I looked in the rearview mirror. Daniel Harper was right there, inches from my steel bumper, his old headlights shaking like a man praying.
Part 2″” The cold air howled through the two-inch gap in my window, a high-pitched whine that competed with the thrum of the siren. I didn’t roll it up. I needed the cold. It was the only thing keeping the adrenaline from turning into pure, blinding panic. In the academy, they teach you to control the scene. Dominate the space. But right now, barreling down I-71 at 94 miles per hour with a stranger’s beater sedan welded to my back bumper, I wasn’t controlling a damn thing. I was just aiming the nose of the cruiser toward the distant orange glow of Columbus and praying the Goodyear tires held on.w
Dispatch crackled again, the voice tinny and distant in the chaos of the cabin.
“Unit 27, copy. Be advised, construction zone active at the 670 East split. Lanes reduced to one. Heavy congestion reported. ETA to Grant Medical via surface streets from your location is thirty-seven minutes.”
Thirty-seven minutes. I glanced in the rearview mirror. Daniel Harper’s headlights were two steady, trembling dots. They didn’t waver. The guy had the focus of a fighter pilot. I’d seen drunks swerve and teenagers over-correct. Daniel drove like he was carrying nitroglycerin in the trunk—steady hands, white knuckles, a man who understood that a single mistake meant he’d never hear his daughter’s voice again.
