Chapter 14 - The Final Ascent
Detective Miller kicked the battered door open, stepping onto the rain-swept catwalk with his gun raised. His uniform was blackened with soot, his face contorted in desperation.
“End of the line, Vance!” Miller shouted over the howl of the wind.
Marcus didn’t hesitate. He thrust Lily gently into Nathan’s arms behind the stone buttress. “Protect her with your life,” Marcus whispered.
Before Miller could align his sights, Marcus charged forward across the slick granite catwalk. Miller fired, but Marcus twisted his torso; the round grazed Marcus’s left shoulder, tearing through his suit fabric and drawing a line of fire across his skin.
Marcus closed the distance instantly. He clamped his right hand over Miller’s gun slide, driving his thumb behind the hammer to prevent a second round from cycling. With a savage twist, he wrenched the firearm from Miller’s grip and discarded it over the balustrade into the void below.
Miller threw a wild punch, but Marcus slipped under the blow, driving a brutal combination into the detective’s ribs and jaw. Miller staggered backward against the low stone railing, spitting blood into the rain.
“You think you can beat Victoria?” Miller sneered, gasping for air. “She owns the governor. She owns the courts. Even if you upload that drive, the story will be buried before sunrise!”
“Then I’ll make sure the whole world watches it burn,” Marcus replied.
Marcus grabbed Miller by the lapels and slammed him down against the catwalk deck, pinning him with a decisive knee to the chest before securing his hands with his own tactical zip-ties.
Marcus turned back toward Nathan, took the flash drive, and climbed the iron rungs of the antenna tower into the teeth of the gale. Reaching the transmitter box, he pried open the seal and jammed the drive into the auxiliary port.
May you like
The transmitter blinked amber, then steady green.
Below in the alleyway, every mobile device in Victoria’s security detail began chiming simultaneously. The unredacted murder confession, the financial wire transfers, and the autopsy audits had just been uploaded live to forty federal oversight servers and major news syndicates across the country.
