Chapter 17 - The Stranger at the Pier
The wooden stairs creaked beneath my violent ascent.
"Clara, stay behind me!" I roared, pushing open the nursery door with the muzzle of the 12-gauge.
The room was bathed in the dim pink glow of the nightlight.
The wooden crib was empty.
The white ruffled blanket Lily always slept with lay crumpled on the floor near the open bay window.
The ocean breeze was blowing the sheer curtains wildly inward, carrying the cold scent of rain and wet asphalt.
"Lily!" Clara screamed, lunging past me toward the window, her sanity visibly crumbling.
I grabbed her waist, holding her back as I thrust the shotgun out into the darkness.
Below the nursery window, a ladder made of braided climbing rope hung anchored to the heavy gutter.
Footprints in the damp flowerbed led directly toward the rocky shoreline trail.
In the distance, down by the old commercial fishing pier, a single boat engine roared to life with a violent, throaty sputter.
"Get Vance!" I yelled, my voice ringing with a level of ferocity I had never known I possessed. "Call the Coast Guard! Tell them there's an active kidnapping in progress!"
I didn't wait for her response.
I vaulted over the low windowsill, catching the braided rope with one gloved hand and sliding down into the mud below.
The gravel tore into my palms as I hit the ground running.
The coastal fog was thick, rolling in off the Atlantic like a blinding gray sheet.
Every breath tore at my throat like swallowed glass.
Through the mist, the flashing amber navigation light of an old lobster boat flickered near the end of the wooden pier.
"Lily!" I bellowed into the howling wind, pumping a shell into the shotgun chamber.
As I reached the wooden planks of the pier, a silhouette emerged from behind a stack of weathered lobster traps.
It was Raymond Shaw.
He was wearing a dark waterproof slicker, holding a silenced 9mm automatic pointed directly at my chest.
"Drop the weapon, David," Shaw said, his voice calm, chilling, and completely detached.
"Where is my daughter, Shaw?" I snarled, keeping the shotgun raised at his head, my finger tightening on the heavy trigger.
"She's safe in the cabin of the boat," Shaw replied smoothly, not flinching an inch. "For now."
"I will blow your head off your shoulders right here on these planks," I promised him, every muscle in my body vibrating with lethal intent.
"You could," Shaw agreed with a cold smile. "And while your shot echoes across the harbor, the timer on the incendiary charge under her bassinet will expire in ninety seconds."
My heart plummeted into an abyss of pure horror.
"You bastard," I whispered, the barrel of my gun dipping an inch as my knees went hollow.
"Drop it into the water," Shaw commanded, nodding toward the dark, churning ocean beneath the pier. "Drop it, or your bloodline ends tonight."
Slowly, deliberately, keeping my eyes locked on his cold, dead gaze, I opened my fingers.
The heavy shotgun slipped from my grasp, falling through the gap in the wooden pilings and splashing into the freezing black tide below.
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"Now," Shaw said, his smile widening into a grotesque grimace. "Let's discuss terms."
***
