Chapter 6: The Kill Zone
The sound of shattering glass and heavy, fully-automatic gunfire was absolutely deafening.
Haley opened her mouth to scream, but the air was violently driven from her lungs as Cole’s massive frame tackled her hard onto the wet, filthy pavement of the alleyway. He completely covered her smaller body with his own, pressing her face down into the rotting garbage and cold concrete.
A torrential rain of jagged glass, splintered wood, and pulverized plaster rained down on their backs as the art store’s front display was shredded into confetti.
“Move!” Cole roared, his gravelly voice cutting through the chaotic din of the gunfire.
He didn’t look like a bored, judgmental bodyguard anymore. He was a highly lethal, terrifying machine. He brutally hauled her up to her feet, his heavy Glock already drawn and raised in his right hand. His left hand gripped the thick collar of her expensive jacket so tightly it choked her.
“They found us!” Cole violently shouted into his tactical earpiece, dragging her deeper into the dark alley. “Ambush at the Arts District, Sector Four! I need immediate armed extraction, code red!”
Static aggressively crackled and popped in the silent earpiece.
Cole cursed violently, ripping the earpiece out. “Jammer! They’re aggressively blocking the cellular signal. We are entirely on our own.”
Before Haley could even process the terrifying words, three massive men wearing black tactical gear and ski masks rapidly turned the corner of the alley, raising compact submachine guns to their shoulders.
Haley completely froze. Her brain simply stopped working.
Cole didn’t freeze. Without a millisecond of hesitation, he violently shoved Haley hard behind a rusted, foul-smelling metal dumpster and smoothly raised his weapon.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Three shots. Perfectly controlled, utterly precise.
The first two masked mercenaries dropped instantly to the wet asphalt, their weapons clattering uselessly away. The third man screamed in panic and desperately scrambled behind a stack of wooden pallets for hard cover.
“Stay absolutely down!” Cole ordered, his eyes never leaving the pallets.
Haley was hyperventilating, her heart pounding against her ribs like a trapped, desperate bird trying to violently escape her chest. “I… I can help!” she yelled blindly, her hands frantically searching the ground for a weapon, a pipe, anything.
“You can help by not getting shot in the head, Princess!” Cole fired two more suppressing shots into the pallets, wood aggressively splintering in the air. He lunged forward and violently grabbed her arm again. “We have to get to the subway station three blocks down. It’s totally underground. There are way too many panicked crowds down there for them to spray and pray. Run!”
They sprinted blindly out of the dark alleyway and merged onto the chaotic, screaming main street.
Mass panic had entirely set in. Innocent civilians were screaming, dropping their shopping bags, and running blindly in all directions, completely confused by the echoing gunshots.
This sheer chaos was their only viable cover.
Cole navigated the screaming crowd like a Great White shark, violently shoving people aside with his broad shoulders and dragging Haley behind him. They ducked aggressively into the concrete subway entrance just as a second black, heavily armored van screeched violently onto the sidewalk behind them, entirely tearing through a metal newsstand.
“Jump it!” Cole commanded.
They vaulted over the metal subway turnstiles without breaking stride, sprinting recklessly down the steep, metal escalator stairs.
“Who are they?!” Haley violently gasped, her lungs burning like they were filled with battery acid.
“Stefano Rossi’s elite hit squad,” Cole said, his dark eyes frantically scanning the crowded, underground platform. “High-end, heavily paid mercenaries. They aren’t local street thugs. They knew exactly where we were going to be.”
Haley grabbed his arm, forcing him to look at her. “How? How could they possibly know?”
Cole stared down at her, his jaw tightly clenched. “Because you have a massive, bleeding leak inside your impenetrable house, Haley.”
Haley felt a sudden, profound chill wash over her that had absolutely nothing to do with the freezing, damp subway air. A leak? Inside the Sterling estate? That was statistically impossible.
The silver subway train finally arrived with a deafening, metallic screech of its heavy brakes.
Cole violently shoved her inside the crowded car the exact second the doors opened, pressing her flat against the cold metal wall. He stood directly in front of the scratched glass window, his hand hovering over his concealed weapon, intensely scanning the faces on the platform as the heavy doors slid shut and the train slowly pulled away.
“We’re completely safe. For exactly one minute,” Cole finally breathed, sliding his hand away from his gun.
He looked down at her. His face was entirely grim, covered in a thin layer of brick dust and sweat, but there was a sudden, strange flicker of something else in his dark eyes.
Respect? Or maybe just pure relief?
“You actually run pretty fast for a spoiled rich girl,” Cole noted, his voice slightly breathless.
Haley leaned heavily against the metal subway pole, panting violently. “I was a waitress for three years, Cole. I walked ten miles a shift carrying heavy ceramic plates. I’m not made of glass.”
Cole smoothly checked the heavy magazine of his Glock, ignoring the terrified stares of the civilian commuters around them.
“We absolutely cannot go back to the estate,” Cole said quietly, leaning in so only she could hear. “If they knew exactly what time we were at the art store, they are definitely heavily watching the only bridge back to your island. They deliberately want us to try and run home so they can intercept us on the road.”
“So, where the hell do we go?” Haley asked, her voice shaking with raw adrenaline.
“I have a private, off-the-books safe house,” Cole said, his eyes scanning the moving tunnel outside. “It’s entirely off the grid. No digital footprint. No cameras. We go there. We aggressively regroup. And I find a way to physically contact your father on a secure, hardwired line.”
When betrayal comes from inside your own impenetrable fortress, who do you trust? If you were Haley, would you blindly follow this dangerous stranger, or try to run alone?
