Chapter 5 - CODE SILVER
The air inside the supply closet was rapidly growing stale, thick with the scent of sterile packaging and my own cold sweat. Every breath felt like inhaling ground glass. I kept my hand firmly, but gently, over Lily's mouth, feeling the rapid, terrified flutter of her lips against my palm.
"A vest," Higgins repeated outside, her voice betraying not a sliver of the terror I knew she must be feeling. "You walk in here with a suicide vest, Elias? Over what? A custody dispute?"
"This isn't about custody, Detective. It’s about survival," Thorne hissed. I heard the chilling sound of a zipper slowly being pulled down. "Elena took a ledger. A digital flash drive containing the names, bank accounts, and coordinates of every major player in my organization. I’m a dead man walking if that drive gets into the hands of the feds. I checked her house. I tore it down to the studs. It’s not there. Which means she gave it to the girl."
I looked down at Lily in the dark. Did she have something? When she arrived, she was wearing nothing but a soiled, oversized cotton dress. We had stripped it off her, bagged it as evidence, and scrubbed her clean. There was nothing on her. No pockets, no hidden compartments.
"The girl doesn't have it," Higgins said. "We searched her when she arrived. She had nothing on her."
"You're lying to me to buy time for SWAT to set up on the roof," Thorne chuckled dryly. "But I know the layout of this hospital, Detective. There are no sightlines into this corridor from the outside. You have a choice. Bring me the girl, let me check her, and I walk away. Or I press this little red button, and you, me, and those two little bastards in the plastic boxes turn to ash."
I felt Lily’s small hands grab my wrists. She pulled my hand away from her mouth just enough to whisper in my ear.
"The dirt," she breathed, her voice barely audible over the pounding of my heart.
"What?" I mouthed back, staring into the dark.
"Mommy made me put it in the dirt. In the wheelbarrow."
My stomach plummeted. The rusted wheelbarrow. The one Lily had insisted we keep safe in the trauma bay. The one that was currently sitting unguarded by the front admission desk, surrounded by chaos. If the police didn't know it was there, and Thorne realized where it was, he would tear through the hospital to get it.
I had to get a message to Higgins. But how? If I opened the door, he would see us. If I shouted, he would know exactly where we were.
My eyes darted around the dark closet, settling on the emergency call button mounted on the wall next to the door. It connected directly to the central nurses' station, which I knew was currently occupied by the police command center that had been set up during the lockdown.
I slowly released Lily, placing her hands on the floor. "Stay exactly here. Do not move a single muscle," I whispered.
I crawled on my hands and knees toward the door, wincing as a loose screw on the floor bit into my palm. I reached up, my fingers brushing the smooth plastic panel. There was a small, braille-marked button for internal comms. I pressed it, holding it down.
A tiny, muted beep acknowledged the connection. I couldn't speak, but I could tap.
Using my fingernail, I began to tap in Morse code on the plastic casing of the intercom. W - H - E - E - L - B - A - R - R - O - W.
I prayed someone at the command center was paying attention. I prayed someone knew Morse code. I tapped it again. D - R - I - V - E - I - N - W - H - E - E - L - B - A - R - R - O - W.
Outside, Thorne was growing impatient. "Ten seconds, Detective. Bring me the girl, or we all go out together. Ten. Nine."
"Elias, think about this!" Higgins yelled, her boots shifting on the linoleum. "You kill them, you kill yourself. You never get the drive. You lose everything."
"Eight. Seven."
Suddenly, a loud, artificial voice boomed over the hospital's PA system, interrupting Thorne's countdown.
"Mr. Thorne. This is Captain Reynolds with the SWAT negotiation team. We have the wheelbarrow. We have the drive you are looking for."
The silence in the hallway was immediate and heavy. Thorne stopped counting.
"If you want it," the Captain's voice continued, cool and professional, "you are going to leave the PICU, walk down the west stairwell to the main lobby, and trade yourself for it. If you detonate, the drive survives, and your bosses find out exactly who betrayed them."
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. They got the message.
"You think I'm stupid?" Thorne roared, his composure finally breaking. "You think I'm going to walk into a kill box?"
"It's your only play, Elias!" Higgins shouted, seizing the moment.
May you like
Before Thorne could respond, the heavy reinforced glass of the PICU skylight directly above the hallway imploded in a shower of brilliant, glittering shards.
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