Chapter 8 - THE SHADOW IN THE NURSERY
The high beams in the rearview mirror were blinding.
Three black Dodge Rams.
Modified with heavy steel push-bars and tinted windshields.
They were gaining on us at over one hundred and twenty miles per hour.
"Dante," Teresa said calmly, clicking the safety off her small revolver.
"They're not trying to pass."
"I know," Dante replied.
He didn't tap the brakes.
He didn't swerve.
He shifted the transmission into manual mode and grabbed the heavy leather-wrapped paddle shifters behind the wheel.
"Elena, get Sophie onto the floorboards."
"Cover her with your body."
I didn't argue.
I slid off the leather seat into the narrow footwell.
I pulled Sophie beneath me, tucking her small head between my chest and the front seat frame.
"Mama, it's dark," Sophie whispered.
"I know, baby. Keep your eyes closed."
"Think about your star pillow."
CRUNCH.
The first Ram slammed into our rear bumper.
The impact felt like an artillery shell striking the frame.
The Suburban shuddered violently, the tires screeching across the slush on the Kosciuszko Bridge.
The ballistic glass of the rear hatch spiderwebbed into thousands of white fractures, but held.
"Hold on!" Dante roared.
He downshifted two gears.
The engine screamed at six thousand RPM.
Dante tapped the emergency brake with his left foot, swinging the three-ton vehicle into a controlled slide across three lanes of traffic.
The trailing Ram overshot us, its tires losing traction on the black ice.
It struck the bridge's concrete retaining wall at eighty miles per hour.
The truck flipped end over end, a blinding spray of sparks and twisted sheet metal raining down onto the roadway before it vaulted over the edge into the black waters of Newtown Creek.
One down.
Two left.
The second Ram pulled up alongside our driver's side door.
The passenger window rolled down.
A man in a dark tactical mask leaned out, raising a drum-fed shotgun.
BOOM.
Heavy buckshot peppered Dante's window.
The two-inch ballistic glass turned milky white, spiderwebbing under the blast, but the pellets didn't penetrate.
Dante didn't flinch.
He yanked the wheel hard to the left, using the Suburban’s reinforced steel running boards to pit-maneuver the truck.
The two vehicles collided with an ear-splitting shriek of grinding steel.
Dante leaned on the gas, driving the Ram into the steel suspension cables of the bridge.
The truck's front wheel sheared off in a shower of sparks.
The vehicle spun out of control, slamming backward into an overhead sign gantry and stalling across the lanes.
"Clear on the left!" Teresa announced.
"Where is the third one?" I panted from the floor.
Dante looked up into the rearview mirror.
The third truck hadn't followed us onto the bridge.
It had taken the lower commercial bypass.
"He's heading directly to Pier 4," Dante said, his voice tightening.
"He knows the route."
"He knows we have to exit at Atlantic Avenue."
Dante took the off-ramp on two wheels, the tires hopping over the icy curb into the desolate industrial streets of DUMBO.
The cobblestones rattled our teeth.
The old brick warehouses of the waterfront loomed through the freezing mist like ancient tombs.
The Brooklyn Bridge towered overhead, its massive granite arches disappearing into the low-hanging storm clouds.
Dante killed the headlights.
He killed the running lights.
He steered the darkened SUV through the narrow alleys between the old coffee storage houses until we reached the rusted iron gates of Pier 4.
The gate was hanging open.
The chain had been cut with heavy bolt cutters, fresh copper links lying in the snow.
Inside the compound sat the third Dodge Ram.
Its engine was idling, white exhaust curling into the rain.
The driver's door was open.
Footprints led across the wooden pier toward the cavernous entrance of the cold-storage building.
Dante brought our SUV to a silent stop beside an overturned shipping container.
He turned around in his seat.
He reached into the footwell and gently touched my shoulder.
"Are you all right, Elena?"
I looked up at him.
My sweater was torn, my hair plastered to my face, but my eyes were steady.
"We finish this, Dante."
"We finish it tonight."
Dante looked down at Sophie, who was peeking out from beneath my arm.
He reached out and gently tapped her small nose with his index finger.
"You stay with your grandmother in the truck, little star."
"Bruno would want you to guard the front seat."
Sophie nodded solemnly, wiping a tear from her cheek.
"I will, Mr. Dante."
Dante reached beneath his seat and pulled out a heavy twelve-gauge tactical shotgun.
He racked the slide with a crisp, lethal clack.
He handed me his spare pistol—a compact silver Sig Sauer.
"Do you know how to use this?"
I took the cold metal in my palm.
"Miguel showed me once."
"Point and squeeze."
"Don't pull the trigger until you see his face," Dante said.
May you like
He kicked his door open into the freezing wind.
"Let's go take our family back."
