Chapter 5 - THE GOLD POCKET WATCH
“Drop the phone, Diana.”
Marcus’s voice was calm, but his eyes were entirely devoid of humanity. The silencer on the end of his weapon gleamed under the apartment’s cheap overhead light.
I slowly lowered the phone, letting it clatter to the hardwood floor. The line was still open. Dominic was listening.
“Don’t hurt her,” I pleaded, stepping in front of Elena, shielding her trembling body with my own. “You want the ticket stub. I have it.”
“I want the stub, and I want you,” Marcus corrected. He gestured to his men. “Tear this place apart. Find the stub. Then grab them both.”
Two of the men advanced.
“Wait!” I yelled, reaching into my pocket. My fingers brushed the stiff cardboard of the ticket. But before I pulled it out, my mind raced.
If I gave it to him, we had no leverage. He would kill us both the second he had the evidence.
“I don’t have it on me,” I lied smoothly, forcing my voice not to shake. I had spent eighteen months managing crises for billionaires. I knew how to bluff. “I mailed it. The second I left the office, I dropped it in a blue USPS mailbox on the corner of State and Lake. It’s gone, Marcus. Addressed to the FBI field office.”
Marcus’s jaw tightened. The warm facade finally shattered, revealing pure, unfiltered rage.
He stepped forward, grabbed me by the throat, and slammed me against the wall.
“No!” Elena screamed, lunging at him. One of the men caught her by the hair, throwing her brutally to the floor.
“You’re lying,” Marcus hissed, his breath hot against my face. His grip tightened, cutting off my air. “You didn’t have time to mail it. Give it to me, or I will blow your sister’s head off right now.”
I gasped for air, my vision swimming with black spots. I clawed at his hand.
I couldn’t let Elena die.
I reached into my pocket, my fingers closing around the ticket.
Suddenly, the lights in the apartment went completely dark.
Not just the room. The entire building. Outside the window, the streetlights flickered and died. A total blackout.
Before Marcus could react, the glass of the living room window exploded inward.
A heavy, cylindrical object bounced across the floor, hissing violently.
Tear gas.
Thick, blinding white smoke instantly filled the room. Marcus cursed, coughing violently as he dropped me to cover his face.
I hit the ground hard, gasping for air. Through the stinging smoke, I heard the heavy, rhythmic thwip-thwip of silenced gunfire. Marcus’s men cried out, hitting the floor.
Strong hands grabbed my shoulders, hauling me up.
I panicked, thrashing wildly.
“Stop fighting. It’s me.”
The voice was a low rumble. Smelling of cedar, expensive cologne, and gunpowder.
Dominic.
He pulled me against his chest, shielding my face with his overcoat. He had a heavy, matte-black pistol in his right hand.
“Elena!” I choked out through the smoke.
“I have her,” another voice shouted. I squinted through the haze and saw one of Dominic’s personal security men lifting Elena off the floor.
“Move!” Dominic commanded.
He dragged me out of the apartment, down the dark, chaotic stairwell, and out the back exit into the alley. A black SUV was idling, its headlights off.
Dominic shoved Elena and me into the backseat, climbing in right behind us.
“Drive,” Dominic snapped to the driver.
The SUV peeled out of the alley, tearing down the dark streets of Chicago.
I collapsed against the leather seat, coughing until my throat was raw. Elena was weeping silently beside me, clutching my hand so hard it hurt.
Dominic sat across from us. The streetlights sweeping through the tinted windows illuminated his face. He looked terrifying. His charcoal suit was ruined, his white shirt stained with soot. But it was his eyes that shook me. The cold, calculating distance was entirely gone. He looked frantic.
He reached into his vest pocket and pulled out his gold pocket watch.
It was an antique. I had seen him check it a thousand times in the office. Usually, it was a gesture of impatience.
But right now, he didn’t look at the time. He pressed his thumb against the glass face, hard.
He held it to his ear.
“It stopped ticking,” he muttered, his jaw clenching.
“What?” I asked, my voice hoarse.
Dominic looked at me, his gray eyes burning.
“My watch,” he said. “It’s not just a timepiece. It’s a proximity jammer. If it stops ticking, it means a military-grade GPS tracker is transmitting within ten feet of us.”
My blood ran cold.
Dominic looked around the interior of the SUV. Then, his gaze snapped to me.
Specifically, to my coat pocket.
“Diana,” he said softly. “What did Marcus give you today?”
I frowned, my mind struggling to keep up. “Nothing. We just had dinner.”
“Think!” he demanded, the edge returning to his voice. “Did he hand you anything? A pen? A napkin?”
The memory hit me with sickening clarity.
The park bench. My tears. Marcus sitting beside me, offering me comfort.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out the crisp linen handkerchief with the embroidered M.S. initials.
Dominic snatched it from my hand. He pulled a pocket knife from his belt and sliced open the thick embroidery.
A tiny, blinking red dot fell into his palm.
A micro-tracker.
Marcus hadn’t comforted me at the park. He had bugged me. He used my moment of absolute vulnerability to plant a tracker on me, knowing it would lead him straight to whatever secrets Dominic was hiding.
“Driver!” Dominic yelled.
But before the driver could respond, the SUV was hit with the force of a freight train.
A massive garbage truck T-boned us in the middle of an intersection.
The world flipped upside down. Glass shattered. Metal shrieked.
I was thrown violently against the door, my head slamming into the window frame. Everything went black.
When I finally opened my eyes, the world was spinning. The SUV was on its side. Smoke poured from the crumpled hood.
I tasted blood in my mouth.
“Elena?” I groaned, reaching out blindly in the dark.
My fingers found the soft wool of her sweater. She was breathing, unconscious but alive.
Then, I heard the sound of heavy boots crunching on the broken glass outside the car.
The passenger door above me was wrenched open.
A flashlight beam blinded me.
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“Hello again, Diana.”
Marcus leaned into the wreckage. He reached down, grabbed me by the collar of my coat, and dragged me out of the shattered window onto the freezing asphalt.
