Chapter 2 - The Blast Radius
The explosion ripped the armored SUV apart, sending a massive shockwave of heat through the narrow alley.
Lorenzo tackled Evelyn to the wet asphalt just as a wall of fire roared directly over their heads.
Debris rained down on them, bouncing violently off the brick walls of the alleyway.
Bruno shielded them with his massive body, taking the brunt of the flying shrapnel in his back.
Evelyn coughed heavily, her lungs burning from the thick, toxic black smoke.
"Get up!" Lorenzo shouted, hauling her to her feet by her apron strings.
They could not go back inside the restaurant, and their only escape vehicle was now a burning wreck.
Heavy footsteps echoed rapidly at the far end of the alley.
A dozen of Celeste's private mercenaries poured out of a black van, their laser sights cutting through the smoke.
"Down into the subway," Lorenzo ordered, pointing to a rusted maintenance grate on the ground.
Bruno grabbed the heavy iron cover and ripped it off the street with a guttural roar.
Evelyn didn't wait to be told twice.
She scrambled down the rusty iron ladder into the pitch-black tunnels below the city.
Lorenzo followed her quickly, while Bruno stayed up top to provide cover fire.
The sound of gunfire above them was absolutely deafening, but it was quickly silenced by a final, fatal volley.
Evelyn looked up, expecting to see the giant enforcer climbing down the ladder.
Instead, a bleeding Bruno looked down at them with a sad, final smile before kicking the heavy iron grate back into place.
He had sealed them in the darkness to buy them time to escape.
Lorenzo turned on a small tactical flashlight, his face an unreadable mask of cold stone.
"Walk," he told her, pushing her forward into the damp, rat-infested tunnel.
Evelyn stumbled forward in the dark, her hands shaking uncontrollably.
"Why did you save me?" she finally whispered.
Lorenzo stopped walking and pinned her aggressively against the cold, wet concrete wall.
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"Because you are going to tell me exactly how you knew about the bomb," he said softly.
He pulled a bloody switchblade from his pocket and pressed the cold steel directly against her throat.
