Chapter 9 - Blood Against Steel
The desert wind whipped Gabriel’s hair into his eyes, but his gaze remained pinned on Miller's finger resting on the trigger.
"Let the girl go, Miller," Gabriel said, keeping his hands open, palms facing outward. "You want the Vance deeds? You want the western routes? They don't mean a damn thing without Sarah's living heir. You shoot her, and the whole board reverts to the state. You walk away with nothing."
Miller laughed, the sound cold and shrill against the whine of the helicopter engine. "You always were smarter than the other grease monkeys, Gabriel. But you're wrong about one thing. I don't need her alive to claim the land. I just need her blood on the transfer deed before the courts declare Sarah legally deceased. And Sarah..." Miller’s eyes darkened with malice, "...Sarah signed her share over to me twenty minutes ago."
Gabriel's chest hollowed out. "You're lying."
"Go check the old logging cabin by the dam," Miller smirked. "She held out for three days. But when I showed her a picture of little Maya standing in front of your diner booth... she broke. She gave up everything just hoping you’d save her."
Maya looked at Gabriel, tears finally spilling over her lashes, tracing clean lines through the dirt on her face. "Mommy is alive?"
"She is, baby," Gabriel said softly, his voice dropping an octave, dead and steady. "And she’s waiting for us."
Miller sneered. "She’s waiting to die. And you're too late."
Miller began backing toward the open helicopter door, dragging Maya with him.
Gabriel didn't reach for his gun. Instead, his right foot subtly shifted a loose piece of granite on the canyon ledge. Beneath the gravel lay a heavy rusted chain, once used to secure old ore carts on the steep incline.
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With a lightning-fast kick, Gabriel snapped the rusted counterweight cable loose.
A three-ton iron ore cart, balanced on the ridge fifty feet above the landing pad, broke from its rusted chock and plummeted down the gravel slope with the roar of an avalanche.
