CHAPTER 25: THE BASEMENT SENTINEL
CHAPTER 25: THE BASEMENT SENTINEL
The heavy concrete vault door sealed shut with a resounding click.
Inside, the emergency battery lights glowed a faint, tactical amber. I held Sophie close against my chest, listening to the muffled sounds of violence echoing through the floorboards above us.
A loud crash.
The sound of shattering glass in the main lobby.
Then, the intercom system static-hissed to life.
"Evelyn. Hannah," Helena Sterling’s voice echoed into the concrete bunker.
"Your father is currently holding an iron rod at the top of the stairs. It is a very touching, pathetic display of parental instinct."
"But my men are carrying executive enforcement gear."
"Hand over the titanium container from the 1983 ledger, or I will let him take the fall right here."
I stood before the vault terminal, my hands sweating against the steel casing.
"If I give you the container, you’ll destroy the evidence and kill him anyway, Helena!" I shouted into the microphone.
"True," she replied smoothly.
"But it will be swift. If you refuse, I will let the federal prosecutors dismantle your family name piece by piece before I eliminate you."
Suddenly, a secondary alarm pinged on my phone.
A vehicle had breached the perimeter gates outside.
Not a mercenary van.
A convoy of black federal SUVs, their sirens completely silent but their high-beam spotlights cutting through the dark Chicago fog.
Agent Bennett had arrived.
May you like
---
##
