Chapter 4 - The Midnight Escape
Eleanor backed away from the two men, her mind racing for a way out.
She could not fight both of them in her weakened state, especially not with Dr. Vance holding a heavy sedative.
“Stay away from me, Richard,” she warned, trying to keep her voice steady.
“It’s for your own good, Eleanor, the excitement of the gala was simply too much for your fragile nerves,” Dr. Vance said smoothly.
As they closed in, Eleanor feigned a sudden, violent muscle spasm in her legs.
She collapsed onto the floor, knocking over a heavy glass lamp that shattered loudly across the carpet.
She lay perfectly still on the ground, closing her eyes and making her breathing shallow.
“Damn it, Vance, did she hit her head?” Richard barked, rushing over.
“I need to check her pulse, help me lift her onto the bed,” the doctor ordered.
As Richard bent down and reached his arms under her shoulders, Eleanor opened her eyes.
She grabbed a large jagged shard of the broken lamp from the carpet.
With all her newfound strength, she slashed the heavy glass across Richard’s forearm.
He roared in pain, dropping her and clutching his bleeding arm as dark red stained his white tuxedo shirt.
Dr. Vance lunged at her with the syringe, but Eleanor kicked his knee as hard as she could with her heavy leather boot.
The doctor crumpled with a cry of pain, the syringe skittering uselessly under the bed.
Eleanor scrambled to her feet, ignoring the screaming pain in her newly awakened muscles.
“Leo, run!” she yelled.
The boy burst from behind the curtains, and the two of them sprinted out the open suite door and down the hallway.
They bypassed the elevators and threw open the heavy fire doors to the stairwell.
They descended eight flights of stairs in a desperate, breathless rush, bursting out into the cold, rainy alley behind the hotel.
Eleanor pulled out her cell phone, her hands shaking violently, and dialed the only person she still trusted.
Marcus had been her family’s lead corporate attorney for twenty years, and he had always hated Richard.
“Marcus, it’s Eleanor, I need an extraction right now at the back alley of the grand hotel,” she gasped into the phone.
“Eleanor? I’m five minutes away, wait in the shadows,” Marcus replied, his voice calm and reassuring.
She huddled with Leo behind a large dumpster in the freezing rain, praying Richard hadn't alerted his security teams outside.
Tires screeched on the wet pavement as a sleek black luxury sedan pulled into the dark alley.
Marcus rolled down the driver's side window and unlocked the back doors.
“Get in, quickly!” he shouted over the rain.
Eleanor threw open the back door and pushed Leo inside to safety.
She climbed in after him, sighing in massive relief as the warm air of the car hit her shivering body.
“Thank you, Marcus, you have no idea what Richard has done,” she cried.
“Oh, I think I have a pretty good idea,” a dark voice said from the front seat.
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Eleanor froze in absolute terror as the passenger seat slowly reclined backward.
Richard was sitting right next to Marcus, a bloody bandage wrapped tightly around his arm, pointing a silver pistol directly at her chest.
