Chapter 8 - The Traitor in the Shadows
Behind Richard Whitmore stepped four armed men in dark tactical gear, their rifles trained on Marco and Elena.
And standing right beside Whitmore, carrying a leather duffel bag, was Paul—Marco’s trusted lieutenant.
Marco didn't look at Whitmore. His dark eyes fixed squarely on Paul.
"Paul," Marco said, his voice dropping into a deadly, pitch-black register. "Ten years."
"Ten years of taking orders from a boy who thought he was a king," Paul spat out, his face twisted in bitterness. "Whitmore paid me two million dollars three months ago to find these ledgers, Marco. I was the one who told Clark to use the girl."
Elena gasped. "You... you were the voice in the pantry!"
"Smart girl," Paul sneered. "I needed Clark to press you so hard you'd panic and use the code. I knew your father gave it to you before he died. I just needed you to write it down for Marco so he'd lead us straight to the vault."
Marco slowly stepped in front of Elena, placing his body between her and the five guns pointed into the narrow room.
"You brought five men into a enclosed concrete vault, Paul," Marco said calmly, his hands resting naturally at his sides. "Did you forget what I taught you about underground combat?"
"Don't try to bluff me, DeLuca!" Paul barked, his rifle shaking slightly. "Your outside guards are already down! We hit them with tranquilizer darts five minutes ago! Nobody's coming down that gangway!"
"I don't need anyone coming down the gangway," Marco said.
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, black plastic remote control no larger than a key fob.
Richard Whitmore’s eyes narrowed. "What is that?"
" Dock Seven was built in 1942 as an ammunition depot," Marco explained, his voice smooth and untroubled. "My father installed four charges of industrial dynamite beneath the concrete floor thirty years ago as a fail-safe in case the federal authorities ever raided the vault."
Whitmore took a hasty step back toward the door. "You're lying!"
"Am I?" Marco thumbed the safety latch on the small remote. "If I press this button, the pier collapses into sixty feet of freezing water. We all die in three seconds."
Paul’s face drained of all color. He knew Marco. He knew Marco DeLuca was entirely capable of blowing up a pier if it meant taking his enemies down with him.
"Marco... wait..." Paul stammered, lowering his rifle an inch.
"You broke the code, Paul," Marco whispered.
In that fraction of a second, while every gun in the room dipped in sudden terror, Elena acted.
She grabbed the heavy gray metal toolbox from the floor and hurled it with all her strength directly at Richard Whitmore’s legs.
The forty-pound steel box smashed into Whitmore’s knees. The old man screamed in agony, his cane snapping as he collapsed onto the wet concrete, his gun firing harmlessly into the ceiling.
BANG.
"Down!" Marco roared.
He tackled Elena to the floor, rolling her behind the heavy steel locker door as gunfire erupted inside the enclosed space.
PA-PAT-PAT-PAT!
The deafening roar of automatic fire bounced off the concrete walls, filling the small room with smoke, blinding flashes, and flying ricochets.
Marco pulled his nickel-plated revolver from his coat, leaned around the metal locker door, and fired three controlled shots into the darkness.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Two of Whitmore’s guards dropped instantly. Paul scrambled toward the exit, dropping his duffel bag, screaming in panic.
"Elena! Take the ledgers!" Marco ordered, shoving two of the oilskin-wrapped books into her hands while keeping his gun trained on the doorway. "Run for the side hatch!"
"What about you?!" she yelled over the deafening noise.
"I'm right behind you!"
Elena scrambled on her hands and knees, clutching the heavy ledgers to her chest, heading for a narrow drainage hatch in the back wall that led out to the lower seawall.
Behind her, Richard Whitmore was crawling through the smoke, reaching desperately for his fallen pistol.
"DeLuca!" Whitmore screamed, his face covered in concrete dust and blood. "You won't leave this dock alive!"
Marco stood over the old man, his gun pointed straight down at Whitmore's forehead.
"My father built this dock, Richard," Marco said coldly. "And it's time you paid your rent."
Marco pulled the trigger.
May you like
BANG.
He turned, grabbed the remaining two ledgers from the floor, and vaulted through the drainage hatch just as the muffled sounds of approaching sirens began to echo across the water from the mainland.
