Chapter 7 - The Shipyard Ambush
The phone line went completely dead, leaving Evelyn staring blankly at the dark screen.
Tears spilled heavily over her eyelashes, blurring her vision as pure, suffocating panic consumed her.
"She has Maya," Evelyn choked out, dropping the phone onto the cold stone floor.
Lorenzo walked over and placed a heavy, intensely reassuring hand on her trembling shoulder.
"We are going to get her back alive," he promised with absolute certainty.
He walked over to a steel weapons locker and began rapidly loading magazines with hollow-point ammunition.
"You cannot go to the pier, it's a guaranteed suicide mission," Evelyn cried.
"I have survived suicide missions many times before," Lorenzo replied, tossing her a lightweight Kevlar vest.
"Put this on immediately, because you are coming with me."
Evelyn strapped the heavy armor tightly over her waitress uniform, feeling entirely out of her depth.
They left the unconscious Julian bound in the basement and successfully hotwired a car from the church parking lot.
Lorenzo drove like a madman through the empty streets of Chicago, heading straight for the industrial waterfront.
The shipyard on Pier Four was a desolate wasteland of rusted shipping containers and towering metal cranes.
A thick, freezing fog rolled continuously off the lake, perfectly masking their approach as Lorenzo cut the headlights.
"Stay closely behind me and do not make a single sound," he ordered, pulling his gun from his holster.
They crept silently through the maze of towering metal boxes, guided only by the distant glow of a single floodlight.
Beneath the harsh light, Celeste was sitting comfortably on a wooden crate, flanked by a dozen heavily armed mercenaries.
Tied securely to a chair next to her was a young girl with a dirty burlap sack pulled over her head.
"I know you are out there hiding, Lorenzo!" Celeste called out into the dense fog.
Lorenzo stepped bravely out from behind a shipping container, walking directly into the open with his hands raised.
Evelyn watched in absolute horror from the shadows as Celeste smiled triumphantly.
Celeste stood up gracefully and walked over to the tied hostage, ripping the burlap sack completely off the girl's head.
May you like
Evelyn covered her mouth forcefully to trap a sudden scream.
The girl tied to the chair was not her sister Maya at all.
