Chapter 16 - Ambush at Midnight
We abandoned the SUV half a mile downriver, concealing it beneath an overgrown copse of weeping willows along the railway tracks.
The air smelled of sulfur, wet mud, and rusted iron. The Blackwood complex sprawled across thirty acres of abandoned industrial wasteland, surrounded by twelve-foot chain-link fences topped with razor wire. Spotlights swept lazily across the perimeter yards, their beams cutting through the driving rain.
"The river intake tunnel is beneath the old coal dock," I whispered, kneeling beside Dante in the tall grass. I pointed toward a half-submerged concrete culvert where the dark waters of the Hudson churned against rusted iron grates.
"Sensors?" Dante asked, checking the chamber of his suppressed rifle.
"Croft knows the land, but he doesn't know the hydraulics," I replied, pulling a heavy pair of hydraulic bolt cutters from the tactical pack. "My father designed the intake to lock automatically if water levels dropped below three feet. It’s submerged enough to fool automated thermal scans."
We moved swiftly through the mud, staying low beneath the sightlines of the guard towers. The water was freezing as we waded waist-deep into the culvert. The stench of stagnant oil and decay was suffocating, but within five minutes, I had cut through the submerged security bars.
We climbed into the narrow maintenance shaft, our boots splashing softly against the concrete floor. The pipe sloped upward, leading us deep into the belly of the smelting complex.
Suddenly, Dante stopped, raising a closed fist.
Directly above us, through an iron drainage grate, voices echoed across the concrete.
"Croft said execute her at dawn if the courier doesn't arrive," a man with a heavy Eastern European accent said. "Why wait? The boss already has the offshore routing numbers. What does he need the second cipher for?"
"Because without the second cipher, the accounts dump fifty million dollars into the federal escrow reserve within twenty-four hours," a second voice answered, the metallic click of a lighter following. "We wait until seven. If Dante doesn't hand over the Vance girl, we put Clara in the river and blow the bridge."
Dante leaned close to my ear, his breath warm against the chill of the tunnel. "The boiler room is twenty yards ahead. When we breach, you stay behind me until the room is clear."
"I can shoot, Dante," I whispered back, pulling the Glock 19 he had given me from my holster. "Don't treat me like collateral."
A grim smile touched the edge of his lips. "Never again, Sarah."
We climbed the rusted iron ladder leading to the boiler hatch. Dante pushed the circular iron cover open an inch, scanning the space with his thermal scope. Three heat signatures occupied the smelting floor above.
With blinding speed, Dante threw the hatch open and ascended. Three suppressed shots cracked in rapid succession—*phut, phut, phut*.
By the time I pulled myself up onto the iron catwalk, the two guards were sprawled motionless against the concrete floor. The third had dropped his weapon and was backing away toward an alarm console, his hands raised in terror.
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"One word," Dante whispered, the barrel of his rifle inches from the man's temple, "and you join them. Where is Clara?"
The guard pointed with a trembling finger toward a heavy bank-style vault door set into the far concrete wall, illuminated by a pulsing yellow security beacon. "Inside... she's inside the clean room. But you can't open it. Croft set a dead-man trigger on the electronic lock!"
