Chapter 7 - THE CHASE IN THE DARK
The train station became a blur of shadows and flashing police lights. I heard the heavy thud of Ethan’s boots echoing ahead of me, followed by the frantic scrambling of Sterling’s leather shoes.
"Stop right there!" Ethan’s voice boomed through the terminal.
I rounded a corner into the main ticketing hall just in time to see Sterling violently shove a heavy wooden bench into Ethan’s path. Ethan vaulted over it, but the delay was just enough. Sterling burst through the chained double doors at the front of the station, shattering the rotted wood.
I pushed through the splintered doors a moment later, the freezing winter air hitting me like a wall.
Outside, the scene was chaos. Three State Trooper cruisers had barricaded the street, their lights painting the snow in frantic pulses of red and blue. The alumni from my porch had followed them—dozens of cars were parked haphazardly along the road, people spilling out into the freezing night.
Sterling was trapped. He stood in the center of the icy plaza, clutching the canvas bag, surrounded by a wall of police officers with their weapons drawn.
"Drop the weapon and put your hands on your head!" a State Trooper bellowed over a megaphone.
Sterling frantically looked left, then right. His chest heaved. He realized there was no escape. But instead of dropping the gun, a sickening, desperate smile spread across his face.
He lunged toward the crowd of alumni, grabbing the closest person to him.
A collective scream ripped through the air as Sterling dragged a small figure in front of him, pressing the barrel of the gun against the hostage's temple.
My heart stopped beating. The world tunneled into a pinpoint of absolute, paralyzing horror.
It was Leo. Little five-year-old Leo, clutching a toy train, his eyes wide with terrified tears.
"Let him go!" Lily shrieked, fighting against a police officer who was holding her back. "Please! He's just a baby!"
"Back up!" Sterling screamed, his voice cracking with hysteria. "All of you, put your guns down and back the hell up, or the kid dies right here!"
The troopers hesitated, their weapons wavering.
Ethan stepped forward, his hands raised in surrender. "Sterling, don't do this. He has nothing to do with it. Take me. I'm the one who was at the river. Take me."
"Shut up!" Sterling barked, backing slowly toward his idling black sedan. "I'm leaving. Anyone follows me, the boy goes into the river just like his grandfather!"
The mention of the river snapped something inside me. The fear evaporated, replaced by a blinding, incandescent mother’s wrath. I was not going to let this monster take my grandson to the same watery grave where he had thrown my son.
I stepped out from the shadow of the station doors. I still held the plastic bag containing the bloody crowbar.
"Thomas," I said, my voice eerily calm, cutting through the panic of the crowd.
Sterling flinched, turning slightly to look at me. "Stay back, Martha! I swear to God!"
"You're a businessman, Thomas," I said, taking a slow, deliberate step forward. "You don't want the boy. The boy is a liability. You want what's in that canvas bag. You want the proof."
"I have the proof!" he yelled, shaking the heavy green duffel bag in his left hand.
I smiled—a cold, humorless smile. "Do you? When you kicked the bag away from me in the dark... did you check inside it again?"
Sterling frowned, his grip on Leo tightening. "What are you talking about?"
"When Ethan distracted you, I took the ledgers out," I lied smoothly, my eyes locking onto his. "I shoved them under the lockers. You're holding a bag full of old phone books and rusted metal, Thomas. You leave now, you leave the evidence behind. And the State Police will find it in five minutes."
Sterling's eyes darted frantically. Doubt crept into his face. He looked down at the heavy canvas bag, the weight of it suddenly feeling suspicious.
"You're lying," he hissed.
"Check it," I challenged, taking another step closer. "Open the zipper. See for yourself. Because if you drive away with garbage, you'll spend the rest of your life in federal prison."
The greed and paranoia that had driven Sterling for twenty-six years was his undoing. He couldn't resist. He had to be sure.
May you like
Still holding the gun to Leo's head, Sterling awkwardly fumbled with the zipper of the canvas bag using his left hand. He glanced down, just for a fraction of a second, to look inside.
It was the only opening Ethan needed.
