Chapter 11: The Blood Price
“We have to manually pry the doors open,” Julian instructed, stepping back and holstering his weapon. “If they cut the power, the electronic locks are dead. We can force it.”
Maya nodded, her adrenaline surging. She wedged her fingers into the tiny gap between the steel elevator doors. Julian mirrored her on the other side.
“On three,” Julian grunted. “One. Two. Three!”
They pulled with everything they had. The heavy steel groaned in protest before slowly sliding apart.
They stepped out onto the twentieth floor. It was a massive, open-plan corporate office space, completely dark except for the moonlight pouring through the floor-to-ceiling windows.
“The emergency stairwell is fifty yards east,” Julian whispered, drawing his pistol again. “Stay low. Move from desk to desk.”
They crept through the labyrinth of cubicles. Every shadow felt like a threat. Every creak of the building sounded like a footstep.
“What about Marcus?” Maya whispered, crouching behind a heavy mahogany desk. “We can’t just leave him.”
“Marcus knows how to extract himself,” Julian replied tightly, though Maya could hear the underlying worry in his voice. “My priority is getting you to the subterranean garage. I have a reinforced vehicle waiting.”
Suddenly, the glass window of the office space shattered inward.
A hail of suppressed gunfire tore through the room, shredding the cubicle walls and sending a blizzard of paper into the air.
“Get down!” Julian roared, tackling Maya to the floor.
He rolled smoothly, popping up over the desk and firing three precise shots into the dark. A heavy thud echoed from the corridor.
“They’re coming up the stairs!” a mercenary shouted from the hallway.
“We’re cut off,” Julian gritted his teeth, checking his magazine. “I have four rounds left.”
“Four?” Maya panicked, looking around the dark office. “There are dozens of them!”
“Then I don’t miss,” Julian said coldly.
He grabbed her hand, dragging her toward the heavy wooden double doors of an executive boardroom. They slipped inside, locking the doors behind them.
It was a temporary fix. Heavy boots immediately began pounding against the wood outside.
“Kick it down!” a voice yelled.
Maya backed away from the doors, her hands blindly grasping the edge of the large conference table. Her fingers brushed against something cold and sharp.
A heavy, solid steel letter opener. Shaped like a miniature dagger.
Maya picked it up. The metal felt familiar in her hands. It wasn’t a jeweler’s scribe, but it was a tool. And Maya knew how to wield tools.
CRACK.
The wooden doors splintered.
CRACK.
The hinges gave way.
Three mercenaries burst into the room. Julian fired instantly. Bang. Bang. Bang. Two men dropped to the floor.
But the third mercenary lunged forward before Julian could take the final shot. He slammed the butt of his rifle into Julian’s jaw.
Julian stumbled backward, dropping his pistol as he crashed into the glass whiteboard.
“Julian!” Maya screamed.
The mercenary ignored Julian, his eyes locking onto Maya. He dropped his rifle and pulled a tactical knife from his vest, advancing toward her with a predatory grin.
“Sterling wants you alive,” the mercenary sneered, lunging forward and grabbing Maya by the throat. He slammed her back against the conference table, pinning her down. “But he didn’t say I couldn’t hurt you first.”
Maya gagged, gasping for air as his heavy gloved hand crushed her windpipe. Her vision began to blur.
“Take your hands off her,” Julian snarled, pushing himself off the floor, his face bloodied.
“Stay back, Vance, or I’ll slice her pretty face open right now,” the mercenary threatened, raising his knife.
Maya couldn’t breathe. Her lungs were burning. But her right hand, trapped against her side, was still gripping the solid steel letter opener.
I am a designer, Maya thought, her eyes locking onto the soft, unprotected gap in the mercenary’s tactical vest, right under his collarbone. I know exactly where to apply pressure to make things break.
Maya didn’t scream. She didn’t cry.
With a vicious, primal surge of strength, she drove the heavy steel letter opener directly upward, burying it deep into the mercenary’s shoulder joint.
The man let out an agonizing, bloodcurdling shriek.
His grip instantly released from her throat. He stumbled backward, dropping his knife and clawing desperately at the steel lodged in his shoulder.
Maya slid off the table, coughing violently and gasping for air.
Julian didn’t waste a millisecond. He lunged forward, sweeping the mercenary’s legs out from under him and delivering a devastating, knockout blow to the man’s temple.
The room went completely silent, save for Maya’s ragged breathing.
Julian rushed over to her, his hands frantically checking her neck for deep injuries.
“I’m fine,” Maya coughed, looking down at the unconscious mercenary. “I told you. I work with metal.”
A dark, incredibly proud smile spread across Julian’s bloodied face. “My beautiful, terrifying queen.”
He reached down to grab his fallen pistol.
But before his fingers could touch the grip, the unmistakable, chilling sound of a gun hammer clicking back echoed from the shadows of the boardroom.
“Drop the weapon, Vance. And step away from the girl.”
Julian froze. Maya turned her head slowly, her blood running completely cold.
Standing in the doorway, bleeding from a gunshot wound to the side, but holding a massive silver revolver pointed directly at Maya’s head, was Silas. Richard Sterling’s chief fixer.
And his finger was tightening on the trigger.
“I always clean up Mr. Sterling’s messes,” Silas whispered, a sickening smile stretching across his pale face. “Any last words, sweetheart?”
Julian’s eyes widened in sheer panic. “NO!”
