Chapter 12 - Ambush at Dock Fourteen
Gunfire roared like thunder inside the enclosed warehouse.
Bullets ripped through the steel walls of the shipping containers.
Alessandro sprinted through the crossfire, throwing himself over my crouching
body.
He pulled me against the concrete base of the container.
He fired his rifle with one hand, taking down two mercenaries who rushed our
position.
“Are you hurt?” he yelled over the deafening noise.
“I’m fine!” I shouted back. “The computer—we have to trigger the beacon!”
“Forget the money!”
“It’s not money, Alessandro! It’s the evidence that destroys Vaneau’s entire
network!”
Alessandro looked across the open floor.
The folding table with the laptop was fifteen feet away in the direct line of
fire.
Vaneau was pinned behind an iron forklift, firing frantically with his automatic
pistol.
Marco and the Moretti soldiers were suppressing the remaining mercenaries near
the entrance.
“Cover me!” I yelled, preparing to lunge for the table.
Alessandro grabbed my collar, hauling me back.
“Are you crazy?! You’ll get shredded!”
“My father died for this!” I screamed into his face, tears mixing with the dust
on my skin. “I won’t let his name die in the dark!”
Alessandro stared at me.
Then, he nodded once.
“On three,” he said.
“One.”
“Two.”
Alessandro stood fully upright into the hail of lead.
He laid down a relentless spray of suppressive fire directly toward Vaneau’s
forklift.
“Go!” he roared.
I dove across the concrete.
A bullet grazed my thigh, tearing my trousers and burning like a hot iron.
I ignored the agony.
I scrambled on my knees to the folding table.
I grabbed the laptop and pulled it behind a heavy iron pillar.
My fingers flew across the keyboard.
The Fox’s Eye algorithm.
Reverse the numbers.
Every third noun.
L-U-M-I-E-R-E.
The Star Falls.
I slammed the enter key.
On the screen, a red warning flashed:
DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY REVOKED. GLOBAL DISTRESS BEACON ACTIVE. FEDERAL TRANSMISSION
SENT.
High above the warehouse, sirens began to scream in the harbor.
Coast Guard cutter sirens.
FBI assault helicopters roared through the foggy night sky.
Searchlights sliced through the warehouse skylights.
“FEDERAL AGENTS! DROP YOUR WEAPONS!” a megaphone boomed from above.
Vaneau looked up at the glass ceiling in sheer panic.
“No!” the ambassador screamed. “No!”
May you like
He turned his weapon toward me, preparing to fire his final bullet.
Alessandro stepped between us.
