Chapter 4 - NIGHT AT THE SAFEHOUSE
"Red Alpha! Red Alpha!" Marcus bellowed into his tactical radio, his calm demeanor instantly shattering into military precision. "All teams, weapon readiness level one! We have incoming hostiles!"
Outside, the quiet solitude of the New Hampshire pine forest was shattered by the roaring engines of three heavy dark SUVs crashing through the wooden perimeter gate.
Inside the cabin, June let out a terrified scream, grabbing Iris and pulling her behind the thick stone fireplace. "Mr. Cole! What do we do?"
"Marcus, get them to the underground storm bunker!" Nathan commanded, pulling a heavy semi-automatic pistol from a hidden compartment beneath the dining table. "Now!"
"No time for the bunker—they're already on the lawn!" Marcus shouted, drawing his weapon as the heavy glass windows of the living room shattered into a hail of bullets.
Tactical gunfire echoed through the trees. Nathan’s security team outside traded heavy automatic fire with the syndicate mercenaries clad in black tactical gear. The thunderous cracks of high-caliber rifles tore through the wooden walls of the cabin, sending wood splinters and drywall dust filling the air.
Nathan ducked behind the solid oak dining table, firing three controlled shots through the shattered window, dropping an advancing mercenary on the front porch.
"June! Iris! Follow me!" Nathan yelled over the deafening noise.
He sprinted toward the kitchen, where a hidden trapdoor led to a secondary escape tunnel built into the mountain foundation. Marcus covered their retreat, firing methodically down the main hallway as two black-clad operatives kicked in the back door.
"Go, go, go!" Marcus shouted, shoving June down the narrow metal ladder inside the floor opening.
Iris hesitated at the edge of the opening, looking back at Nathan. "Mr. Cole! Your paper!"
Nathan looked down. The paper with Iris’s handwritten routing codes and her hand-drawn map was lying on the floor in the middle of the kitchen, exposed to the gunfire.
"Forget the paper, Iris! Get down!" Nathan roared, grabbing her by her hoodie and hoisting her safely down into the concrete shaft before diving in after her and slamming the heavy steel hatch shut.
They heard the loud thud of heavy combat boots hitting the floor above them, followed by rapid foreign shouting in Russian. Seconds later, a heavy explosive charge detonated against the steel hatch above, making the dust rain down on their heads, but the reinforced vault door held firm.
"The tunnel leads out to a concealed culvert half a mile down the ridge," Marcus panted, his hand bleeding from a glass scratch. "We have two tactical vehicles parked in the lower ravine."
They moved rapidly down the dark, damp concrete corridor, lighted only by low-voltage red emergency lights. June was weeping silently, her arms wrapped tight around her daughter, but Iris remained uncannily quiet, holding tightly to the sleeve of Nathan's jacket.
They reached the end of the tunnel, pushing open a rusty iron grate hidden beneath a thick tangle of pine branches and boulders. A black, unbranded SUV was waiting in the shadows of the ravine, its engine idling silently.
"Get in!" Marcus ordered, pushing June and Iris into the back seat while he took the driver's seat and Nathan jumped into the front passenger side.
Marcus floored the accelerator. The SUV surged forward, tearing through the muddy off-road track just as two enemy vehicles rounded the upper ridge, spotlights cutting through the dark forest. Bullets slammed into the rear armored glass of the SUV with heavy thuds, but the thick ballistic glass held.
As they burst onto the paved highway heading back south toward Boston, the adrenaline in the vehicle remained sky-high. June was trembling hysterically in the back.
"They knew where we were..." June sobbed. "They're going to kill us! They're going to kill my baby!"
"They won't touch you, June," Nathan said, turning in his seat to face her. His suit was covered in plaster dust and soot, his eyes burning with a fierce, dangerous light. "I promise you."
"Mr. Cole," Iris whispered from the back seat.
Nathan looked at the small girl. "Are you okay, Iris?"
Iris slowly unzipped her green dinosaur hoodie. From inside her shirt, she pulled out the folded sheet of paper—the drawing of the camera layout and the transcribed routing numbers.
"I picked it up before we ran," she said softly. "You said it was important."
Nathan stared at the little girl in absolute disbelief. In the middle of an armed assault, while bullets were tearing through the house, she had possessed the composure to grab the single piece of evidence that linked Raymond's Zurich accounts to the Vane Syndicate's main offshore server.
Marcus caught Nathan’s eye in the rearview mirror and shook his head in awe. "That kid isn't human, Nathan. She’s an operative."
Nathan reached back and gently took the paper from her small hands. "Iris, you just saved our lives for the second time today."
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"Does this mean we can stop the bad man with the ring?" she asked.
"Yes," Nathan said, his voice dropping into a cold, lethal register. "It means we finish this tonight."
