Chapter 4 - THE HOSPITAL WING
By 4:00 AM, rain was drumming relentlessly against the reinforced glass windows of St. Jude’s Hospital’s private penthouse wing.
I stood on the roof of the adjacent medical pavilion, wearing a dark rain jacket, looking through a pair of tactical night-vision binoculars.
Across the thirty-foot gap between the buildings, the 8th floor of St. Jude's was heavily guarded. Two private security guards in navy suits stood outside Room 812—Liam Carter’s private suite. Down in the courtyard below, two more guards patrolled the perimeter.
Liam was playing his hand well. By checking into a private hospital wing under the guise of a medical emergency, he had effectively removed himself from police custody while keeping his own private security detail in full control of his environment.
Marcus sat beside me on the gravel roof, adjusting a long-range directional microphone.
“I’m picking up audio from Room 812,” Marcus whispered, handing me an earpiece.
I put the earbud in.
Through the static, Liam’s voice came through crystal clear—calm, arrogant, and entirely unbothered by his arrest.
“...The police have nothing, Julian,” Liam was saying. “The video footage will be thrown out of court by noon. Have you spoken to Nikolai?”
A secondary voice—Julian Mercer, his lawyer—replied: “Nikolai is furious, Liam. The twenty million in bearer bonds was supposed to be delivered to his courier in Zurich yesterday. He wants to know why your wife was able to access the encrypted dark trust.”
“Emma was smarter than I thought,” Liam scoffed over the feed. “She hid the micro-drive containing the secondary authorization keys. But Burke is swapping the locket out of the precinct right now. Once Burke delivers the locket to you, we can crack the encryption and transfer the funds to Nikolai.”
“And what about Daniel?” Mercer asked. “He’s a loose end.”
Liam let out a cold, chilling laugh. “Daniel thinks he’s a hero playing military investigator. Once the bail is finalized this morning, I want Nikolai’s team to take care of him and his sister permanently. Make it look like a tragic house fire.”
I took the earbud out of my ear. My chest burned with a dark, consuming rage.
“They’re planning to kill Emma as soon as the bail clears,” I said, looking over at Marcus.
“We have the micro-drive from the locket, Daniel,” Marcus reminded me, pointing to his laptop. “We can take this directly to Agent Vance and the Federal Prosecutor right now.”
“It’s not enough, Marcus,” I countered grimly. “Mercer has judges on his payroll. If we go through official channels, Mercer will drag this out in pre-trial motions for months while Solokhov’s hitmen target Emma. We need to end this tonight.”
Marcus looked at me intently. “What are you thinking?”
“Liam thinks he’s safe inside that hospital suite,” I said, pulling a specialized grappling gun from my gear bag. “He thinks his money and his cartel connections make him untouchable. I’m going to show him how wrong he is.”
“You’re going to breach a high-security hospital wing?” Marcus asked, a slow smile spreading across his face. “You really love your sister, don't you?”
“She’s all the family I have left,” I said simply.
I anchored the heavy pneumatic line to the roof’s structural air handling unit, aiming the launcher at the open service balcony on the 8th floor of St. Jude's.
PFT.
The titanium grapple head shot across the thirty-foot gap, anchoring securely into the concrete balustrade of the 8th-floor balcony.
I clicked my harness onto the high-tension steel cable.
“Cover my entry, Marcus,” I instructed. “If those guards on the floor make a move, drop them with the tranquilizer rounds.”
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“Got your back, brother,” Marcus said, racking his rifle. “Go get him.”
I stepped off the edge of the roof, sliding fast across the dark gap through the freezing rain, disappearing into the shadows of Liam Carter’s private sanctuary.
