Chapter 6 - The Ascent Through Fire
The emergency elevator shaft was dead. The primary electrical grid had been severed by the explosion at the bulkhead, leaving the car suspended midway between the sub-basement and the main mansion floor.
I didn't hesitate. I holstered my pistol, grabbed the industrial ladder bolted into the damp limestone wall of the shaft, and climbed upward with the syringe clutched tightly in my right fist, my knuckles white against the glass.
Above me, the sounds of combat echoed through the floorboards of the mansion. Shouts, shattering glass, and the dull thud of close-quarters fighting meant Crosby Vane’s assault team had breached the main house.
They were tearing my home apart, looking for me, looking for safes, looking for leverage.
They had no idea the real prize was two rooms away in the private medical suite.
I hauled myself up through the floor hatch of the first-floor pantry, rolling quietly onto the checkered tile floor. The kitchen was empty, but the swinging doors leading into the main hallway were splintered, covered in soot and bloodstains.
I kept low, moving with the silent, predatory grace I had learned during my early years in the syndicate before I ever wore a tailored suit.
As I crept down the corridor toward the master medical suite, a heavy figure stepped out from the library doorway, holding a tactical shotgun.
It was one of Vane’s senior enforcers—a scarred brute named Marcus Vance—no relation to my attorney, but twice as lethal.
“Well, well,” Marcus sneered, leveling the shotgun barrels at my face. “The boss said you’d try to crawl out of your hole, Mercer. Say goodbye.”
He didn't get the chance to pull the trigger.
From the shadows behind him, a dark figure dropped silently from the ceiling rafters like a striking viper. Prescott Hale—battered, bleeding from a gash across his forehead, but very much alive—slashed a combat knife downward with terrifying speed, burying the blade deep into Marcus’s shoulder.
Marcus roared in pain, his shotgun discharging harmlessly into the plaster ceiling.
Prescott didn't give him a second chance. With a brutal twist of his arm, he drove Marcus to the floor, rendering him unconscious with a swift strike to the temple.
Prescott rose, wiping blood from his eyes, his chest heaving as he looked down at me.
“Boss... you’re alive,” Prescott wheezed, clutching his ribs.
“And the cure is in my hand,” I said, holding up the glass syringe. “How’s the rest of the house?”
“Holding... barely,” Prescott gasped, leaning against the wall for support. “The east wing is secure, but the front gates are completely overrun. Vane’s personal detail is heading this way right now.”
“Hold the hallway,” I commanded, my voice absolute. “Give me five minutes.”
I didn't wait for his reply. I sprinted the remaining twenty feet to the heavy glass doors of the twins’ private suite, swiped my biometric card against the scanner, and threw the door open.
Inside, Dr. Franklin Yates stood over Jonah and Blythe’s beds, looking panicked as flatline monitor alarms began to emit a low, terrifying warning tone.
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“Lawson! Thank God!” Yates yelled, spinning around. “Their temperatures just crashed. Their blood pressure is dropping into freefall! We’re losing them—we don't have ten days anymore, we have minutes!”
I didn't answer. I rushed past him to the side of Jonah’s bed, my hands shaking for the first time in my life as I uncapped the shimmering blue syringe.
