“My back…” she cried out, her face drenched in cold sweat. “Julian, the baby is coming… I can feel it… the pressure is too much!”

Julian kicked open the mangled passenger door, scrambled out onto the wet wooden planks of the pier, and reached back in. “Marcus, help me!”

Together, the two men gently pulled Elena from the teetering wreckage, carrying her through the driving rain toward the shelter of an abandoned dry-dock boat shed thirty yards away.

As they reached the rusted corrugated iron doors of the shed, the sound of heavy boots echoed down the pier. Cross’s men had abandoned their vehicles and were advancing on foot, flashlights cutting through the rain, their weapons drawn.

“Julian Sterling!” Cross’s voice drifted through the storm. “There is nowhere to run! You’re on a dead-end pier! Surrender the girl, and Mrs. Sterling will let you walk away with your trust fund intact! Make this hard, and none of you leave this dock alive!”

Julian kicked open the boat shed door, dragged Elena inside onto a pile of clean canvas sails, and turned to Marcus.

Marcus pulled his Glock, checked the magazine, and slid the slide back. “Nine rounds, Mr. Julian. I can hold them at the shed entrance for three minutes. Not four. Three.”

Julian looked at his loyal friend, then down at Elena, who was writhing on the canvas, her hands clutching her belly, her breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps.

“Marcus,” Julian said, his voice deadly steady. “You don’t die for me tonight.”

“I’m not dying for you, sir,” Marcus said, a faint, grim smile touching his lips as he cocked his weapon. “I’m dying for the little girl you saved five years ago. Now get your wife through that delivery. I’ll buy the time.”

May you like

Marcus stepped out into the pouring rain, raised his weapon, and fired two suppressive rounds into the darkness.

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