Chapter 5 - The Alley Run
They didn't use the front stairs.
Vance grabbed a heavy iron poker from the small fireplace hearth while Leah wrapped Matteo in his heavy winter coat, pulling his wool cap low over his ears.
"Auntie Leah, why is that man angry?" Matteo whispered, his small voice trembling as he clung to Leah’s neck. "Are the bad men coming?"
"Nobody is going to hurt you, Matteo," Leah said, her voice fiercely steady as she carried him into the dark hallway behind the kitchen. "Auntie is right here."
They moved down the narrow rear fire escape ladder behind the building.
The rain had turned into a cold, biting sleet. The iron rungs of the fire escape were slippery with ice, and Leah’s boots nearly slipped twice as she descended with Matteo clutched tightly against her chest.
Vance moved ahead of them with astonishing speed and silence, despite his injuries. He cleared every landing before signaling Leah to follow, his heavy frame moving with the fluidity of a trained military operative.
When they reached the second-floor landing, the sound of splintering wood echoed from the front street.
Sable's men had just kicked down the front door of Henderson’s Laundromat.
"Search every floor!" a man shouted from inside the building. "Sable wants the girl alive until she tells us where Vance is! Kill the kid if he makes noise!"
Leah froze on the iron stairs, her teeth grinding together in pure, unadulterated rage.
She looked down at Matteo, who was shivering against her shoulder, his little fingers digging into her wool coat. They were threatening her boy. The only good, clean thing left in her world.
Vance reached up from the alley floor, lifting Matteo down from the bottom ladder with effortless care, then helped Leah step down onto the wet asphalt.
"The van is compromised," Vance whispered, leaning close to Leah’s ear. "Sable’s men will have posted spotters at both ends of Oak Street."
"There's a coal tunnel," Leah whispered back, her eyes narrow, her breathing ragged. "Under the old butcher shop. It connects to the abandoned subway line on 5th Avenue. Henderson uses it to store old wash tubs."
Vance looked at her with newfound respect. "Lead the way."
They slipped through a rusted cellar hatch behind the butcher shop, descending into absolute darkness just as two black SUVs pulled up to the front of Oak Street, their doors slamming open.
The coal tunnel was narrow, damp, and smelled of wet earth and copper.
Leah pulled out her small key-chain flashlight, illuminating the low brick archway. They walked in single file—Leah leading, holding Matteo’s small hand, while Vance brought up the rear, his iron poker held low, his ears straining for any sound of pursuit behind them.
"Auntie," Matteo whimpered softly, his legs trembling as he tried to keep pace. "My chest hurts."
Leah stopped instantly, dropping to her knees on the damp coal dust. She pulled Matteo’s small pulse-oximeter from her pocket—a device she carried everywhere—and slipped it onto his tiny finger.
The screen flashed red: Pulse 142. Oxygen 88%.
His heart was struggling under the stress and the freezing cold.
"We have to stop," Leah said, her voice cracking with terror as she looked up at Vance. "He needs his medication. It’s in my bag... in the apartment!"
Vance knelt beside them in the narrow tunnel.
He looked down at the small boy, whose lips were turning a faint, alarming shade of blue. Vance reached into his own coat pocket and pulled out a small silver pill case he had taken from his ruined suit.
"Is it digoxin?" Vance asked sharply.
Leah blinked through her tears. "Yes! How did you—"
"My mother had the same heart condition," Vance said softly. He flipped open the silver case, revealing three small yellow tablets. "Five milligrams. Is this his dosage?"
Leah checked the imprint on the pill. "Yes! Oh God, yes!"
She dissolved half a tablet under Matteo’s tongue using a drop of water from her water bottle.
Matteo leaned his head against Leah’s shoulder, his small, ragged breaths gradually smoothing out as the medication took effect.
Vance stood up in the dark tunnel, looking back toward the cellar entrance.
Faint, muffled footsteps echoing through the brick passage behind them.
"They found the hatch," Vance said softly. His amber eyes caught the faint beam of Leah's flashlight. "Take the boy through the tunnel to 5th Avenue. Exit through the maintenance grate near the theater."
"What about you?" Leah asked, her heart dropping.
May you like
Vance looked down at his iron poker, then offered Leah a cold, lethal smile that belonged entirely to the king of the North District.
"I’m going to remind Dominic Sable why he used poison instead of a gun," Vance said.
