Chapter 6 - The Siege of Rogers Park
"Get behind me!" I shouted, grabbing a heavy steel diagnostic monitor off the desk and hurling it with all my strength through the glass observation window facing the secondary exit hallway.
The tempered glass shattered into a thousand harmless pieces with a deafening crash.
"Go! Through the window!" I yelled to Elise and Maya.
The four security guards lunged forward, drawing their stun batons. I tackled the lead guard, driving my shoulder into his chest, slamming him against the metal doorframe. His baton clattered to the floor. I grabbed his wrist, executed a swift medical joint lock I had learned during my trauma residency, and threw him into the second guard.
"Gabriel, come on!" Elise screamed from the secondary hallway.
I disengaged, diving through the shattered glass window, landing on the linoleum floor of the service corridor. Maya slapped the emergency fire alarm button on the wall. High-decibel sirens blared through the building, and overhead sprinklers activated, flooding the hallway with cold water.
"This way!" I shouted, pulling Elise toward the underground delivery bay exit.
We burst through the heavy steel service doors into the cold night air, sprinting toward my SUV parked in the alley. Maya climbed into her car and sped off into the darkness to upload the encrypted files to a secure cloud server, while Elise and I scrambled into my vehicle.
As I threw the SUV into reverse and slammed on the gas, my phone rang violently.
It was Marcus.
"Gabriel!" Marcus’s voice was filled with background panic, sirens wailing in the distance. "They found the brownstone!"
My heart stopped. "What?! Who found the brownstone?"
"A team of private process servers accompanied by Cook County sheriff’s deputies!" Marcus yelled over the noise. "They have an emergency temporary protection order signed by an off-duty judge! They're taking Nora and Chloe to Eleanor's private estate right now!"
"No!" Elise screamed from the passenger seat, grabbing the dashboard. "No! My babies!"
"Where are they taking them, Marc?!" I demanded, turning the wheel hard, tires screeching as I shot out of the alley onto Michigan Avenue.
"To the Mercer estate in Lake Forest!" Marcus replied. "They invoked an emergency child welfare hold claiming Elise is an unfit mother fleeing a criminal investigation!"
I slammed my foot on the accelerator, the engine roaring as the SUV surged forward at ninety miles per hour through the empty city streets.
"Gabriel..." Elise sobbed, her hands shaking violently. "She took them. She actually took them."
"She thinks she’s won, Elise," I said, my hands locked onto the steering wheel, my jaw clenched so hard my teeth burned. "She thinks she can hide behind her judges, her private guards, and her money. But she has no idea what I'm about to do."
I dialed my father’s direct cell phone.
"Gabriel?" Arthur answered on the first ring, his voice raspy.
"She took the girls, Dad," I said, every word an ultimatum. "Eleanor had a corrupt judge issue a temporary custody order. They're at the Lake Forest estate right now."
A long silence hung on the line. Then, my father let out a long, shuddering breath.
"I am standing in the main foyer of the Lake Forest estate right now, Gabriel," Arthur said, his voice remarkably calm, steady, and devoid of fear for the first time in his life. "Your mother just brought the girls through the front door. She has locked them in the east wing nursery."
"Dad, don't let her touch them," I pleaded. "I'm twenty minutes away."
"You don't need twenty minutes, son," Arthur said softly. "I have spent thirty years letting this woman destroy everything good in my life. I let her destroy you. I let her destroy Elise. I am not going to let her destroy my granddaughters."
May you like
"Dad, what are you doing?"
"I am unlocking the perimeter gates, Gabriel," Arthur said. "And then I am calling the Chief of the Illinois State Police—a man whose life you saved on your operating table five years ago. Bring Elise. It’s time to end this."
