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Quinn grimaced and glanced in the rearview mirror.

“But if the Whittakers didn’t have the gems and Robie doesn’t have the gems, then who the hell does have the gems?” Andy asked.

Quinn, still watching the rearview mirror, accelerated. The sedan lunged forward. Quinn said calmly, “Hold that thought. Our pal in the red Nissan is back.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“Seat belt buckled?”

“Seat— Yes.” Andy hastily snapped his seat belt on as Quinn twisted the wheel hard at the first corner, accelerating into the turn. Andy swiveled in his seat, peering through the back window of the sedan. The red Nissan turned the corner behind them, speeding up to stay on their tail. His faint hope that this was a coincidence faded. The Nissan’s tinted windows made it impossible to see who was driving, but whoever this was, it was no random motorist.

“I can’t see the driver.”

“I’ve got a good idea who it is,” Quinn said. “And why he just happened to be in the area.” He took the next corner fast, hand over hand, his face expressionless.

“Robie?” Sirius had been driving a gold Lincoln, so unless there was still another player in this game…

“Robie is just the kind of jackass who’d try to tail someone in a red sportscar.”

Two turns later, the winding residential streets gave way to a wider thoroughfare. Quinn maintained his speed, barging onto Broadway, already crowded with workday traffic.

As Quinn played what seemed like a complicated game of motorized hopscotch, Andy began to hope they could lose their pursuit.

He looked back. The red Nissan was a few lengths behind, but trying to maneuver for a better position. “He knows we’ve spotted him, but he isn’t dropping back.”

“He gets points for persistence.” Quinn sounded rueful, his attention on the busy road ahead.

Andy pulled out his cell phone and snapped a couple of quick photos.

Quinn’s cheek creased. “We’ll make a spy of you yet.”

Andy slid the button to video and began to film their pursuer. “Don’t get your hopes up. The angle is horrible, and we’re bouncing all over the place.”

As if to prove his point, they slammed down on another pothole.

Quinn swore, and Andy muttered, “You’re going to lose me my PG rating.” He steadied his phone.

“Okay, enough of this.” Quinn nosed the sedan over to the soggy shoulder of the road, tires kicking up ice and stones and mud. It was a risky choice. If they got stuck in the mud, it was game over. Andy held his breath as they churned along beside the slow-moving traffic—much to the irritation of other drivers.

At last Quinn was able to guide the car back onto the road, and they rejoined the stop-and-go train of workday traffic once more.

Even when a space between cars opened up, the road was too jammed with other vehicles for them to pick up any real speed.

No longer able to get a clear view of the Nissan, Andy stopped filming. “I can’t see him, but he’s still back there.”

Quinn made an absentmm-hm.

“I don’t think we’re going to lose him.”

“Not here, no.”

“What’s the point of this? He knows we’ve got to go back to Safehaven.”

Andy was half thinking aloud, but Quinn replied, “You have to lose the idea that we’re dealing with a smart or rational person.”

True. From smashing Miriam’s snow globe collection to killing Marcus, nothing Robie had done so far indicated a smart or rational intellect at work. If anything, he was growing more violent and irrational with every passing day.

“And what worries me…” Quinn fell silent, and Andy held his breath as Quinn piloted their sedan through a sliver of an opening between a semitruck and a station wagon. With the wet, slick condition of the roads, all it would take was one patch of ice…