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Remi turned to face forward.
Sam took his foot off the gas, eased the Rover into the turn, then accelerated again.
“Sam!”
Fifty yards away, sitting broadside across the road, was a red Nissan SUV.
“There’s your skull and crossbones!” Sam called.
He eased the Rover slightly left, taking the center of the road, and aimed the hood directly at the Nissan’s passenger door. He stepped on the accelerator, and the Rover’s engine roared.
“I don’t think they’re going to move,” Remi said, hands braced on the dashboard.
“We’ll see.”
Remi glanced over her shoulder. “Our tail has closed the gap.”
“How close?”
“A hundred feet and coming fast.”
“Hold on, Remi.”
With his thumb depressing the button, Sam lifted the emergency brake handle. In the space of two seconds the Rover’s speed dropped by half. The Nissan’s driver, seeing no brake lights to alert him, was slow to react. The Nissan loomed in Sam’s rearview mirror. He jerked the wheel right, tapped the brakes, and the Nissan swerved left to avoid the collision. Sam glanced in his side mirror and saw the Nissan coming up alongside. He yanked the wheel left and was rewarded with a crunch of metal on metal. The red Nissan filled the Rover’s windshield. Sam torqued the wheel hard right, swerved around the Nissan’s bumper onto the shoulder, then drove back up onto the road.
“Cut it a little close there, Fargo,” Remi said.
“Sorry about that. Do you see the blue one?”
Remi checked. “He’s still there, about two hundred yards back. The red one’s getting turned around.”
Within two minutes both Nissans were back on their tail and trying to close the gap. While the Rover’s engine probably had more horsepower, the Nissan’s lower center of gravity gave them the advantage on the corners. Slowly but steadily, the Nissans ate up the distance.
“Ideas?” Remi asked.
“I’m open-minded.”
Remi opened the map and began tracing her finger along their course while murmuring to herself. She pulled one of their guidebooks from the glove compartment, flipped pages, and continued murmuring.
She looked up suddenly. “Is there a left turn coming up?”
“We’re on it now.”
“Take it!”
Sam did as instructed, braking hard, then slewing the Rover onto the intersecting dirt road. A sign flashed past: LAC DE MANTASOA.
“Lake Mantasoa?” Sam asked. “Are we going fishing?”
“They’ve got ferries,” Remi replied. She consulted her watch. “Next one leaves in four minutes.”
Sam checked the rearview mirror. The two Nissans were skidding into the turn. “Something tells me we’re not going to have time to purchase tickets.”
“I figured you could pull off something tricky.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
The road devolved into a series of descending switchbacks bordered on both sides by steep embankments. The jungle canopy closed in above them, blotting out the sun. They passed a brown-painted sign with a yellow P, a car pictograph, and “50M.”