Chapter 17 - The Cornered Wolf
Marcus drew his weapon, motioning with his fingers for me to stay low behind the rusted shell of an overturned rowboat.
I crouched in the wet dirt, my heart hammering like a trapped bird against my ribs. The crying inside the cabin grew louder, punctuated by the sound of heavy footsteps pacing back and forth across wooden floorboards.
"Shut up!" Julian’s voice tore through the night, shrill, frantic, frayed to the absolute edge. "Shut up, damn you! They’ll be here in twenty minutes! Shut up!"
The baby’s wails only intensified, shrill with hunger and fear.
Marcus crept up the rotting wooden steps of the porch, his back pressed against the peeling exterior wall. He peered through a grime-covered window, then signaled back to me: *One target. Child on the cot. Subject armed.*
Julian had a gun.
Suddenly, a loud crack echoed across the stillness. Marcus’s boot had put pressure on a rotted deck plank, causing the water-logged wood to splinter.
The crying inside abruptly stopped.
"Who’s out there?!" Julian shrieked from within. "Sienna?! Did you do it?! Did you get rid of her?!"
Silence hung in the air, heavy and lethal.
"I’m warning you! I have a firearm!" Julian screamed, followed by the metallic racking of a slide.
Before Marcus could breach the door, the flimsy wooden panel was kicked wide from the inside. Julian stood in the doorway, wild-eyed, unwashed, his designer coat stained with grease and mud. In his right hand was a compact black pistol, pointing blindly into the darkness.
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"Drop the weapon, Vance!" Marcus’s voice boomed like thunder, the tactical light on his firearm instantly blinding Julian with a blinding cone of white light. "Sheriff’s department! Drop it!"
Julian panicked, firing two wild shots into the trees.
