Chapter 9 - Blood on the Iron Walkway
The first shot made no more sound than a heavy pneumatic staple gun: a muffled thump-crack that ricocheted through the hollow storage tanks.
Vance grunted, his body jerking sideways as a bullet took him in the shoulder. He fired back twice, the loud, unsuppressed booms of his service weapon deafening in the enclosed space. Sparks flew off the Range Rover’s hood, driving the two men back behind the vehicle doors for cover.
“Go!” Vance roared, clutching his bleeding collarbone and emptying the rest of his magazine into the headlights of the SUV, plunging the warehouse back into shadow.
Clara grabbed Lily’s wrist and bolted toward the rusted iron stairs behind the refrigeration compressor. The metal steps rattled beneath their feet like machine-gun fire.
“Mom, I’m scared!” Lily wept, her breath coming in ragged gasps as they climbed.
“Don’t look down, baby! Keep your eyes on the next step!” Clara pushed the girl ahead of her, taking the stairs two at a time. Below them, another series of suppressed shots echoed, followed by a wet, heavy thud and the silence of a man hitting concrete.
Vance was gone.
“Clara!” Declan’s voice called up into the rafters, shockingly close. “You're a clever lass. You survived a dive off Beachy Head. Don’t throw it away on a girl who isn't going to live to see high school anyway!”
They reached the catwalk. Thirty feet below lay the debris of decades—rotting pallets, tangled cables, and pools of stagnant water. Ahead, a heavy steel fire door showed a crack of grey daylight: the walkway to the old railway spur.
Clara reached the door, slamming her weight against the emergency push bar.
It was chained shut from the outside with a heavy padlock.
A cold hand closed around Clara’s throat from behind.
“End of the line, Mrs. Pendelton,” Declan murmured in her ear, his breath smelling of menthol cigarettes.
Lily didn't scream. With a feral snarl that surprised even Clara, the little girl turned, drove the pointed heel of her school shoe into Declan’s knee, and sank her teeth deep into the flesh of his gun hand.
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Declan cursed, pulling his arm back reflexively. The pistol slipped from his bloody fingers, clattering through the metal grating of the catwalk and falling into the dark abyss below.
Clara didn't waste the fraction of a second. She drove her elbow backward into Declan’s nose, feeling the cartilage shatter.
