Chapter 44 - Bloodline Ambush
The red dot burned against Ethan’s chest, but he didn't look down. His eyes remained locked on the terrified flicker in his son's gaze.
"Ethan, down!" Maria screamed.
A high-caliber sniper round tore through the humid air, obliterating the concrete mere inches from Ethan’s knees. In a split second, Maria tackled Ethan behind a massive industrial boiler as a hail of suppressed automatic fire erupted from the upper catwalks.
"Get Nikolai!" Ethan roared, the tactical commander resurfacing through the veil of shock. "Don't let them take the boy!"
High above them, two masked operatives in black tactical gear descended on fast-ropes from the crane gantry, grabbing Nikolai by the harness of his coat. The little boy didn't scream, but his eyes were wide with sudden panic as he looked down at the chaos unfolding below.
"Papa!"
The single word slipped from the child's lips—instinctive, terrified, shattering the brainwashing that had held him captive for four years.
Ethan heard it. The word ignited a savage, volcanic fury within him that erased every ounce of caution.
Ignoring the crossfire chewing through the steel plate beside him, Ethan snatched his Kimber from the floor, broke cover, and fired four consecutive rounds into the chest of the descending mercenary holding the rope. The operative went limp, tumbling forty feet down to smash against the concrete.
The second operative grabbed Nikolai, hauling him onto the upper gantry toward the open roof hatch.
"Maria, cover the rear!" Ethan shouted, already sprinting toward the rusted iron spiral staircase leading to the rafters.
Maria pivoted, her submachine gun barking in precise three-round bursts, dropping three Russian strike-team soldiers emerging from the sugar silos. "Go! Bring our boy back!"
Ethan ascended the stairs three steps at a time, bullets sparking off the iron handrails beside his face. His lungs burned, but his eyes never left the silhouette of his son disappearing into the gray downpour on the refinery roof.
He burst through the roof door onto the open tar-paper deck. The wind from the East River whipped rain into his eyes like needles.
Twenty yards away, near the edge of the roof, stood an elderly woman wrapped in an imperial Russian sable coat, holding Nikolai by the shoulder. Behind her, the twin rotors of an unmarked Sikorsky S-76 helicopter were already spinning, churning the mist into a violent vortex.
Grand Duchess Katerina Romanova looked eighty years old, with silver hair pinned beneath a diamond-encrusted tiara and eyes as dead and sharp as diamond dust.
"You were always persistent, Hawthorne," Katerina shouted over the deafening roar of the rotors. "Like a mongrel that refuses to stay off the velvet furniture."
"Let him go, Katerina!" Ethan yelled, advancing step by step, his weapon trained on her skull. "The war with Alexander is over! The charter is dead! Leave the children out of this!"
Katerina chuckled, a dry, rattling sound. She pulled Nikolai against her skirt. The boy looked pale, shivering violently, his small hands clutching the silver eagle around his neck.
"Leave the children out of it?" Katerina sneered. "Nikolai is not just a child, Ethan. He is the last pure male heir to the Romanov throne. Alexander was an incompetent fool who thought money could buy sovereignty. I gave you Caroline to breed an heir with your syndicate's iron will, and I harvested the fruit of that union. He belongs to the motherland."
"He belongs with his family!" Ethan snarled.
"Then come and save him," Katerina said, her smile curving into a terrifying smirk. She reached into her sable coat and pulled out a small, pneumatic glass injector. Before Ethan could fire, she drove the needle into Nikolai’s neck.
Nikolai gasped, his small body instantly going rigid as a neon-blue fluid emptied into his bloodstream.
"What did you do?!" Ethan screamed, lunging forward.
"A synthetic neuro-inhibitor," Katerina said calmly as her security detail shoved Ethan back with shotgun blasts that forced him to roll behind an air-conditioning unit. "In seventy-two hours, his nervous system will begin to paralyze. There is only one synthesis of the antidote in existence, Hawthorne. And it is in my vault at the Romanov Embassy in Manhattan."
Katerina stepped backward onto the ramp of the helicopter, dragging the collapsing boy with her.
"Surrender Sophie to me by tomorrow midnight," Katerina’s voice echoed over the roar of the engines. "Or watch your son suffocate in his own blood."
May you like
The helicopter lifted into the gray sky, banking hard toward Manhattan, leaving Ethan screaming his son's name into the driving rain.
***
