Replica(13)

The agent sank to the floor. His head flopped over like a rag doll’s, but his chest still rose and fell with his breath. “Wait,” I said as I squatted beside him.

Leah growled, “We don’t have time to wait.”

But I’d already pulled out his earpiece and microphone. I switched the microphone off and inserted it into my own ear. “Now we’ll know what they’re up to.” The other agents’ voices filled my ear.

Ivan gave me a grudging look of approval as we took off for the street, Lea in lead.

As soon as I hit the sidewalk, I saw the men headed toward us. “Shit.”

Lea bolted into traffic, and cars screeched to a halt to avoid hitting her. Ivan and I followed her path, but the agents crossed behind us, so we didn’t gain much ground.

Ivan grabbed the corner of a newsstand as soon as we reached the sidewalk, the worker restacking a rack of magazines. He pressed his shoulder into the edge and the entire stand lifted off the ground and crashed onto the sidewalk. Merchandise spilled into their path, creating a bottleneck of shouting pedestrians and raging newsstand owner.

We took advantage of the diversion to race south, agents still pursuing. I began to get winded after two blocks of that grueling pace. The agents were losing ground fast, and after another two blocks, I could see neither hide nor hair of them.

“We need to find a subway,” I panted.

“Where’s the nearest station?” Lea asked.

Ivan ran beside me, barely looking winded. Asshole. “The Rockefeller, but we’ll be too easy to find. We need to head to Grand Central. We can lose them in the tunnels.”

“There’s no one to lose,” I snapped. “We’ve lost the guys behind us.”

“But now we have fresh pursuers,” Lea said, pointing to a tight group of men headed straight for us.

“They’re directly in our path to Grand Central, not to mention it’s at least six more blocks,” I said. “We need to hide.”

Lea shot me a nasty look and pulled her cowl down around her face. Then she grabbed me, flung me onto her back, and took off at an even faster sprint in the opposite direction of our new pursuers. My only consolation was that Ivan struggled to keep up with her.

She slid around the corner, turning east, and I clung to her for fear of being flung off. The men behind us had little chance of keeping up, but we still weren’t in a position to lose them yet. Ivan steered us down Madison.

“There’s an entrance close,” he said. “A couple blocks.”

People gave us odd looks—an inhumanely fast person with a woman on his or her back was bound to draw attention, but it was New York City. For all they knew, it was a scene from an action movie. Hopefully they wouldn’t figure out there weren’t any cameras rolling.

We’d made it several more blocks, and I knew we were close when I heard something over the earpiece. “They’re sending more backup,” I shouted. “They’re two blocks behind us.”

“They’re close,” Ivan said, looking over his shoulder. “But I think we can make it.”

Lea pushed forward with a new burst of speed, only slowing when we reached the entrance. I slid off her back and the three of us entered the station. With any luck, we’d get lost in the crowd, but that seemed unlikely considering my companions were a big beefy guy and a woman in leather and a cowl. I had a better chance of getting lost on my own, but there was no way that was going to happen. I pulled my subway pass out of my bag as well as a spare I kept in case I lost my other.

“Lea, lower your cowl.”

“What? Why?”

“We have to blend in. Or try to.”

I led the way to the turnstiles, then ran my other pass over the card reader and motioned her through.

“Are you shitting me?” she asked in disbelief. “Always the rule-follower. Even in a foot chase.”

“See that guard over there?” I gave a flick of my finger toward a man who was standing with his back to the wall, keeping a watchful eye on the turnstiles. “He sees us jump the stiles and he’s going to call for backup.”

“Ladies,” Ivan said, already through the stiles, “let’s continue this discussion on the train.”

Lea stalked through the gate behind me.

“Which line?”

“The one with the closest platform.” I was starting toward the first tunnel when Lea tensed.

“They found us.”

“Shit.” We bolted down the steps as a train pulled into the station. “Hurry!” I shouted. “I think we can make it.”

The men in black suits were right behind us as we reached the bottom of the stairs. The passengers were already loading, which was a bad sign. We were still far enough away that we might not make it.