Chapter 9 - THE GARAGE BENEATH VALE TOWERDaniel tackled Riley behind the lookout wall as gunfire cut through the wooden railing.
June and Ortiz returned fire toward the trees. Vanessa pulled Trent beneath the stairs.
The man holding Daniel’s key ran downhill.
Riley shoved her father away.
“You handed it to him!”
“It’s a transmitter.”
Daniel showed her a small receiver clipped inside his sleeve. A red light moved across its screen.
“I needed Grant to believe it was real.”
“You could have told us.”
“There was no time.”
“There is never time when you decide for everyone.”
Daniel had no answer.
The attackers withdrew once the key left the area. Daniel tracked it toward the city. Grant was transporting it directly to Vale Tower.
By sunrise, the family had returned downtown in separate vehicles.
Vale Tower rose forty stories above the financial district. Grant’s offices occupied the upper floors, but the transmitter stopped beneath the underground parking garage.
Daniel believed Northline’s hidden server was housed below it.
They entered through a delivery ramp.
Ortiz remained near the exit to secure a route out. June cut power to the surveillance cameras. Daniel, Riley, Vanessa, and Trent moved down three levels toward a locked service corridor.
Riley used the real brass keys on a concealed panel.
The door opened.
Beyond it was a concrete tunnel lined with fiber-optic cables.
Trent whistled. “This is underneath half the city.”
“Northline controls emergency routing,” Daniel said. “Police, hospitals, traffic systems.”
“And Grant controls Northline,” Vanessa replied.
“Not after today.”
They reached the server room.
Grant waited inside.
Judge Pike stood beside him, no longer in federal custody.
Two guards held June at gunpoint.
Riley turned.
The woman walking beside them was not June.
Grant had captured her through another entrance and used one of his employees as a decoy on the cameras.
“You continue to underestimate how many people need me,” Grant said.
Daniel stepped forward. “Let June go.”
“Give me the keys.”
“You already have one.”
Grant held up the transmitter. “A clever imitation.”
He nodded toward Vanessa.
A guard seized her and pressed a weapon against her side.
Trent moved, but Riley caught his arm.
Grant smiled. “The Mercer family. So determined to protect one another after spending years lying.”
He was right about the lies.
Riley hated him more for being right.
Daniel placed the real key on the floor and slid it forward.
Grant’s guard picked it up.
The second key remained hidden inside Vanessa’s coat.
Grant looked at her. “Your turn.”
Vanessa slowly reached inside.
Instead of producing the key, she threw a metal compact at the overhead lights.
Darkness filled the room.
Daniel attacked the nearest guard.
Riley rushed Grant.
Emergency lights activated in red pulses. Grant caught Riley’s arm and drove her into a server cabinet. She blocked his next strike and swept his leg, but he grabbed a cable and pulled her down with him.
They crashed onto the floor.
Trent tackled the guard holding Vanessa. The two men rolled between the server racks. Vanessa crawled toward the central console with the second key.
June broke free and struck her captor with his own forearm. Daniel disarmed him.
Grant pinned Riley against the concrete.
“You think your father is a hero?” he whispered. “Ask him who selected the witnesses Northline abandoned.”
Riley drove her forehead against his chin, not hard enough to injure him badly but enough to break his grip.
She rolled on top and trapped his wrist.
“Talk.”
Grant laughed. “Daniel built the first version of the system.”
Riley looked toward her father.
Daniel’s silence confirmed it.
“You created this?”
“I built it to protect people.”
“And Grant used it to hunt them.”
“I tried to shut it down.”
“How many died before you tried?”
Daniel’s expression collapsed.
Grant used Riley’s hesitation to throw her aside. He grabbed the second key from Vanessa and ran through the emergency exit.
Riley followed.
The door opened into the underground parking garage.
Grant climbed into an armored sedan. Riley jumped onto the hood as it accelerated up the ramp. She caught the windshield edge while the vehicle swerved between concrete columns.
Grant braked sharply.
Riley slid across the hood but held on.
The sedan reversed toward another car. Riley rolled off seconds before the vehicles collided. The impact spun Grant’s sedan sideways.
Daniel’s SUV entered the garage, blocking the ramp.
Grant abandoned his car and ran.
Riley chased him onto the next level.
He reached a parked motorcycle, but Trent rammed a maintenance cart into its front wheel. Grant flew over the handlebars and landed on a padded construction barrier.
He recovered and seized Trent.
Riley stopped.
Grant held a gun beneath Trent’s jaw.
“Give me the keys.”
“You have them,” Riley said.
“Your father changed the code.”
Daniel emerged behind her.
“Let the boy go.”
Grant’s hand tightened. “You never cared about him.”
Vanessa walked into the garage.
“I do.”
She stepped closer despite the weapon.
“Trent, look at me.”
He did.
“When I move, drop.”
Vanessa threw her handbag at Grant’s face.
Trent dropped.
Riley rushed forward and drove Grant into the side of the damaged sedan. They wrestled for the weapon. Daniel caught Grant’s wrist. Riley twisted the gun free and threw it beneath a parked truck.
Federal vehicles entered the garage.
Grant finally stopped fighting.
Ortiz approached with several armed agents.
Riley exhaled for the first time in minutes.
“It’s over,” Trent said.
Ortiz took the paired keys from Vanessa.
Then she aimed her gun at Daniel.
“No,” Ortiz replied. “It’s changing ownership.”
The federal agents turned their weapons toward the Mercer family.
They were not federal agents.
Grant began laughing from the ground.
Ortiz helped him stand.
“You worked for him,” Riley said.
“Grant worked for me,” Ortiz answered.
June entered the garage from the server tunnel, but two of Ortiz’s people captured her.
Ortiz placed the keys inside her coat.
“Northline is worth more than evidence,” she said. “It is the ability to decide who receives help and who disappears.”
She forced June into a black vehicle.
Grant entered beside them.
The convoy drove toward the exit.
Riley grabbed the motorcycle Grant had abandoned. Its front wheel was bent, but the engine still ran.
Daniel caught the rear of her jacket.
“You cannot chase them alone.”
Riley pulled free.
“I’m not asking permission anymore.”
She accelerated up the ramp.
On Daniel’s receiver, the transmitter began moving toward the airport.
Then a second signal appeared.
It came from inside Ortiz’s vehicle.
June had activated another tracker.
May you like
A message flashed beneath it:
Hangar 19. Do not trust Daniel with the archive. He knows why your mother was selected to die.
