Chapter 4 - Subterranean Extraction
"I'm not going to shoot you, Camille," Declan said, calmly reloading his pistol with his last fresh magazine. "Not here. Not in the dark."
"How generous," she sneered, her eyes darting to the floor indicator light above the elevator. It was slowly rising from the basement. "You always were a romantic."
"You ruined everything," Declan said, looking her dead in the eye. "Not just the empire. Not just the business. Me. I spent two years mourning a ghost while you were lying in my house laughing at me."
"I wasn't laughing, Declan," she said, a sudden, surprising flash of genuine pain crossing her features before she masked it again. "I was terrified! Every time you walked into that room, every time you kissed my forehead and cried... I knew that if I made a single mistake, if my eyelids twitched, if my breathing changed, you would realize I was lying and put a bullet in my head!"
"You didn't know me at all then," Declan murmured softly. "If you had woken up two years ago and told me you wanted out, I would have burned the world to keep you safe."
The service elevator arrived with a soft electronic chime. The heavy steel doors slid open.
Dr. Aris immediately bolted inside, clutching the duffel bag to his chest like a life raft. "Get in! Hurry!"
Declan and Camille stepped into the elevator, keeping their weapons pointed at each other as the doors closed, isolating them in the small, stainless-steel box as it began its slow descent to the subterranean garage.
Above them, a muffled explosion shook the shaft. Moretti’s men had breached the master closet door.
"They'll be down the stairs in thirty seconds," Declan said, checking the garage camera feed on his wrist monitor.
The screen displayed four heavy SUVs parked in the concrete bay. Two armored mercenaries were standing guard near the main security gate, holding assault rifles.
"There are two guards at the exit," Declan told Camille. "You take the left, I take the right."
"And Aris?" Camille asked.
"Aris stays behind me if he wants to live," Declan replied coldly.
The elevator dinged as it reached the subterranean level.
Before the doors had even fully opened, Declan slid to the floor, rolling out into the brightly lit garage. He fired twice beneath the undercarriage of a parked Mercedes, hitting the ankles of the first guard. The guard screamed, collapsing to the concrete, and Camille finished him with a single, precise headshot from the elevator doorway.
The second guard swung his rifle toward Camille, but Declan was already on his feet. He closed the distance in three violent strides, grabbing the barrel of the guard's weapon, twisting it upward as it discharged into the concrete ceiling, and driving his tactical knife deep into the guard's side.
The man went limp, falling to the floor in a pool of dark blood.
"Clear!" Declan barked.
Dr. Aris stumbled out of the elevator, his face green with motion sickness and terror. "The exit gate is locked! We're trapped!"
"The override switch is in the security booth," Camille said, pointing across the wide concrete bay toward a reinforced glass office.
"I'll open the gate," Declan said, walking rapidly toward the booth. "Get in the armored Maybach."
"Declan, wait," Camille called out suddenly.
Declan stopped, turning his head slightly.
She was standing five feet away, her Glock lowered, looking at him with an unreadable expression. "Why are you helping us? You know what's in this bag. You know where I'm going."
"I'm not helping you, Camille," Declan said quietly, his voice echoing in the vast, cold space of the garage. "I'm keeping you alive until I decide what your punishment is."
He stepped into the security booth, smashed the glass over the manual release, and pulled the heavy iron lever.
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Across the garage, the massive steel security door began to grind slowly upward, revealing the dark, rain-soaked driveway leading up to the street.
And sitting right at the top of the driveway, blocking the exit, was a black, unmarked van.
