Thuggz Valentine

Chapter Two

5:56 p.m.  

The back of the ambulance swung wide and slammed into a parked car as Ebony fishtailed out of the hospital parking lot. Car alarms whooped loudly, but could hardly be heard over gunfire and screeching tires.

Boc! Boc! Boc! Boc!

Boosh!

One of the back windows shattered as police opened up with multiple shots trying to stop the stolen ambulance and the wanted couple inside. "Gimme that gun!" Bless gritted, fighting through the pain. Ebony handed him the gun as she swung a hard left, picking up two more cruisers on the chase.

Bless staggered toward the back of the ambulance, thrown off balance by Ebony's wide maneuvers. The painkillers had him doped up, so he couldn't feel the bullets that would be forever lodged inside him. He braced himself against the wall and took aim through the same back window the police blew out. He let the gun go.

Boc! Boc! Boc!

He shot straight at the driver's face. The first bullet spider webbed the windshield, but the second shattered the officer's skull. Bless watched the driver's head snap back, a mist of blood painting the inside of the cracked windshield. The passenger tried to grab the wheel, but the cruiser slammed into a parked car, hurling the passenger through the windshield and breaking his neck against the car's hood.  

"Mutherfuckin' right!" Bless shouted, proud of his handiwork. He knew he wouldn't live through this, so he was intent on taking as many souls with him to hell as he could.

"What happened?" Ebony called out.

"I just blew that muth . . . aaarrrggggh!" he groaned. Bless had only turned his head for a second, but that was enough time for another police cruiser to zoom up close to the bumper of the ambulance and allow the passenger of the cruiser to snipe him through the window. The bullet pierced Bless on the left side of his chest and knocked him back onto the gurney. "Oh my God, Bless! Talk to me!" Ebony yelled, wanting to jump up and run to him.

"Fuck! I got hit!"

Their situation was growing darker by the minute.

"Baby, just hold on. I got us!" Ebony vowed, slamming the accelerator to the floor.

More police cruisers poured into the chase from every side street she passed. In the distance, she could hear the beating wind. That could only mean one thing.

Helicopters.

She took a deep breath to fight back the tears, but her mind continued to race. She remembered hearing somewhere that helicopters couldn't fly over airports, but she knew they were too far away from Newark Liberty International Airport. They had to lose the police on foot, or blend into a crowd. They had to disappear somehow, somewhere. It's useless, her mind told her.

Fuck you! Her spirit screamed back.

Ebony made a right so sharp, she damn near flipped the ambulance. Two police cruisers overshot the turn and sideswiped each other. Two more gone. But the police were like roaches. For every one taken out, there were ten more in hot pursuit. "T-take 'em t-t-to the hood, bae," Bless gritted. "We . . . can lose 'em there."

Ebony looked at the speedometer leaning hard over 100. The downtown city stores, office buildings, people, hustle and bustle zipped by with the speed of a bullet. Up ahead she saw the road block. The police had the street clogged. Guns cocked, sights set. But Ebony wasn't about to stop. She gripped the steering wheel with both hands and focused dead ahead.