Chapter 7 - The Breach
The high-pitched screech of the security siren sliced through the safe house like a serrated blade. On the surveillance monitors mounted by the kitchen door, two black Cadillac Escalades had blocked the narrow alleyway behind the property.
Four private security guards in tactical gear were already using a motorized ram on the rear basement entry.
"How did they find us?" I screamed, lunging across the room to scoop Miles from his portable bassinet. Miles shrieked in terror as the alarms thundered against the walls.
Elena was already at the network console, furiously typing. Her face paled. "The infant’s car seat! Did Bennett buy the travel carrier?"
My stomach dropped through the floor. "Yes! He bought the entire travel system last month."
"There’s an integrated Bluetooth and cellular location beacon sewn into the internal safety harness for lost luggage tracking," Elena gasped, grabbing a heavy pump-action shotgun from a concealed wall panel. "Bennett tracked the carrier’s serial number through his cellular cloud account!"
A violent crash shuddered through the floorboards as the basement security door gave way.
"Walter!" Elena yelled into her two-way radio. "Bring the sedan to the front storm drain escape tunnel! Now!"
Audrey grabbed my uninjured left arm, pulling me toward a narrow pantry at the back of the hallway. "Mara, move! If they take Miles through that door, you will never see him again!"
Heavy boots pounded up the basement stairs. The pantry floor featured a hidden hydraulic trapdoor that led directly into an old brick coal chute running beneath the sidewalk to a forgotten municipal access tunnel.
"Elena, come with us!" I cried.
"Someone has to buy you three minutes to reach the street!" Elena racked the shotgun with a deafening metallic clack. "Audrey, take Mara and run!"
Just as Audrey shoved me down the rubberized slide of the coal chute, the kitchen door splintered into wooden shards. Bennett’s voice echoed down into the darkness, stripped of all aristocratic elegance, dripping with pure, homicidal rage.
"Mara! Give me that child! You walk out of here alive, or you leave in a body bag like Audrey’s bastard!"
The sound of his voice—so vile, so entirely devoid of humanity—ignited a primal fury inside me. I landed at the bottom of the brick chute, holding Miles so tightly to my chest that my broken wrist screamed in agony. But I didn't slow down. I couldn't.
Audrey landed right beside me. "This way! Follow the pipe!"
The subterranean tunnel was damp, freezing, and pitch-black, illuminated only by the faint light of Audrey’s mobile phone. Miles was sobbing against my neck, his little hands clutching the fabric of my sweater. We scrambled through sixty yards of wet concrete until a rusted iron ladder appeared ahead, leading up to a storm drain grate.
Above us, the storm grate was suddenly hauled upward with a screech of grinding metal.
Walter’s bearded face appeared in the opening. "Give me the baby first! Quickly!"
I pushed Miles up into Walter’s strong, steady hands, then Audrey helped hoist me through the narrow street opening into the blinding snow. Gunfire cracked from the rear of the safe house—Elena was holding the line.
We piled into Walter’s reinforced sedan just as two of Bennett’s guards rounded the street corner, guns drawn.
Walter slammed the accelerator to the floor. The tires shrieked, catching traction on the slush, and the car hurled forward, smashing through the wooden barricade Bennett’s men had erected at the end of the block. A bullet shattered the rear passenger window, spraying safety glass across the leather seats, but Walter never wavered.
We burst onto the Schuylkill Expressway, melting into the morning rush hour traffic.
I looked back. The black Escalades were lost in the sea of commuter vehicles. Miles was breathing, safe in my arms.
"Where are we going?" Audrey asked, her breath coming in ragged gasps as she checked me for wounds.
I wiped the cold sweat from my forehead, my gaze locking onto the downtown skyline of Philadelphia.
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"We are going to the courthouse," I said, my voice ice-cold. "Bennett wants an emergency hearing? Let's make sure the whole world attends."
***
