Chapter 13 - The Slamming Gate
Before Christian could register Julian’s movement, Julian threw his entire body weight against the red emergency lever on the wall.
A deafening horn blared through the vault. Heavy steel blast doors on the inner chamber began descending with terrifying speed, concrete dust raining down from the reinforced ceiling. Christian instinctively turned his weapon toward Julian and fired, the shot echoing like thunder in the enclosed space. Julian slumped backward, a crimson stain spreading across his white dress shirt, his eyes rolling back.
In that split second of distraction, Claire moved.
She didn't run for the exit. She drove her heel directly into Christian’s knee with all the force she could muster. Christian grunted in pain, his leg buckling, and Claire grabbed the heavy fire extinguisher mounted to the adjacent wall pillar, swinging it violently into the side of his skull.
The impact sent Christian sprawling across the marble, his pistol flying out of his hand and skittering across the floor, directly under the descending blast door.
""Claire, don't!"" Victoria screamed, scrambling toward the narrowing gap of the door. ""It's sealing! We'll suffocate in here!""
Victoria dove beneath the descending steel barrier, her silver dress catching on the sharp metal lip, tearing open as she scrambled out into the service hallway.
Claire looked back. Christian was already pushing himself up from the floor, blood pouring down the side of his temple from the wound she had inflicted. His eyes were wide, wild with an animalistic fury that eradicated any trace of the man she had loved.
""Claire!"" he roared, lunging toward her with his bare hands. ""Open the box!""
Claire stepped backward through the threshold of the blast door just as it reached waist height. She looked Christian dead in the eyes as she dropped the heavy manual seal pin into place on the outside corridor wall.
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""Enjoy the dark, Christian,"" she said coldly.
The three-ton blast door slammed into the concrete floor with an earth-shattering crash, sealing Christian Vance inside the Saint Jude Depository with the corpse of Julian and thirty-two tons of airless titanium.
