Chapter 2 - Shadows in the Storm
Three miles from St. Matthew’s Hospital, the rain slammed against the rusted metal roof of an abandoned railway warehouse in the city’s industrial district.
Rachel Carter collapsed against a pile of wooden pallets, clutching her side. The rain had washed away much of the mud on her clothes, but it could not wash away the blood soaking through the makeshift bandage pressed against her left ribcage.
She pressed her back into the dark corner, holding her breath as the beam of a high-powered flashlight swept across the shattered glass windows forty feet above her head.
"She went toward the tracks!" a harsh, gravelly voice echoed through the cavernous structure.
Heavy tactical boots crunched against shattered concrete. Rachel closed her eyes, squeezing the trigger of a small, cold steel burner phone she had pulled from a hidden pocket inside her jacket lining. She dialed a number she had memorized three years ago—a number she had sworn she would never call unless death was standing in the room with her.
The line clicked.
"Speak," a sharp, authoritative female voice answered on the third ring.
"Sofia," Rachel gasped, her voice barely a thread above the howling wind outside. "It’s Katherine."
There was a sudden, violent pause on the line. At St. Matthew’s Hospital, Detective Sofia Ramirez stopped dead in her tracks in the middle of the pediatric lobby, pulling her phone tightly to her ear.
"Katherine?" Ramirez whispered, stepping away from the patrol officers. "Katherine Vance? Where have you been for three years? The entire state thought you were dead! Your husband—"
"Julian is trying to finish what he started," Rachel—Katherine—interrupted, gasping for air as a surge of agony shot through her abdomen. "He found us in Chicago two weeks ago. He’s been dosing Eli’s food with a synthetic compound from his lab. He didn't want to kill him immediately—he wanted to use Eli's illness to force me out of hiding so I would hand over the master ledger."
"Katherine, your son is in the ER right now," Ramirez said urgently, signaling to her partner to trace the cell signal. "He’s in critical condition. His hemoglobin is bottoming out."
"I know," Katherine wept, dark blood smearing her lips as she spoke. "I left him with Dr. Brooks because I knew Julian’s men were watching the hospital perimeter. If I stayed in that room, they would have stormed the pediatric floor. I drew them away, Sofia. I led four of his private security contractors into the industrial park."
"Where are you right now?"
"It doesn't matter where I am," Katherine rasped, listening to the heavy boots approaching her row of pallets. "Listen to me carefully, Sofia. In Eli’s backpack, there is a vial of V-77. It’s a custom blood toxin created by Julian’s pharmaceutical firm. The antidote isn't in a hospital pharmacy. The only counter-agent is derived from my own blood—my specific antibodies created during the initial trial three years ago."
"What are you saying?" Ramirez asked, her heart hammering against her ribs.
May you like
"If Julian catches me, Eli dies," Katherine said, racking the slide of a small pistol she had concealed beneath her stretched gray sweater. "And if I die before Dr. Brooks gets my blood, Eli dies anyway. Send an unmarked unit to the old train yard on 5th Street. Come alone, Sofia. If Julian’s men see blue lights, they’ll execute everyone in the block."
The line went dead.
