Chapter 5 - Midnight Run
"Move!" I yelled, abandoning all silence.
I grabbed Matthew and Lucy by their hands, shoving them down the dark, narrow service passage just as three gunshot blasts tore through the canvas of the painting, shattering wood splinters all over us.
"Vance! Block all estate exits!" Alexander’s voice echoed through the walls, distorted and demonic. "Kill anyone who tries to leave!"
We scrambled down the iron spiral stairs in pitch darkness, the thunder outside exploding in a deafening roar that shook the entire estate. Flashlight beams began slicing through the cracks in the wooden wall panels behind us—Alexander’s armed mercenaries were already entering the service tunnels from the basement level.
"Which way, Matthew?!" I panicked, as we reached a three-way junction in the foundation tunnels.
Matthew didn't hesitate. He signed: Left leads to the old wine cellar drainage pipe! It opens out into the forest ravine!
We sprinted through the damp, cold tunnel, the smell of damp earth and moss filling my lungs. Behind us, heavy boots stomped on the iron stairs, accompanied by the harsh barks of security dogs.
"There they are!" a voice shouted from behind. A beam of blinding light locked onto my back.
I turned, grabbed a heavy wooden wine crate stacked against the tunnel wall, and pulled with all my strength. Dozens of hundred-pound wooden crates tumbled down into the narrow passage with a deafening crash, creating a temporary barricade of splintered oak and iron hoops that blocked the mercenaries.
"Lucy, Matthew, jump!" I screamed as we reached the end of the cellar pipe.
We threw ourselves out into the pouring rain, tumbling down a steep, muddy embankment into the dense forest surrounding the estate. The storm was merciless, wind whipping cold rain into our faces, but the rain was our savior—it washed away our scent and blinded the thermal cameras mounted on the estate's perimeter towers.
"We can't go to the police in town," I panted, pulling the two shivering children beneath the thick canopy of a pine tree. "Alexander owns the local sheriff. He owns the media. He'll have the roads blocked in ten minutes."
"Where do we go, Mommy?" Lucy cried, shivering violently in her wet clothes.
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I looked at the silver ring on my thumb—a ring carved from spent shell casings, given to me by my great-grandfather before he passed.
"We go to the coast," I said, my voice hardening with newfound resolve. "We go to Great-Grandpa Samuel’s old cabin. It's thirty miles north, completely off the grid. And Samuel left me something that can finish this."
