Chapter 4 - The Breach
I ripped the IV line from Emily’s arm. She winced in pain, but adrenaline was rapidly replacing her exhaustion. I helped her into a pair of sweatpants and a loose hoodie. I carefully wrapped our newborn—whom we hadn’t even officially named yet—in a thick swaddle and strapped him tightly to my chest using a baby carrier from the gift bag.
Heavy footsteps echoed in the hallway.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Someone rattled the door handle. It was locked. Then, a heavy fist pounded against the wood.
"Mr. Carter," the smooth, cold voice of Dr. Aris called out through the door. "Open the door. The baby needs to be taken to the NICU for standard bloodwork. It's hospital policy."
"Call security!" I shouted, dialing 911 on my cell phone.
I put the phone to my ear, but the call immediately dropped. No Service. I looked at the top corner of the screen. Marcus's team had jammed the cellular signals in the ward. We were completely cut off.
"David, the service elevator," Emily whispered, pointing toward the en-suite bathroom. "When I was pacing the halls yesterday, I saw that the bathroom air vent connects to the utility maintenance shaft. It leads straight down to the basement."
"Can you fit?" I asked, looking at her pale face and the fresh surgical bandages hidden beneath her shirt.
"I have to," she said, her jaw setting in a fierce, maternal determination I had never seen before.
The pounding on the door turned into violent slamming. They were trying to break the hinges.
I grabbed a metal IV pole and smashed the ventilation grate above the bathroom toilet. It popped out with a loud clang. I boosted Emily up. She groaned in agony, tears streaming from her eyes, but she dragged herself into the dark, dusty shaft.
I climbed up right behind her, my hands shielding the baby strapped to my chest. Just as I pulled my legs into the vent and slid the grate back into place, the hospital room door burst open with a deafening crash.
Through the slats of the grate, I watched as Dr. Aris and two massive men in dark suits stormed into the room.
"They're gone!" one of the men barked.
Dr. Aris kicked the empty hospital bed in a rage. "Lock down the building! Check the stairwells, check the lobby! No one leaves this hospital with that infant. Marcus wants that baby tonight."
We crawled through the dark, suffocating maintenance shaft. The smell of dust and bleach burned my lungs. Below me, Emily moved with desperate speed, sliding down a steep incline toward the basement level.
When we finally reached the bottom, I kicked open the lower grate and we tumbled out into the hospital's underground laundry facility. The room was massive, filled with rows of rolling laundry carts and humming industrial washing machines.
"We need a car," I whispered, holding Emily as she struggled to stand. "My keys are upstairs."
"Over there," Emily pointed.
Parked near the loading dock was a hospital linen delivery van, the keys dangling from the ignition while a worker took a smoke break outside. I didn't hesitate. I helped Emily into the passenger seat, strapped the baby into the center console area with a pile of blankets, and jumped behind the wheel.
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I threw the van into drive and smashed through the wooden loading dock gate, tearing out into the rainy, pitch-black streets of the city.
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