The Amulet of Power Read Free Page B

trigger. Sculpted to fit my hand, and weighted exactly as I directed—and it’s got a chip that reads my palm print. No one else can fire it.” She slid the pistol back into its holster. “There’s not a more accurate pistol around.”
    “Interesting,” said Mason, pulling onto a main thoroughfare.
    “Are you ready to tell me what this is all about?” asked Lara.
    Mason’s reply was to swerve the car into a narrow alley and floor the gas pedal. “We’ve got company,” he said, looking into the rearview mirror as three cars entered the alley behind them.
    He veered onto a side street, then another, and finally hit another main drag.
    “I’m going to ask you one more time,” said Mason, trying to keep the urgency from his voice. “Did you find
anything
, no matter how trivial or unimportant, in the Temple?”
    “I already told you,” said Lara irritably. “No.” She paused, trying to order her thoughts. “The men in my hospital room, and these men who are chasing us—how did they know I’d been to the Temple of Horus, anyway?”
    “They—or the ones they work for—were keeping a watch on it.”
    The back window shattered as a bullet crashed through.
    “Keep your head down,” warned Mason.
    “But why did they come after me?” demanded Lara, ducking. “Why didn’t they simply steal what they wanted from the Temple of Horus?”
    “Because they couldn’t find it,” said Mason. He swerved sharply as another bullet took away his side mirror.
    Just what have I stumbled into?
Lara wondered as the Land Rover sped south along the Nile.

3

    “Damn!” muttered Mason as they raced out of the city and into the desert.
    “What now?” asked Lara.
    “I can’t outrun them.” He glanced at the rearview mirror again. “They’re not gaining on us, but I’m not putting any more distance between us . . . and I have to. There’s nothing between here and Luxor, and I don’t have enough petrol to get us there.”
    “Where are the police?”
    “Maybe they’ve been bribed. Maybe they stop at the city limits. Maybe they just don’t expect people to be racing down the highway at three in the morning. Whatever the reason, I haven’t seen one since we left the hospital.”
    “Then we’ll have to make a fight of it.”
    He grimaced. “There are six or seven men in those cars, maybe more—and you’re in no condition to fight.”
    “You worry about the driving,” said Lara. “I’ll worry about the fighting.”
    “Lara . . .” he began.
    “Just drive,” she said. She turned in her seat, steadied her hand against the headrest, aimed her Black Demon out the gaping hole where the back window had been, and heard a
click
as the hammer fell on an empty chamber. She pulled the trigger twice more. Two more
click
s.
    “Kevin?”
    “Yes, Lara?”
    “Where are my bullets?”
    “That’s what I was trying to tell you.” He reached into a pocket and tossed a handful of sleek narrow clips to her. “I emptied them for your own good,” he explained. “I knew I might have to take you out of hospital tonight, and I knew you would want your guns, but I didn’t want you firing them. In your condition, you’re as likely to shoot me or yourself as an enemy.”
    “Let
me
worry about my condition,” she said furiously, ignoring the pain in her head and loading the clips into the weapons. “And don’t ever mess with my pistols again.”
    He was about to answer when a bullet smacked into the dash between them. Mason cursed and resumed swerving as the speedometer crept up to 110 miles an hour.
    Lara tried to focus her eyes on the pursuing vehicles. It seemed to get blurrier and darker, and the next thing she knew, Mason’s hand was on her shoulder and he was shaking her awake.
    “Are you all right?” he asked. “You passed out.”
    “We’ve stopped!” she exclaimed.
    “For the moment.”
    She began blinking her eyes furiously. “How long have I been out?”
    “Perhaps an hour, perhaps a little