Chapter 29 - The hunter's crosshair
The radio died with a sharp squawk of static. Marcus stood motionless in the damp cavern, his thumb releasing the push-to-talk button. The limestone ceiling dripped cold water onto his shoulder, each drop echoing like the ticking of an executioner's clock.
"He's waiting for us at the exit," Viktor whispered, panic tightening around his throat like a noose. "We can't go up there. It's suicide! There will be snipers covering every rail car, thermal drones over the tracks—"
"Quiet," Marcus ordered, his voice cutting through Viktor's hysteria like a surgical blade.
Marcus set Tessa down gently on a dry boulder. He took off his canvas jacket and wrapped it around her small shoulders, tucking the collar tight around her neck. "Tessa, look at me."
The little girl looked up, her dark eyes wide and remarkably calm. She had her mother's eyes—sharp, observant, refusing to succumb to fear.
"I have to clear the building above us before we can leave," Marcus said softly. "I need you to stay right here with Viktor. If he tries to run, or if he tries to touch that radio, what do you do?"
Tessa reached into the oversized pocket of the jacket and rested her small hand on the grip of the Colt pistol Marcus had handed her earlier. "I aim at his knee and pull the hammer."
Viktor stared at the child in disbelief, taking an involuntary step back against the stone wall. "You trained a seven-year-old to shoot me?"
"I trained her to survive people like you," Marcus said coldly.
He checked the magazine on his primary sidearm. Seven rounds remaining. He picked up the suppressed combat knife he had taken from the operative in the gym. He had no body armor, no night-vision optics, and no backup. But he had something Vance’s mercenaries would never possess: an intimate knowledge of the terrain. Marcus had worked the machinery at the limestone quarry for two years when he first arrived in Oak Ridge. He knew every rusted catwalk, every blind corner, and every iron chute in that crumbling industrial complex.
Marcus turned and moved soundlessly up the inclined stone ramp leading toward the basement maintenance hatch of the crusher.
He reached the heavy iron bulkhead. The seals were cracked with age, allowing faint slivers of yellow halogen light to cut through the seams. Above him, he could hear the steady hum of a portable diesel generator and the low murmur of tactical chatter over military-grade radios.
Marcus peered through a rust hole in the steel plate.
Two operators in high-cut helmets and digital gray camouflage were stationed by the loading dock, their assault rifles slung across their chests. In the center of the vast, open processing floor sat three tactical command cases.
May you like
And standing beside the largest console was a tall, silver-haired man in a crisp field jacket, his back turned, sipping coffee from a steel thermos as though he were conducting a routine military exercise.
Colonel Vance was alive. And he was holding Miller's federal badge in his gloved palm, flipping it over like a pocket coin.
