Chapter 4 - Dark Alleys and Iron Rings
""Lily?"" Mark choked out, fumbling in the dim yellow glow of the elevator’s emergency light. ""Lily, look at me!""
His hands searched desperately through the torn lace of her dress, terrified that a bullet had struck her small body. But as his fingers traced her ribs and back, he realized the blood was not coming from a gunshot. The heavy steel cuff around her ankle had twisted violently during the dive onto the terrace, tearing a deep laceration into her flesh.
""It hurts, Daddy... it burns,"" she whimpered, her face white in the gloom.
""I know, baby. I know. I've got you,"" Mark breathed, ripping off his silk necktie. With trembling hands, he wrapped the fabric tightly around her ankle, above the jagged metal edge, stanching the flow.
The elevator groaned and jerked to a violent halt in the sub-basement laundry facility. Steam hissed from overhead pipes, and the smell of industrial bleach hung heavy in the damp air. The Vance family owned the hotel; it was only a matter of minutes before their men flooded the basement.
Mark scooped Lily into his arms, gathering the slack of the chain in his free hand so it wouldn't rattle against the concrete floor. He pushed through the emergency exit doors into a narrow, rain-slicked alleyway behind the hotel.
Thunder rumbled across the city skyline. Freezing rain began to fall in sheets, drenching Mark’s suit and plastering Lily’s hair to her forehead. He had no phone, no wallet, and only four rounds left in the stolen pistol.
He needed a bolt cutter, antibiotics, and a ghost.
Walking through the shadows of the warehouse district, avoiding streetlamps and surveillance cameras, Mark kept his head down. Every passing car seemed like a hunter. He turned down an alley behind an auto repair shop where an old friend worked the late shifts.
He banged on the corrugated metal door. Three beats, a pause, then two.
The door rolled up six inches. A pair of cautious, grease-stained eyes peered out. ""Mark? What the hell... you're supposed to be getting married.""
""Open the door, Tommy,"" Mark said, his voice flat with exhaustion. ""Or my daughter dies.""
The door flew up, and Tommy pulled them into the warmth of the garage, locking the deadbolts behind them. When Tommy looked down at the heavy chain hanging from the little girl’s bleeding foot, his jaw went slack.
""Who did this to her?"" Tommy asked, reaching for a toolbox.
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""The woman I almost gave my life to,"" Mark said, laying Lily gently onto an oily leather sofa. ""Cut it off, Tommy. Now.""
Tommy grabbed a pair of industrial pneumatic bolt cutters. He knelt beside Lily, positioning the hardened blades against the lock's cylinder. But just as he squeezed the handles, a sudden red laser dot danced across Lily’s forehead through the high glass clerestory window.
