Chapter 9 - The Anatomy of a Traitor
The patrol cutter opened fire with a heavy caliber mounted machine gun, rounds punching through the tugboat's hull like paper. Metal screeched and sheared away. Below deck, water began to seep across the bilge floor, mixing with oil into a toxic black sludge.
Adrian abandoned the ruined wheelhouse and dropped into the engine hold. His shirt was torn, blood staining his left side where shrapnel had grazed his ribs.
"He anticipated the water route," Clara yelled over the deafening engine roar. "How could he know you kept a boat here?"
Adrian’s jaw tightened. He pulled a small GPS tracker from the lining of Sarah's swaddling blanket—the blanket Clara had retrieved from the penthouse crib. "He didn't track the boat. He tracked the blanket."
Clara stared at the blinking LED in horror. "I brought him to us."
"You didn't know," Adrian said, tossing the tracker onto the engine block and crushing it beneath his heavy boot heel. "Elena was compromised before she ever reached my penthouse. Victor planned every step of this extraction."
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Suddenly, the tugboat shuttered violently as the cutter rammed its starboard quarter. The impact threw Adrian and Clara across the compartment. Footsteps thudded heavily onto the exterior deck above their heads.
The hatch above was kicked open, and an armed soldier tossed a flash grenade down the ladder.
