Chapter 36 - Ash on the Wind
I didn't reach for my gun. I reached for the emergency fire-suppression lever on the wall six inches from my left hand.
I hauled it down with all my weight.
A deafening siren shrieked through the cavernous loading bay. Overhead, high-pressure industrial dry-chemical nozzles detonated, flooding the room with a dense, blinding storm of toxic white fire-retardant powder.
"Down!" I screamed, grabbing Mateo by the collar and shoving him beneath an overturned steel mail cart.
Gunfire erupted.
Julianna fired blindly through the white fog, the suppressed cracks of her pistol snapping against the concrete pillars. Arthur roared, his revolver booming like thunderclaps, the muzzle flashes illuminating the swirling white dust like strobe lights in hell.
A bullet ricocheted inches above my ear, showering my hair with pulverized concrete. Clara let out a sharp, terrified wail.
"Get in the truck!" Dante roared.
Through the blinding ash, Dante lunged forward with the primal fury of a wounded lion. Despite the severe burns on his chest, he slammed his full body weight into Arthur Vance, driving his father backward into the spinning fan belt of the idling diesel generator.
A sickening crunch echoed through the room, followed by an agonized, inhuman howl that was suddenly cut short as the generator sputtered and died, choking on bone and fabric.
Dante stumbled back out of the dust cloud, clutching his bleeding side. "The truck! Brianna, go!"
I scrambled to the driver's side of the armored Suburban, reached under the front wheel well, and pulled the magnetic key box free. I hit the unlock switch. The heavy doors clicked open with the solid thud of a bank vault.
"Mateo, in! Floorboard, now!"
Mateo scrambled into the backseat, tucking himself beneath the heavy floor mats just as I dove into the driver's seat, unstrapping Clara and pressing her into the passenger seat harness beside me.
Julianna emerged from the white cloud like a ghost, her face smeared with chemical dust, blood leaking from her nose. She raised her gun, aiming dead center through the windshield at my face.
"Die, you little bitch!" she screamed.
*Click.*
The slide of her pistol locked back. Empty.
I stared at her through the reinforced ballistic glass. My hands gripped the leather steering wheel. I jammed the key into the ignition, slammed the gear shift into drive, and flattened the accelerator to the floor.
The four-ton armored vehicle roared to life, six hundred horsepower exploding into the rear tires.
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Julianna’s eyes widened with pure, unadulterated terror as the heavy steel push-bar on the front of the Suburban hit her at forty miles an hour, launching her through the wooden loading bay doors into the icy Chicago night.
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