Chapter 5 - The Edge of Midnight
The high-pitched siren continued to wail, echoed by the cold, mechanical voice counting down from three minutes. High above them, heavy steel blast doors were slowly sliding down, threatening to seal the basement chamber into an airtight tomb.
"Sam! Get the gurney!" Ethan shouted, stepping between Victoria and the exit.
Samuel sprinted to the medical bed, unlocking the wheel brakes and unhooking the heavy IV lines from Olivia’s arm. Olivia groaned softly, her hands reaching out blindly in her confused state.
"I’ve got her!" Samuel yelled over the deafening alarm. "We have less than ninety seconds before that main door seals completely!"
Victoria tried to dart toward a secondary emergency door behind the medical equipment, but Ethan grabbed her arm, spinning her around and pinning her against the concrete wall.
"You’re coming with us," Ethan growled. "You’re going to stand in front of a judge and answer for every single year you stole from my wife!"
"Let go of me!" Victoria screamed, thrashing wildly. "You don't understand what’s coming, Ethan! If I don't deliver that signed document to my father by midnight, he will activate the failsafe on your daughter's bank accounts! He’ll destroy Lucy!"
Ethan’s eyes narrowed into slits. "What are you talking about?"
"Six months ago, when Lucy turned eighteen, my father opened a trust fund in her name!" Victoria admitted frantically, her composure completely shattered. "He routed thirty million dollars of illegal offshore capital through her account! If Olivia doesn't sign the extension, my father will blow the whistle on Lucy for international money laundering! She’ll spend the rest of her life in a federal prison!"
Ethan felt a sickening wave of revulsion wash over him. The Sterling family hadn't just targetted his wife—they had set a legal trap around his innocent daughter, ensuring that even if Ethan ever discovered the truth, he would be forced to protect them to save Lucy.
"You monsters," Ethan whispered.
"CONTAINMENT FLUSH IN SIXTY SECONDS."
Thick, white chemical gas began venting from the ceiling grates, filling the room with a bitter, suffocating fog.
"Ethan! We have to go NOW!" Samuel yelled, pushing the heavy gurney toward the slowly closing steel door, which was already down to waist-height.
Ethan grabbed Victoria by the collar of her silk gown, dragging her along as he sprinted toward the door. "Move!"
Samuel slid the gurney under the descending steel door just as it reached two feet off the ground. He slid underneath after it, reaching back to pull Olivia out onto the corridor floor.
Ethan shoved Victoria under the door first. She scrambled through, coughing wildly as the chemical gas filled her lungs. Ethan dropped flat onto his stomach, sliding under the heavy steel edge just as it slammed shut against the concrete floor with a deafening THUD, sealing the chamber behind them.
They lay on the cold corridor floor, gasping for clean air under the flickering red emergency lights.
"Is everyone alive?" Samuel wheezed, sitting up and checking Olivia’s pulse. "She’s stable, but we need to get her out of this air quality."
Ethan pulled himself up, picking up his weapon and pointing it directly at Victoria, who was huddled against the wall, shivering and weeping in her ruined silk wedding gown.
"Get up," Ethan commanded coldness.
Samuel unlocked the heavy service doors leading to the rear yard. Outside, the freezing rain poured down, washing away the sting of the chemical gas.
Parked just fifty yards away in the dark woods, the black SUV’s headlights suddenly flashed twice.
Lucy burst out of the driver’s side door, carrying an umbrella and sprinting through the rain toward them. "Dad! Mom!"
She reached them, dropping the umbrella as her eyes landed on the fragile, dark-haired woman resting on the gurney. Lucy fell to her knees in the wet grass, holding her mother’s pale face in her hands.
"Mom?" Lucy sobbed. "Mom, it’s me. It’s Lucy."
Olivia’s cloudy eyes slowly focused on the young woman kneeling before her. She raised a frail, trembling hand, her fingers gently touching Lucy’s cheek. A tiny, faint tear leaked from the corner of her eye.
"My... baby..." Olivia whispered softly. "My little girl..."
Lucy buried her face against her mother’s neck, weeping uncontrollably.
Ethan stood over them, his hand resting gently on Lucy’s back, before looking up at his brother. "Sam, take Victoria and Julian to the safehouse. Put them under twenty-four-hour guard."
"Where are you going?" Samuel asked.
May you like
Ethan turned his head, looking toward the city skyline in the distance, where the grand clock tower of the Federal Plaza was illuminated against the dark clouds.
"It’s eleven-forty p.m.," Ethan said, his voice cold and sharp as steel. "I have twenty minutes to visit Senator Arthur Sterling before midnight."
