Chapter 7 - The Alleyway Ambush
The cold night air hit Adeline like a physical blow as she wriggled through the narrow window frame, her coat snagging on a jagged piece of wire mesh before tearing free. She dropped six feet onto the metal grating of the fire escape, her knees buckling slightly as she landed on the iron steps.
Behind her, the bathroom door splintered inward with a deafening crash, followed by the sharp, metallic crack of a gunshot echoing inside the tiny apartment.
"Eleanor!" Adeline screamed, horror gripping her chest.
"Move, you idiot!" Eleanor’s voice yelled back from inside the wrecked bathroom, followed immediately by two rapid bangs from her revolver.
Adeline didn't look back. She scrambled down the rusted iron stairs of the fire escape, her hands scraping against the freezing metal, until her boots hit the damp asphalt of the alleyway below.
The alley was pitch black, flanked by towering brick walls that trapped the echo of shouting voices from above. She hit the ground running, her breath turning into white plumes in the freezing air, her canvas bag slapping against her hip.
She rounded the corner toward the main street—and stopped dead.
Two men stepped out from the shadows of the dumpster enclosure, blocking the exit. One of them held a suppressed pistol, the barrel gleaming dully under the distant streetlamp.
"There she is," the first man muttered, stepping forward with a cruel, flat smile. "End of the line, sweetheart."
Adeline backed up a step, her hand dropping into her pocket, her fingers closing around her heavy brass keys. It was a pathetic weapon against a gun, but it was all she had. She braced herself to charge, preparing for the worst—
Screeech!
The screech of burning rubber cut through the alley. A sleek black Maybach slammed sideways into the mouth of the alley, its high-beam headlights blinding the two gunmen in a searing wall of white light.
The rear door flew open before the car even came to a complete stop.
"Get in!" Marcus roared from the driver’s seat.
Adeline didn't hesitate a second time. She sprinted toward the open door, diving across the leather interior just as a bullet punched a clean, neat hole through the rear quarter-panel of the car.
Marcus slammed his foot down on the gas pedal, the Maybach roaring forward, clipping the side of the dumpster as it tore out of the alley and into the open street.
In the back seat, breathing heavily and clutching her scraped hands, Adeline looked up.
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Julian Vance was sitting beside her in the dark leather interior, his face illuminated only by the passing streetlights. He wasn't bleeding. He wasn't panicked. He was calmly reloading a custom-weighted titanium pen into his breast pocket, his eyes fixed entirely on her.
"You have a very bad habit of lingering in alleys at midnight, Adeline," Julian said quietly.
