Chapter 14 - Cold Waters
The chase tore down the darkened, rain-swept highway skirting the naval base. The two Vanguard SUVs boxed me in from behind, aggressively nudging my bumper at seventy miles per hour. My rental car shuddered under the impacts, metal scraping against metal with ear-piercing shrieks.
I slammed the brakes. The SUV to my left overshot, skidding wildly across the median into a ditch. But the second SUV, driven by Miller, rammed my rear quarter panel with calculated precision, executing a pit maneuver.
My vehicle spun out of control, hydroplaning across the slick tarmac, crashing through a rusted wooden guardrail, and plunging over the rocky embankment into the icy, churning black water of the inlet.
Freezing water exploded through the shattered windows, shocking my lungs and driving the air from my body. In seconds, the car was submerging, nose down, the muddy bottom rising fast.
Panic is a death sentence in water. My training took over.
I didn't fight the door against the water pressure. I reached for my tactical pocket knife, waited for the cabin to fill completely to equalize the pressure, and sliced the seatbelt. Taking one last breath from the air pocket trapped against the ceiling, I used the glass-breaker tip of the knife to shatter the rear window.
I pushed myself through the jagged frame and kicked toward the surface, swimming deep beneath the silhouette of the floating debris.
Breaking the surface fifty yards downstream beneath the shadows of an old pier, I gasped for air, staying completely still. On the road above, flashlight beams swept the water where the bubbles were still rising.
"He's in the drink," I heard Miller’s voice carry over the wind. "Check the current. If he surfaces, put two in his head."
"Sir, the car's sunken. Nobody survives that impact without surfacing in thirty seconds."
"I know this bastard," Miller growled. "He survived Vance's crew. Assume he's a ghost until we see a corpse. Tell Thorne the shipment is on the move to Site B. We scrub the Pentagon files tonight."
I remained submerged up to my nose in the freezing bay, my muscles burning from the cold, watching the headlights finally turn and speed away.
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I pulled myself onto the wooden pilings, shivering violently, water streaming from my soaked uniform. They thought I was dead. That was the only tactical advantage I had left.
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