Chapter 16 - The Trap on Devil’s Basin
Daniel lowered the weapon by half an inch. His mind was racing, calculating angles, distances, and exit routes with the cold clarity of a cornered predator. "Where is Evelyn?"
Vance chuckled, standing up and brushing a speck of lint from his sleeve. "Evelyn is waiting at the family estate on Devil’s Basin. She wants to see her boy, Daniel. She wants to hold the child she engineered."
"The woman in the prison," Daniel said, stalling for every second. "Who was she?"
"A heroin addict with terminal lupus from Philadelphia," Vance replied carelessly. "Three hundred thousand dollars into her daughter’s college fund, and she happily walked into that cell with Evelyn’s identification tags. People will do anything for family, Daniel. Even you."
Vance snapped his fingers. The two tactical contractors moved forward, zip-ties in hand.
*Now.*
Daniel didn't aim for Vance. He whipped the Glock downward and fired twice through the floorboards directly into the exposed propane heater line beneath the baseboard.
The blue flame exploded into a wall of fire.
The concussion knocked the two contractors backward into the hallway. Daniel threw his entire body weight forward, slamming his shoulder into Vance’s chest. The doctor crashed against the drywall, gasping for air as Daniel snatched the umbrella from Vance’s hand, drove the reinforced carbon-fiber ferrule into the doctor's kneecap with a sickening *crack*, and vaulted through the shattered front window onto the gravel lot.
Bullets chewed through the wood siding behind him. Daniel hit the rain-soaked asphalt, rolled, and sprinted for the contractor’s idling Maybach.
He shattered the driver-side glass with his gun handle, reached in, hit the unlock, and dove behind the wheel. The keys were in the center console. The engine roared to life.
As he threw the luxury sedan into reverse, slamming through the motel's wooden perimeter fence, his satellite phone on the dash buzzed.
A video message had arrived.
Daniel tapped the screen with a bleeding thumb as he accelerated onto the coastal highway.
The screen flickered, showing the interior of an antique maritime tower. The rain lashed against high arched glass. Sitting on a velvet chair in front of a raging fireplace was Evelyn Montgomery. Her face was gaunt, her eyes sunken but burning with manic triumph.
Cradled in her lap, drugged into unconsciousness, was Noah.
Beside her, lying face down on the bloody floorboards, was Rosa.
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"You're late, darling," Evelyn whispered to the camera, stroking Noah’s hair with long, diamond-encrusted fingers. "The tide is coming in at Devil’s Basin. And Claire has been waiting in the water for you for a very long time."
***
