Chapter 6 - The Ticking Carrier
My blood ran ice cold as I stared at the laptop screen.
My younger sister, Chloe, was crying silently, her hands raised in surrender.
Marcus looked directly into the camera lens with a sadistic smile.
He held up a piece of paper with a phone number written on it.
Sarah sneered from her chair, telling us we had exactly thirty minutes to bring the baby to him.
If we didn't show up, Marcus would kill Chloe without a second thought.
Rage blinded me, and I grabbed Sarah by the collar of her shirt.
I screamed at her, demanding to know how they found my house.
She just smiled, blood trickling from the cut on her forehead.
David pulled me away gently, telling me we couldn't lose focus.
We had to leave right now and save my sister.
I grabbed the suppressed pistol from the floor and shoved it into my waistband.
David carefully picked up the baby's plastic carrier from the corner of the room.
He placed the newborn securely inside and strapped him in.
We rushed out of the motel room, leaving Sarah bound in the dark.
We sprinted back through the rain toward where we had abandoned the SUV.
I knew the plates were flagged, but we had no other way to get across town in time.
We jumped in, and David pushed the car to its absolute limits down the highway.
The windshield wipers fought a losing battle against the downpour.
I sat in the back seat with the baby, watching the clock on the dashboard tick away.
We had twenty minutes left.
Suddenly, a strange, high-pitched electronic whine started echoing in the back seat.
It was coming directly from the baby's plastic carrier.
I leaned down and saw a hidden compartment on the side flashing with a yellow light.
David looked at it in the rearview mirror and his face went pale.
He told me the crushed tracker wasn't just a beacon.
It was a proximity fail-safe linked to the carrier.
When he destroyed the main tracker, he activated a secondary dead-man's switch.
The carrier wasn't just a seat.
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It was rigged with a small incendiary explosive to ensure nobody else could take the child.
The yellow light abruptly turned solid red, and the whining sound locked into a continuous, deafening tone.
