couldn’t screw up. But she was about to prove them wrong.

“Hi there!” she said, letting her accent shine through. She jutted a hand toward him.

He reflexively shook her hand, jaw slightly agape. Maltz stood right behind her. His HK was tucked inside a many-pocketed photographer’s vest, and around his neck hung a digital camera that harbored a 9mm and a huge flash designed to blind and disorient.

“I’m Gail Jones, from the Arizona Republic? We’re doing a story on the parade tomorrow? You know, the sorts of things people are doing to prepare, what Independence Day means to them…” She laid a hand on his arm. “Human interest. We’ve taken shots of almost all the other floats, and would love to include yours. Did you go with a red, white and blue theme? Or something else?”

“Umm…” he stammered.

She brushed past him into the warehouse. It was stifling inside, the heat had been trapped by the cheap metal roof and the air appeared to shimmer. Syd fanned herself with one hand as her eyes darted around the interior. Another man was adjusting something on the truck bed. He straightened at the sight of her and frowned. No one else visible, but it was hard to make out the depths of the warehouse in the dim lighting. She caught movement by the back door-Fribush and Kane.

“Hey, lady, you’re not supposed-”

She swiveled to face the kid, who had a look of growing alarm in his face.

“I really love this, your whole melting pot theme. Haven’t seen anything like it yet. Do you mind if we take a few pictures?”

“No pictures!” The other man jumped off the float and ran toward them, waving his arms forcefully. Head of the local cell, I presume, Syd thought. Maltz raised the camera.

She pasted her best startled look on her face. “But really, what you’ve done here is so great. Why don’t you all gather in front of it. One shot and we’ll be out of your hair. This could be the lead-”

“Get the fuck out,” the guy snarled, skidding to a stop directly in front of her. He was average-sized but had a hard look to him-prison, or maybe the army, Syd thought. Shit. And he was clearly the brains of this particular operation.

He glared at her, then his gaze shifted to Maltz. His eyes suddenly narrowed, and Syd knew they’d been made. “Flag!” she yelled, digging in her purse for her gun. She fumbled it and cursed.

All hell broke loose in the warehouse. Maltz’s camera flashed, blinding her, followed immediately by the sputter of rounds being squeezed off. Something sparked to her right, and Syd instinctively dove in the direction of the flatbed, commando-crawling until she was underneath it. She got behind one of the wheels just in time to see the kid drop, felled by Maltz. The other guy had vanished.

Shouting erupted from the rear of the warehouse. Syd panned the darkness quickly, eyeing through the sight on her HK. The yelling was coming from behind a door to a partitioned-off area. It slammed open and a spray of bullets pocked the floor and walls. There was a sudden bright light and piercing noise. Syd jerked her head away, wishing she had a free hand to plug her ears. The flash bang was hell in an enclosed space.

Everything was muffled, as if sounds were crawling to her ears through glue. Maltz was fifteen feet away, aiming his gun at something she couldn’t see. She was rusty, since diving for cover it had taken her thirty seconds to process the scene and react. Not good. If she was still with the Agency, that alone would have been grounds for dismissal.

A sudden rumbling, then a lurch. For a second Syd experienced the disconcerting sensation that the warehouse was moving away from her, then realized it was the tires as the truck headed out the door. She rolled in time to avoid getting squashed and lay as flat as possible, watching the tow lights blink red. A collision, the grinding of metal muted by her temporary deafness as the truck shoved their SUV aside as if it were an errant toy. She jumped to her feet. Maltz was already behind the wheel when she scrambled in. One side of the SUV was badly scraped and dented, but it looked driveable.

“Fribush and Kane?” she asked, breathless.

“It looked like they had it handled.” Maltz peeled out after the truck. “Bastard just missed me, had a 9mm subcompact in his jeans. By the time I reloaded he was in the truck cab.”

“We’ve got to stop him,” Syd said, watching as the truck fishtailed, the flatbed whipping in a wide arc as he spun onto the main road.

“We can try,” Maltz said, jaw set. “But I gotta be honest, a car versus a big rig, I don’t love our chances.” He glanced at her. “You want to call the cops?”

Syd chewed her lower lip. She hated the thought of it. But if that truck made it downtown…she dug in her purse for her cell phone. “Stay as close as you can without riding up his ass,” she muttered as she dialed.

Jake picked up on the third ring. “Hi, partner,” she said.

“Hey,” he said. “How’s Phoenix?”

“How did you know?”

“Call it a lucky guess. So, did you find the guy?”

“We did, actually.” Syd watched as the truck nearly took out a Honda Civic. It swerved up the on-ramp to Route 10, headed north toward Phoenix proper. “One slight problem, though. He’s got the bomb on the road.”

“Jesus, Syd.”

“I was thinking you have a better shot at getting the police to respond. Coming from me, it might get dismissed as a crank call.”

“Go figure.” Syd heard Jake talking to someone in a low voice, then an exclamation in the background. “All right, George is handling it. I’ll stay on with you while he patches us through to dispatch. What exit are you closest to?”

“He just passed Exit 155.” Syd watched smaller cars struggle to get out of the way, several of them nearly colliding with each other. Maltz swerved around them, managing to stay fifteen feet back from the truck’s tail. It was surreal watching the float whip around, the Statue of Liberty canted sideways by the rapid turns, streamers tearing away and wafting back on the breeze. Syd wondered where the bomb was-inside the main statue? It would make sense, especially if someone had a funny sense of irony. “You’re pissed, aren’t you?”

“Pissed isn’t the right word. I’m just wondering what it is about me that sends women running toward a bomb,” Jake said cryptically.

Syd decided that didn’t bear a response. She called out the next few exits as they blew past them. The truck was gaining momentum. She watched nervously as their speedometer crept past ninety, then a hundred. Horns blared in their wake, but the truck cleared a straight swath.

“Uh-oh,” Maltz said suddenly.

Syd saw it at the same time: the highway swept up a bridge in a long arc, and there were brake lights ahead. Rush-hour traffic. “Shit,” she said.

“Yup,” Maltz agreed.

“Jake, he’s driving about a hundred miles an hour, and he’s about to hit traffic,” Syd said.

There was silence on the other end of the phone. “The nearest unit is still a few minutes away,” Jake finally said. “They’re setting up roadblocks at the exits, but it doesn’t sound like he’s going to make it that far.”

“Definitely not. This is going to get ugly.” Syd turned to Maltz. “Flip around and get us the hell out of here.”

Maltz nodded, slowing down. The truck plowed forward as if the driver was oblivious to the danger ahead. “C’mon,” she breathed. “Slow the fuck down. Don’t do this.”

They had almost decelerated enough for Maltz to turn the SUV around when the truck started climbing the bridge. Two cars skidded into each other as the drivers took too long to react. The screech of brakes, crunch of metal. A horn blared, then was cut off as the truck slammed into the wall of slower vehicles at the top of the ramp, scattering them like metal jacks.