Chapter 4 - The Ambush under the Bridge
"Down!" I roared, slamming Lucas into the footwell and throwing my body across both boys. Liam gasped, his tiny fingers clawing into the leather of my seat, but he didn't scream. He squeezed his eyes shut, pressing his forehead into my collarbone.
*Crack-crack-crack!*
The windshield of the Maybach shattered into a spiderweb of frosted white glass as high-caliber rounds struck the B6 ballistic armor. The glass held, but the sound inside the vehicle was deafening, like sledgehammers hitting an iron safe.
"Return fire! Delta formation, take the flanks!" Marcus shouted into his tactical headset. He kicked his door open, utilizing the reinforced frame as cover, and began firing his Glock 17 with methodical, terrifying precision.
The two escort Suburbans behind us swung wide. Six of my private security operators—men I paid five hundred thousand dollars a year precisely for scenarios I never truly believed would happen—spilled out into the street. The roar of automatic gunfire turned the concrete cavern beneath the bridge into an echo chamber of violence.
"Claire, keep their heads down!" I commanded, reaching across to pull the jump seat open. Beneath the plush leather upholstery was a locked compartment. I pressed my thumb to the biometric scanner.
The latch clicked. Inside lay a Sig Sauer P320 and four extended magazines.
I hadn't fired a weapon in six years, not since the tactical private retreats my security consultants ran in the Nevada desert. But the cold weight of the polymer grip felt natural. Protective instinct superseded reason.
"Jason, you stay inside!" Marcus yelled over the cacophony, ducking as a volley of rounds shredded the Maybach's side mirror. "They’re not trying to kill you! They’re using non-lethal flash cartridges on the rear cabin—they want the kids!"
One of the attackers, moving with military discipline, broke away from the crossfire, sprinting low along the retaining wall toward my door. He held a glass-breaker punch in one hand and a sidearm in the other.
He lunged for the rear handle.
I didn't wait for him to breach.
I kicked the door open with everything I had. The heavy, armored panel smashed directly into his chest with sickening force, knocking him back onto the wet asphalt. Before he could recover, I stepped out into the rain, raised the Sig Sauer, and fired twice into his center mass.
The rounds slammed into his Kevlar vest, dropping him instantly, gasping for breath. I stepped forward, kicked his weapon across the pavement, and pressed the muzzle of my gun against the gap between his helmet and his collar.
"Who sent you?" I screamed over the roar of the engines.
The man wheezed, blood spitting from his lips, but he didn't answer. He reached for a grenade pin on his chest.
Marcus appeared from the smoke, planting a round squarely through the man's temple.
"We don't have time for interrogations, Jason!" Marcus yelled, his face streaked with cordite and rainwater. "Two more vehicles just turned onto the ramp! We need to move on foot through the pedestrian tunnel to the subway maintenance line. Now!"
I turned back to the car. Claire was trembling, her hands shielding Lucas, who was hyperventilating.
I reached in, scooped Lucas into my left arm, and pulled Liam with my right hand. "Liam, hold my belt. Do not let go, no matter what you hear. Do you understand me?"
Liam looked at the dead man on the pavement. His little face went chalk-white, but he grabbed the leather loop of my pants with both fists and clamped his jaw shut.
"I won't let go," Liam said.
"Good boy. Marcus, lead the way!"
We broke into a sprint through the blinding rain toward the rusted iron gate of the MTA emergency access shaft fifty yards away. Behind us, the surviving operators formed a rear guard, laying down suppressive fire to buy us seconds.
Marcus blew the padlocks off the steel maintenance door with a twelve-gauge breaching shell. He kicked the door wide, revealing a narrow, descending concrete stairway lit by flickering yellow service bulbs.
"Move, move, move!"
We tumbled into the dark belly of New York City, the heavy iron door slamming shut behind us, cutting off the thunder of the street battle above.
The air down here was thick with grease, ozone, and stagnant water. Distant subway cars rumbled through the earth like subterranean beasts.
Lucas was trembling violently against my chest, his small heart beating so hard I could feel it through my ribs. I sat on the bottom step, pulling both boys into my lap in the dim, yellow light.
"You're safe," I whispered, kissing the top of Lucas’s wet hair, then Liam’s. "You're safe. I've got you."
Liam looked up, his breathing shallow. "Mommy said you were a prince in a glass tower."
A bitter, broken laugh escaped my throat. "Mommy lied to you, Liam. I'm just a man who realized too late what was worth fighting for."
From the depths of his oversized red hoodie, Lucas slowly reached into his tiny pocket. He pulled out something small, wrapped in plastic cling-wrap.
"Mommy said... if the bad men with the trucks came... to give you the silver key," Lucas whispered.
I stared at his tiny, dirt-smudged palm.
Lying in his hand was an old-fashioned brass safety deposit key stamped with a four-digit number:
*1986.*
The year Emma was born. And below it, the initials of a private vault bank located in the basement of the New York Stock Exchange.
May you like
A bank owned by Julian Croft.
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