Chapter 2 - THE CHILD EVERYONE WANTED
The first attacker entered the pharmacy through the stockroom as if he already knew the floor plan.
He carried a flashlight in one hand and a pistol in the other. The beam cut through the darkness, touching broken glass, overturned shelves, and finally the corner where Emily Carter lay curled around the injured little boy.
Adrian Vale fired before the light reached Ethan's face.
The shot shattered the tense silence. Medicine bottles exploded from the shelves. Someone screamed behind a display of greeting cards. The attacker spun backward and disappeared between the aisles, but another shadow immediately moved behind him.
"Rear exit," Adrian ordered.
Emily pushed herself up with Ethan clinging to her neck. The boy had stopped crying. That frightened her more than tears. His tiny fingers were locked in her jacket, his body trembling against her chest, and his breath came in short bursts that sounded too old for a child his size.
The older agent, Cole, moved ahead with his weapon raised. Mason, the younger one, covered the shattered front window. Adrian stayed beside Emily, close enough to shield her, but not close enough to touch Ethan without permission.
That detail did not escape her.
"Who are these people?" she whispered.
"The wrong question," Adrian said. "The question is who told them where to find him."
They slipped through the stockroom. A smell of cardboard, antiseptic, and smoke filled the narrow space. The rear alley waited beyond a metal door, wet with rain and glowing faintly under security lights.
Cole opened it two inches, looked out, then swore.
A delivery van sat in the alley with its engine running.
"Yours?" Emily asked.
"No," Adrian said.
The van accelerated.
Cole yanked the door open and shoved everyone left. The van smashed into the loading dock where they had been standing, metal screaming against brick. Gunfire tore through the alley. Emily dropped behind a dumpster, curling over Ethan while bullets punched sparks from the concrete.
Mason returned fire. Adrian fired twice, calm and precise. The van reversed, slammed into trash bins, and disappeared around the corner.
"We cannot use the alley," Cole said.
Emily looked up. A rusted fire escape climbed the side of the neighboring building.
"There," she said. "It connects to the parking garage. My car is on level four."
Adrian stared at her. "You parked downtown during a presidential lockdown?"
"I parked before the city went insane."
They climbed. Ethan shook in the cold, so Emily wrapped her scarf around his bandaged head. Adrian watched every step, his jaw tight with helplessness. Halfway up, a red laser dot appeared on Cole's chest.
Emily saw it first.
"Down!"
She threw herself against him. A rifle shot struck the railing where his heart had been. Cole hit the platform hard, dragging her with him. Mason fired toward a rooftop. Adrian kicked open a maintenance door, and they rushed inside a stairwell washed in emergency red.
Cole stared at Emily. "You saved my life."
"Return the favor before thanking me."
At the fourth level, Emily's old blue Honda waited between two polished black SUVs. The sight of it looked absurdly normal.
Adrian blinked. "That is our escape vehicle?"
"It starts when emotionally supported."
The garage lights died.
A voice came through the speakers.
"Emily Carter."
Her blood turned cold.
The voice was male, calm, and electronically distorted.
"You are carrying something that does not belong to you."
Adrian pulled her behind a pillar. Ethan pressed his face into her shoulder.
"Leave the child," the voice continued, "and your mother will remain safe."
Emily stopped breathing.
No one in that garage should have known about her mother. No stranger should have known about Room 314 at Lakeshore Haven, about the window her mother liked open, about the nurse who called when she refused dinner.
The speaker crackled again.
"Thirty seconds, Emily."
Her fear became anger so clean it almost steadied her.
"Get in the car," she said.
Adrian did not move. "They have threatened your mother."
"Then they should have threatened someone less stubborn. Get in."
Mason slid into the passenger seat. Cole and Adrian climbed into the back. Ethan refused to let go of Emily, so she drove with him strapped against her by the seat belt, one arm around him and one hand on the wheel.
The engine coughed, failed, then roared alive.
Two armed men appeared from the stairwell.
Emily reversed hard into one SUV, spun forward, and shot toward the ramp. Bullets struck the trunk. The Honda screamed down four levels, crashed through the exit barrier, and burst onto Lower Wacker Drive.
For several seconds, no one spoke.
Then Ethan lifted his head.
He looked not at the men chasing them, but at Adrian's bloodstained shirt cuff.
"Red," the little boy whispered.
Emily glanced in the mirror. "What did you say?"
Ethan pointed at Adrian.
"Red man."
The car went silent.
May you like
Adrian turned pale. Cole tightened his grip on his weapon. Mason slowly looked over his shoulder.
And Emily realized the child she had saved might be trying to warn her about his own father.
