Chapter 3 - THIRTY FEET TO FREEDOM
Samuel's voice came faintly through the drainage tunnel.
“Dominic.”
Dominic pushed Elena toward it.
“Go.”
“No.”
“Elena.”
“I didn't come back three times to leave you thirty feet from freedom.”
Footsteps crossed the floor overhead.
Dominic looked at the narrow tunnel, then at his injured side.
He could not crawl quickly enough.
Elena could.
That decided it.
Dominic took the micro-SIM card from his pocket and pushed it into her palm.
“Get this to Samuel.”
“What about you?”
“Marcus needs my signature. That keeps me alive.”
“For how long?”
Dominic did not answer.
The basement door opened.
Elena crawled into the tunnel.
Dominic dragged the shelving back across the entrance just before Marcus's men descended.
Through a crack, Elena watched them seize him.
Dominic did not resist.
Marcus appeared last.
He looked at the broken chain.
Then smiled.
“Where is she?”
Dominic wiped blood from his mouth.
“Who?”
Marcus struck him.
Elena flinched.
Dominic barely moved.
Marcus struck him again.
“Where is the maid?”
“You really need better conversation.”
Marcus's expression changed.
He ordered his men to search the basement.
Elena began crawling.
Behind her came the crash of furniture being overturned.
Twenty feet.
A man shouted.
Ten.
Then someone moved the shelf.
“There!”
Elena scrambled forward.
A hand caught her ankle.
She screamed.
Then Samuel appeared at the opposite end and grabbed both her arms.
For several terrible seconds, Elena was pulled between two men.
Her shoe came off.
Samuel dragged her through.
A gunshot exploded behind them.
Samuel pushed her down.
They ran.
Dominic heard the shot from the basement.
Something inside him changed.
For three weeks he had endured everything Marcus did because resistance endangered his mother.
But Elena had become another hostage simply because she had chosen not to abandon him.
He would not allow it.
Marcus turned back toward him.
“Now.”
Dominic hit him.
One punch.
Hard.
Marcus stumbled.
Dominic drove his shoulder into the nearest guard.
Pain tore through his ribs.
He ignored it.
He reached the stairs before another man tackled him.
They crashed onto the concrete.
Dominic fought like a man who understood that survival was no longer about himself.
Then Marcus pressed a gun against his head.
“Enough.”
Dominic stopped.
Marcus was breathing heavily.
“You always did think you were the hero.”
“No.”
Dominic looked up.
“I just know what you are.”
Marcus's jaw tightened.
He ordered Dominic moved upstairs.
But neither brother knew that Elena had escaped with the SIM card.
Samuel drove her to an abandoned warehouse near the harbor.
There, a laptop revealed what Marcus had hidden.
Bank transfers.
Names.
Photographs.
Police officers.
Judges.
Business executives.
And one file labeled E.C.
Evelyn Crane.
Samuel opened it.
A security-camera image appeared.
Dominic's mother sat inside a bedroom.
Elena recognized the wallpaper.
“Wait.”
Samuel looked at her.
“I've cleaned there.”
The property belonged to a Crane charity foundation.
A rehabilitation estate in Milton.
Marcus had hidden Evelyn in a building controlled by the family because nobody would search their own property.
Samuel stared at Elena.
“You're sure?”
“I cleaned that room last spring.”
Within an hour, Samuel had assembled four men Dominic trusted.
Elena insisted on going.
“No.”
“She knows me.”
Samuel frowned.
“Mrs. Crane?”
“I've cleaned her house twice. She'll trust me before she trusts armed strangers.”
That ended the argument.
At 2:14 in the morning, they entered the estate through a service corridor.
Elena found Evelyn exactly where the image suggested.
The older woman recognized her.
“Elena?”
“We need to leave.”
Evelyn looked behind her.
“Dominic?”
“He's alive.”
The woman's eyes filled.
That was enough.
They escaped without firing a shot.
At sunrise, Marcus walked into the basement carrying the transfer documents.
Dominic sat in a chair, wrists bound.
“Sign.”
Dominic looked at the page.
“Let me speak to my mother.”
“After.”
“No.”
Marcus sighed and dialed a number.
Nobody answered.
He tried again.
Nothing.
A third time.
Then another phone rang.
Dominic's.
Marcus stared at it.
His men had placed Dominic's belongings on a nearby table weeks earlier.
The phone had been dead.
Now it was ringing.
Marcus picked it up.
Unknown number.
He answered.
“Hello?”
A woman's voice came through.
“Marcus?”
All color disappeared from his face.
Evelyn.
Dominic slowly smiled.
His mother was free.
Marcus looked at him.
For the first time since the kidnapping, the balance of power had shifted.
May you like
“You should answer her,” Dominic said.
“She sounds angry.”
