Chapter 3 - The Broken Seal
Ten minutes earlier, in the sitting room across the hall, Ruby Kelly had not moved an inch.
Her heart was pounding so hard she could feel it behind her teeth, vibrating in her small chest like a trapped bird. The big man in the dark tactical vest, the one Vincent had called Marcus, stood three feet away from the doorway, holding a rifle across his chest. He looked like the bouncers outside the clubs near her mother’s apartment in Brooklyn—bored, cruel, and completely indifferent to the people around him.
"Stay down, kids," Marcus had grunted when the shooting started in the study.
Then the loud thud had shuddered through the walls as the heavy metal plates dropped into the doors. Marcus had cursed, lunging toward the hallway, firing three frantic rounds through the sitting room door before realizing the bullets were bouncing off the inner steel core.
"Boss?!" Marcus yelled, slamming his shoulder into the door. "Moretti! What the hell happened to the locks?!"
No answer came through the reinforced walls, only the muffled sounds of a struggle and the sudden, unmistakable crack of a handgun.
In the corner, Lucas was trembling so violently that the aluminum footrests of his wheelchair were clattering against each other. His breathing came in ragged, shallow gasps. "Ruby," he whispered, his voice tiny, barely audible over the hum of the air system. "They’re going to kill my dad."
Ruby squeezed his hand harder. Her fingers were sticky with sweat, but she didn't let go.
"No, they aren't," she whispered back fiercely. Her red hair fell into her eyes, wild and tangled. "Your dad’s tough. He built this whole place like a castle. Remember what you told me about the secret walls?"
Lucas swallowed, trying to find his breath. "The... the maintenance crawlspace? The one for the elevator cables?"
"Where is it?"
Lucas looked toward the decorative wainscoting beneath the built-in bookshelves on the western wall. "Behind the encyclopedias. The bottom panel slides to the left. But... Ruby, I can’t walk. I can't climb into the crawlway."
Ruby looked at the heavy door. Outside, they could hear the second guard, Elena, shouting in the hallway, trying to wedge a crowbar into the lock mechanism. Marcus was distracted, pacing the perimeter of the room, checking the reinforced windows to see if the steel shutters had sealed them in as well.
"You don't need to climb," Ruby whispered, leaning down so her lips brushed Lucas's ear. "You just need to unlock the brake on your chair when I tell you to. You have the battery override button, right? The one your dad showed you that makes it go really fast?"
Lucas nodded slowly, his fingers finding the toggle switch beneath the right armrest. It was an emergency high-torque mode designed to help the heavy motorized chair navigate steep outdoor gravel inclines.
"If he comes over here," Ruby said, her voice dropping into that strange, eerie calm that children sometimes display in disasters, "you hit that switch and drive right into his shins. As hard as you can."
"What are you going to do?"
Ruby reached into the pocket of her overalls. Her fingers closed around a heavy, brass-handled antique letter opener she had picked up from the coffee table when Vincent’s men had first marched them into the room. It wasn't a sword, but the point was sharp, and the solid brass pommel had weight.
"I’m going to make sure he doesn't touch you," she said.
In the hallway, the sound of the crowbar snapping echoed through the vents. Elena swore loudly. "The hydraulic lock is hardwired into the subfloor, Marcus! We can't pry it! If Moretti’s dead in there, we’re trapped in this corridor!"
"He’s not dead," Marcus growled, turning back toward the sitting room. His eyes landed on the two children. His face tightened into an ugly, ruthless mask. "We need leverage. If Thornton has the boss pinned, he won't do anything if I bring the kid out."
He took two heavy steps toward Lucas’s wheelchair, reaching out his thick, gloved hand to grab the boy’s collar.
"Don't touch him!" Ruby screamed.
She didn't hesitate. She didn't cower. The nine-year-old girl launched herself forward like an arrow, driving the point of the brass letter opener straight down into the meat of Marcus’s left thigh.
Marcus let out an explosive roar of agony and shock. The weapon penetrated two inches into his muscle. Blood instantly soaked through his tactical pants. He staggered backward, his knee buckling, his hands instinctively dropping from his rifle to clutch his leg.
"You little rat!" he howled, swinging his heavy backhand toward her.
"Lucas, now!" Ruby shrieked, tumbling to the carpet to avoid the blow.
Lucas slammed his palm down on the high-torque toggle.
The twin electric motors of the heavy orthopedic chair whined with a high-pitched scream. The two-hundred-pound steel-and-battery machine leaped forward across the hardwood floor with terrifying force. The reinforced steel footrests slammed directly into Marcus’s injured left knee with a sickening, audible crack.
The guard’s leg bent sideways at an unnatural angle. He shrieked, a high, ragged sound of shattered bone, and crashed face-first onto the glass-topped coffee table, shattering it into thousands of harmless safety crystals. The rifle flew from his grip, sliding across the floor and lodging itself beneath the heavy leather sofa.
Marcus lay on the floor, groaning in agony, clutching his ruined knee, completely incapacitated.
Lucas sat in the chair, his chest heaving, his hands locked onto the joystick. For the first time in twelve months, the hollow, helpless look in his eyes was gone. In its place was a sharp, blazing fire.
"Ruby," Lucas said, his voice ringing clear through the room. "The keys. On his belt."
Ruby scrambled across the carpet, ignoring the blood and the broken glass. With steady, deft fingers, she unclipped the heavy ring of security keycards and tactical fobs from Marcus’s webbed belt.
"I got them," she said, looking toward the door.
From the hallway outside, Elena’s voice was hysterical. "Marcus! What happened in there?! Open the door!"
Then, a sudden, heavy crash echoed from the study down the hall.
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The master study door swung open. Maxwell Thornton stepped into the corridor, his face bruised, his clothes torn, holding a Colt .45 in one hand and dragging a bloodied Vincent Moretti by his jacket collar with the other.
"Elena," Maxwell’s voice thundered through the narrow hallway with the terrifying authority of a commander who had retaken his ship. "Drop your weapon on the floor, kick it toward the stairs, and put your hands behind your head. If you don't, Vincent dies right here on the carpet."
