Chapter 13 - The Last Bullet
BANG.
I didn't wait to see him aim. I pulled the trigger on the captured carbine.
The round took the second contractor in the neck. He dropped his weapon, clutching his throat, stumbling backward into the snowdrifts before collapsing motionless against the tire of the SUV.
Caroline took off sprinting down the icy driveway toward the road, screaming for help into the empty winter wilderness.
I raised the rifle, lining the crosshairs up between her shoulder blades.
My finger rested on the cold steel trigger. Ten years of lies. Ten years of gaslighting. The torture of Maya, the kidnapping of Lily, the starvation of Clara inside the walls of my own home. Everything in my primal brain screamed at me to squeeze the trigger and watch her drop.
"Ryan, no!"
Maya’s hand came down gently on the hot barrel of the rifle, pushing it toward the ground.
She stood beside me, her green eyes clear now, filled with an ancient, exhausting sorrow.
"Don't do it," Maya whispered. "Don't let them turn you into what they are. The girls are watching."
I looked over my shoulder.
Clara and Lily were standing by the burning porch steps, huddled together, their small hands locked tight, their wide eyes reflecting the orange glow of the raging inferno.
I slowly lowered the rifle.
"She has the drive," I said, my teeth clenched.
"Let the police have her," Maya said, reaching into her pocket and pulling out the heavy titanium flash drive.
She held it up in the firelight.
"I pulled it from Thorne's coat while he was unconscious on the bed," Maya said, a ghost of a defiant smile touching her cracked lips. "The one she has is a decoy."
Down at the end of the long driveway, a black luxury sedan pulled up to the gate, blocking the road. Caroline waved her arms frantically, running toward it, screaming for Aegis extraction.
The rear passenger window of the sedan rolled down.
A silenced barrel extended through the opening.
Pfft. Pfft.
Two muffled pops.
Caroline dropped instantly into the snow, motionless.
The sedan didn't stop. It put its transmission into reverse, spun around on the icy asphalt, and accelerated away into the blinding blizzard, leaving Caroline’s body behind like discarded garbage.
Aegis didn't leave loose ends.
"We have to go," Maya said, her voice urgent. "Now. Before they send another vehicle."
I limped to the surviving contractor’s SUV, checking the ignition. The keys were in the console. The engine rumbled smoothly to life.
I picked up Lily with my good arm and buckled her into the back seat. Clara scrambled in beside her, wrapping her arms around the smaller girl. Maya climbed into the passenger seat, gripping the dashboard, her breath coming in ragged, relieved gasps.
I climbed behind the wheel, slammed the heavy door shut, and hit the gas.
As we tore down the driveway, I looked in the rearview mirror.
The Victorian house groaned as its structural framing finally collapsed, sending a massive geyser of sparks and orange flames soaring a hundred feet into the freezing winter sky.
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The wall where my daughter had lived was gone. The bunker was buried under tons of burning timber.
We were out. But the road ahead was dark, frozen, and completely unknown.
