Chapter 10
"Help! Somebody help me!" Nola screamed as she cleared the final few steps, bursting through the heavy steel doors leading back into the main lobby.
The uniformed security guard, who had casually buzzed her through thirty minutes earlier, jumped out of his chair, his hand dropping to his holstered weapon. The bustling morning crowd in the bank lobby instantly froze, dozens of heads turning toward the frantic woman emerging from the vault stairwell.
"Ma'am, what's wrong?" the guard demanded, stepping forward, his posture defensive.
Nola didn't stop. She ran directly past him, heading straight for the massive glass revolving doors at the front of the bank. "There’s a man with a gun down there! Call the police!"
The guard drew his weapon, advancing cautiously toward the steel doors.
Nola hit the revolving doors, pushing through the heavy glass with all her remaining strength, and burst out into the freezing, chaotic street. The cold air hit her lungs like knives, but the adrenaline masked the pain. She didn't head for the parking lot where she had left her car. The man knew who she was; he likely had a team watching her vehicle.
She sprinted down the crowded sidewalk, shoving past startled pedestrians, her dark trousers blending into the sea of dark winter coats. She needed to disappear into the city, find a crowded public space, and contact someone she could trust. But who? Her mother was complicit, her grandmother was isolated in the house, and the police might be on the syndicate's payroll.
She ducked into a bustling subway station, the smell of ozone and damp wool washing over her. She vaulted the turnstile, ignoring the shouts of the transit attendant, and ran down the stairs to the crowded platform. She melted into the thick throng of commuters waiting for the downtown train, pulling the collar of her heavy wool coat up to hide her face, clutching her father’s journal tightly against her ribs.
The train arrived with a deafening screech of metal on metal. Nola shoved her way into a packed car, wedging herself between a businessman reading a paper and a teenager with headphones. As the doors slid shut, she finally dared to look back out at the platform.
Standing near the stairs, looking methodically through the crowd, was the man in the charcoal overcoat.
He didn't see her. The train jolted forward, plunging into the dark tunnel, leaving the assassin behind on the platform.
Nola slumped against the cold metal wall of the train car, her entire body shaking violently as the adrenaline began to recede, leaving behind sheer terror and exhaustion. She was alive. She had the journal. But she was now actively hunted by a ruthless criminal syndicate, and her own mother was an accessory to the crimes she was trying to expose.
She pulled her phone from her pocket. It was a beacon, a tracking device they could use to find her. She needed to ditch it, but she needed to make one phone call first.
She dialed the number for the Mercer estate, praying her mother wouldn't pick up.
It rang three times before a frail, trembling voice answered.
"Hello?"
"Grandma," Nola whispered, tears finally spilling down her rosy cheeks. "I got it. I got the journal. But they were waiting for me. I barely got out."
A heavy, static-filled silence hung on the line. Then, Ruth spoke, her voice surprisingly steady, completely devoid of the frailty she had displayed the day before.
"Where are you, Nola?"
"I'm on a subway heading downtown. I don't know where to go. I can't go to the police, they might be bought. I can't come home."
"Listen to me carefully, Nola," Ruth said, her tone shifting into a sharp, commanding register that Nola had never heard before. "Do not trust anyone in the city. Do not trust the police. And above all, do not trust your mother. She will do whatever it takes to protect herself."
"I know, Grandma. What do I do?"
"Take the train to the end of the line. Get off at the old harbor station," Ruth instructed rapidly. "There is a ferry terminal there. Look for a man wearing a red scarf sitting near the ticket booth. Tell him the lion is awake. He will get you out of the city and take you to a safe house."
Nola frowned, wiping her tears. "Grandma, who is this man? How do you know him?"
"I have spent thirty years preparing for this day, Nola," Ruth said, a dark, hidden strength radiating through the phone. "I knew Arthur was dirty, and I knew Elaine was weak. I spent decades building my own insurance policy. The syndicate isn't the only one with resources."
Nola stared at the blurry reflection of herself in the train window. The elderly woman sitting in the armchair wasn't a fragile victim of family circumstance; she was a master strategist who had been playing a long, dangerous game from the shadows.
"Grandma... who are you really?" Nola asked, her voice filled with awe and renewed fear.
May you like
"I am the woman who is going to help you burn them all to the ground," Ruth promised. "Now go. And Nola? Throw that phone on the tracks."
The line went dead. Nola stared at the dark screen, the train hurtling forward into the unknown dark, the war for her family's soul having officially begun.
