Chapter 6 - Shadows on the Third Floor
“Stay behind me,” Maxwell ordered, slipping the pistol into the waistband of his trousers.
“You can’t just walk out there with a gun,” Martha whispered, panic lacing her voice. “If they see you standing, every element of surprise we have is gone.”
“Surprise won't matter if they shoot you on the stairs, Martha.” Maxwell grabbed a dark cashmere coat from the closet, throwing it over his shoulders. He walked to the wheelchair parked near the window, sat down, and pulled the wool blanket over his legs.
He looked up at her, the gun hidden beneath the folds of the tartan throw. “Push me to the landing. Let them think the helpless cripple is coming out to beg.”
Martha took a deep, steadying breath. Her hands trembled as they touched the rubber grips of the wheelchair. She had pushed hundreds of patients through hospital wards, but never into an active crossfire.
She wheeled him through the bedroom doors and down the long corridor toward the mezzanine overlooking the grand two-story foyer.
Below them, the foyer was a scene of controlled violence.
Four men in tactical windbreakers stood around the shattered remains of an antique crystal chandelier. Two of them carried submachine guns fitted with suppressors. Clara Delaney was kneeling on the marble floor, hands clutched to her face, sobbing in terror.
Beside the grand double doors stood Julian, his face pale, flanked by a thickset man with a shaved head and a tailored charcoal topcoat.
“I told you, Mikhail,” Julian was saying, his voice cracking with uncharacteristic panic. “The paperwork is being signed Friday! You didn't need to bring muscle into the house tonight!”
The bald man, Mikhail, sneered. “Friday is too late, little Rourke. Federal authorities seized three containers in Newark this afternoon. We need Pier 9 clear tonight. We take the manifests now, or we bury you in your own garden.”
“The manifests are in the master vault,” Julian stammered, raising his hands. “On the third floor. But Maxwell has the biometric codes. And he’s barely conscious!”
“Then we drag him downstairs and cut off his thumbs,” Mikhail said simply.
Martha felt a sudden, violent shudder run through the handles of the wheelchair. It wasn't fear. It was Maxwell’s muscles coiling, ready to strike.
“Push me to the railing,” Maxwell murmured, his voice barely audible.
Martha pushed the chair until the front wheels touched the carved oak balustrade.
“Julian,” Maxwell’s voice boomed across the cavernous foyer.
The sound froze every man in the room.
The gunmen snapped their weapons upward, aiming directly at the landing. Clara shrieked and dropped flat against the floor. Julian’s head jerked up, his eyes bulging in disbelief.
“Max?” Julian squeaked. “What are you doing out of bed?”
Maxwell sat in the chair, his face calm, almost bored, looking down at the armed intruders as if they were errant delivery boys tracking mud onto his carpet.
“You brought wolves into my home, cousin,” Maxwell said, his voice carrying the deep, resonant authority of a king addressing traitors. “And you didn't even have the courtesy to offer them a drink.”
Mikhail barked a laugh, stepping forward, his hands in his pockets. “The legendary Maxwell Rourke. They told me you were a ghost in a chair. You look like a corpse who forgot to lie down.”
“You must be Mikhail,” Maxwell said smoothly. “Your father used to work our coal docks in Murmansk before he was caught skimming kerosene and thrown into the harbor with a chain around his ankles. It seems treason runs in your bloodline.”
Mikhail’s face darkened with rage. He snapped his fingers at the gunman to his left. “Go up there. Bring me the manifests. Shoot the maid, and drag that piece of meat down the stairs by his hair.”
The gunman raised his weapon and started up the grand curved staircase, boots thudding against the carpeted risers.
Martha’s knuckles turned white on the wheelchair handles. “Maxwell...” she breathed.
“Hold steady, Martha,” Maxwell whispered without moving his head. “Don’t look away.”
The gunman reached the top of the stairs, turning the corner onto the landing, his weapon raised level with Martha’s chest.
“Step away from the chair, bitch,” the man snarled.
Maxwell didn't hesitate.
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In one fluid, blinding motion, he threw the blanket aside, surged upward from the wheelchair on two powerful legs, and closed the distance before the gunman could pull the trigger.
***
