The Final Minute by Simon Kernick

forward and pulled the trigger again, aiming at the rear tyre this time. But nothing happened. I was out of bullets. No matter. I’d slowed them down enough to put some miles between us. The gun was no use to me now so I wiped the handle with my shirt, remembering what the criminals did in all the cop shows I watched (or maybe from experience, I still wasn’t quite sure), and dropped it out of the window.
    In my rear-view mirror, I could see Pen running round the front of the house, holding a gun herself this time, and moving at a good pace. I slammed my foot on the accelerator as she pulled the trigger, tearing up some more of the flowerbed before coming back on to the drive, and within seconds I’d put thirty, then forty yards between us, and then the woods opened up to greet me and I knew that, at least for now, I was safe.
    There was something else too.
    I felt good.

Six
    Pen de Souza screamed a curse into the clear night sky as she watched the car, and their target, disappear into woodland at the end of the driveway.
    There was no point trying to follow him. She’d seen him put the bullet in the tyre. She cursed again, knowing she should have put a bullet in his kneecap the moment he’d first walked in the door. After all, they’d only needed him to answer one question: ‘Where are the bodies?’
    Neither she nor her partner, Tank, had any idea of the identity of the bodies in question, nor did they want to know. In their line of business, knowing too much made you dangerous to the client. They had been tasked to get exact coordinates of the bodies’ location, make a mental note of them (not write anything down), and when it was established that the target was telling the truth, kill him.
    And they’d failed on all counts. Pen felt the bitter taste of it in her mouth. She wasn’t used to failure. In the five years she and Tank had worked together, no target had ever escaped them. The combination of planning and guile they used had ensured that. With her pretty, girl-next-door looks and ready smile, Pen could disarm the most suspicious of people – men and women – while Tank provided the brute force to back her up. Yet tonight it hadn’t worked, and Pen had been humiliated when the target had caught her off-guard – her! And in a choke-hold of all things! Thankfully, he’d been foolish enough to leave her alive and unsecured, which would end up being a mistake on his part. Far worse, though, was what he’d done to Tank. Her man.
    She turned and ran back past the burning house to where Tank was sitting up on the grass, rubbing his chest. ‘Are you OK, babe?’ she asked, crouching down beside him and putting a hand on his shoulder, thanking Lady Luck with all her heart that he’d been wearing a flak jacket. She didn’t know how she would ever cope if she lost him.
    Tank nodded slowly, giving her a tight smile. ‘Yeah, I’m all right. He got me twice in the chest – good shots too, especially for a guy moving. I’m lucky the jacket held from that range. I’m guessing you didn’t get him.’
    She shook her head. ‘He got away. And he put a bullet in one of our tyres.’
    Tank grunted. ‘The guy’s no idiot. He didn’t panic, he knows some good moves, and he can shoot straight under pressure. I didn’t think he’d be that good.’
    ‘Right now, I’m just glad you’re all right.’ Pen put her arms round him and hugged him close.
    ‘I’m always all right, baby, you know that.’
    He kissed her hard on the mouth and she kissed him back, her breathing quickening, because he always did that to her. She was thankful that he didn’t blame her for the plan they’d used. It had been her idea to lure the target into the room with the two people they’d already killed, because she preferred to interrogate subjects when they were terrified but otherwise uninjured: it tended to be easier to get a proper answer out of them that way. Tank hadn’t been so keen, but he’d gone along with it, which