Chapter 7 - the man in the gray raincoat
Elias drove through Portland with Major Sloan’s voice coming through the vehicle speakers.
The state police had placed units around the neighborhood, but they had not yet moved on the house. Sloan wanted confirmation that Lily was outside the primary residence before officers entered.
Then the emergency channel activated.
Lily’s voice came through.
Elias nearly lost control of the car.
Sloan ordered him to keep driving and let her guide the child.
He listened as Lily described the workshop.
He heard the knocking.
He heard the unknown male voice.
Then the radio went silent.
“Lily?” Elias called, even though his voice was not connected to her channel. “Lily!”
Sloan contacted the surveillance van.
“Who entered the workshop?”
The response came through seconds later.
“Claire Grant approached first. Male subject followed from the rear yard. Gray coat, approximately six feet, moving with a limp.”
“Rusk,” Elias said.
The man had returned.
“Team Two, intercept,” Sloan ordered.
A gunshot-like crack sounded through the radio.
Elias gripped the steering wheel.
“What was that?”
“Door impact,” the surveillance officer replied. “Not a firearm.”
Elias forced himself to breathe.
He was two minutes away.
The radio transmitted overlapping commands as officers moved behind neighboring houses.
Then another voice appeared.
“Workshop is empty. Rear escape hatch open.”
“Where is the child?”
“Searching.”
Elias turned into the neighborhood.
Police vehicles blocked the main intersection. An officer recognized his car and opened a path.
The Grant house appeared at the end of the street.
Lily’s bedroom window was dark.
The porch was dark.
The workshop door hung open behind the fence.
Elias stopped beside the utility van and jumped out before the car fully settled.
Major Sloan caught his arm.
“You cannot enter yet.”
“My daughter is out there.”
“And Rusk may be using her to draw you away from the house.”
Elias pulled free.
“He does not get to use her for anything.”
A small figure emerged from the neighboring yard.
Lily ran through the rain.
Elias crossed the street and dropped to his knees as she reached him.
She struck his chest with enough force to knock him backward.
He held her.
For several seconds, there were no investigators, stolen equipment, forged orders, or black military vehicles.
There was only his daughter.
“I knew you’d come,” Lily said against his shoulder.
“Always.”
“They lied.”
“I know.”
“Mom tried to help me at the end.”
Elias looked toward the workshop.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know. The man grabbed her when I went into the tunnel.”
Major Sloan touched her earpiece.
“Team Two found signs of a struggle behind the workshop. No Claire. No Rusk.”
Elias rose with Lily in his arms.
“Search every vehicle.”
“Already happening.”
A sedan suddenly accelerated from the back alley.
An officer shouted.
The vehicle struck a trash bin, swerved onto the road, and sped toward the eastern intersection.
Police units moved after it.
Sloan checked the tablet in her hand.
“The tracker is moving.”
“What tracker?”
“One of the stolen command terminals. It’s inside that sedan.”
“Claire may be in it.”
“We don’t know.”
Lily lifted her head.
“Mom dropped something.”
She opened her hand.
A small brass key rested in her palm.
“She pushed it through the tunnel before the man took her.”
Elias recognized it.
The key belonged to his home safe.
He had not seen it since leaving for deployment.
Sloan looked at him.
“What does it open?”
“A safe in my study.”
“Would Rusk know that?”
“He knows enough to want whatever is inside.”
“What is inside?”
Elias hesitated.
His emergency documents.
Family records.
A sealed letter from an intelligence officer who had died after the Raven Six mission.
Elias had never opened it.
The letter carried one instruction on the front.
Open only if Owen Rusk returns.
Elias looked toward the house.
“Rusk didn’t come back for the equipment.”
Sloan followed his gaze.
“He came back for your safe.”
Police lights appeared behind them as Captain Mercer arrived.
Elias handed Lily to a female officer, then took the brass key.
“I’m going inside.”
Sloan stepped in front of him.
“Not until the residence is cleared.”
A crash sounded from the second floor.
May you like
The bedroom curtain moved.
Then the house lights went out.
