Chapter 3 - The Broken Veil
The steel trapdoor of the ceiling buckled under a crowbar. Silas reacted before the hatch fully yielded. Two muffled thuds spat from his silencer, puncturing the thin ceiling panels. A scream tore through the shaft, followed by the sound of a body tumbling down through the empty void, crashing onto the lower buffer springs floors below.
"Out. Now," Silas commanded, springing upward. Catching the edge of the opening, he hoisted his heavy frame through the roof opening with lethal efficiency, then leaned down to extend a broad hand to Clara.
She reached up. His grip was steel, hauling her out of the cabin into the dim concrete shaft. Above them, on the fifteenth-floor service landing, the elevator doors had been pried open.
Silas guided her through the gap, stepping onto the carpeted hallway of the hotel's penthouse suites. But the corridor was not empty. Three men in matching gray suits turned, guns drawn.
"Run," Silas muttered, shoving her behind a decorative marble pillar.
Gunfire erupted, shattering the hallway mirrors into raining diamonds. Silas moved with terrifying precision. He didn't dive; he pivoted, firing three deliberate shots. Each round dropped a man instantly before they could acquire a target.
Clara covered her ears, screaming silently against the wall. This wasn't real. She was an orphan, an art student working double shifts to pay rent, not someone chased by assassins in high-end hotels.
Silas grabbed her wrist, pulling her toward the emergency stairwell. "They’ve sealed the lower exits. We go to the roof."
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"Who are you?" she gasped, her legs burning as they sprinted up the concrete steps. "What did my father do?"
"Your father kept the records of every blood debt in the underworld," Silas said without breaking stride. "And until five minutes ago, I thought I had executed every last person named on page seven. Except you."
