Chapter 8 - Opening Night Became a TrapThe opening ceremony was canceled.
Not postponed.
Canceled.
Roman made the announcement himself at 5:40 a.m.
By sunrise, federal investigators had closed Pier 19.
News helicopters circled over the harbor.
Audrey’s forged documents became evidence.
For the first time since Tuesday afternoon, she thought they had won something.
Then Chloe disappeared.
Her hospital room was empty.
No discharge paperwork.
No security footage showing her leaving through the main entrance.
Roman learned at 8:12 a.m.
Audrey learned thirty seconds later.
“Marcus took her.”
“Probably.”
“Why?”
Roman already knew.
“The original drive.”
Audrey frowned.
“We have copies.”
“But Chloe knows where she made them.”
Audrey stood.
“We need to find her.”
Roman looked exhausted.
“I know.”
They did not have to wait long.
At 8:37 Marcus sent a video.
Chloe sat tied to a chair inside an empty industrial office.
She was crying.
Marcus stood behind her.
“Roman,” he said into the camera, “you’ve always misunderstood leverage.”
He held up the original flash drive.
“You think evidence gives you power.”
He smiled.
“People give you power.”
The video shifted.
David appeared in another chair.
Audrey froze.
Both Chloe and David.
Marcus continued.
“Bring me the Pier 19 evidence collected overnight, and perhaps these two survive.”
Audrey looked at Roman.
“He doesn’t believe you’ll choose them.”
“He’s right.”
Audrey’s face changed.
Roman continued before she could react.
“I’m not trading evidence that can prevent future murders for two hostages.”
“David is still my husband.”
“I know.”
“And Chloe—”
“I know.”
Roman stepped closer.
“That does not mean I abandon everyone else Marcus has hurt.”
Audrey hated the logic.
Because it was correct.
Then she remembered something Chloe had said.
David used my login credentials at the firm.
Audrey grabbed her laptop.
“What?”
“If Marcus is using David’s accounts…”
She searched the copied files.
Roman watched.
Audrey found a series of automated synchronization logs.
“David’s work laptop backed up through his company system.”
“And?”
“If the device is online, there may be location data.”
Roman called Caleb.
Twenty-three minutes later they had an address.
Sloane Maritime’s abandoned dispatch center.
South Baltimore.
Roman looked at Audrey.
“You stay here.”
She glared at him.
“Don’t start.”
“This time I mean it.”
“You always mean it.”
“Yes.”
“And it keeps not working.”
Roman stepped close.
“This building belongs to Sloane. Marcus expects me.”
“Which means he has planned around you.”
“Yes.”
“He hasn’t planned around me.”
Roman’s face tightened.
“That is not reassuring.”
“I’m not going inside with you.”
“Audrey—”
“I can monitor building plans from the command vehicle.”
Roman paused.
“That’s useful.”
“I know.”
“I dislike when you’re reasonable.”
“I’ve noticed.”
The dispatch center had been built in 1974.
Audrey located archived plans through city records.
She spread them across a portable table inside Roman’s vehicle.
“There are two exits Marcus probably knows you’ll cover.”
Roman listened.
“And one he may not.”
She pointed to a narrow service passage.
“This wall was built around an old stormwater corridor. If the renovation drawings are accurate, there’s an access hatch behind the mechanical room.”
Roman studied the plans.
“You’re sure?”
“No.”
“Excellent.”
“You want certainty, become an accountant.”
Roman looked at her.
“You married one.”
“That experiment went poorly.”
For the first time in days, he laughed.
Actually laughed.
It transformed his face.
Audrey hated how much she liked it.
Then he became serious.
“If anything happens—”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
Roman took her hand.
Audrey went still.
“If anything happens, you leave.”
She looked down at their hands.
Then back at him.
“Come back and tell me yourself.”
Roman’s eyes held hers.
Then he left.
Audrey listened through radio traffic.
Federal agents entered from the front.
Roman’s security team moved through the service corridor.
Everything remained controlled for exactly ninety seconds.
Then Marcus’s voice came over an open channel.
“Roman.”
Audrey froze.
Marcus had accessed their frequency.
“You always did bring too many people.”
Gunfire erupted.
Audrey gripped the edge of the table.
Roman’s voice came through.
“David and Chloe?”
“Alive.”
“Release them.”
“Still giving orders.”
Then Audrey heard David screaming.
“Marcus, stop!”
A crash.
Chloe crying.
Audrey closed her eyes.
Look at the plans.
Think.
She studied the floor layout.
Marcus would want an escape route.
He escaped through a basement in Annapolis.
He liked secondary exits.
Where?
The loading tunnels.
Audrey traced the building.
Then she saw it.
A freight conveyor corridor connected the dispatch center to an adjacent warehouse.
“He’s moving them.”
Caleb’s backup officer looked at her.
“What?”
“Marcus isn’t staying in the building. He’s using the old conveyor tunnel.”
The officer radioed Roman.
No answer.
Audrey pointed.
“Send someone there.”
The federal commander hesitated.
Audrey snapped.
“If you surround the building, Marcus needs somewhere you aren’t looking. That tunnel is exactly where he goes.”
The commander made the call.
Three minutes later:
“Movement in east tunnel!”
Audrey exhaled.
Then another voice:
“Two hostages!”
David and Chloe were found alive.
Marcus was not with them.
Roman emerged seven minutes later.
Audrey ran toward him.
He looked furious.
“He escaped again.”
“David and Chloe are alive.”
“Marcus escaped.”
Audrey stopped in front of him.
“Roman.”
His eyes found hers.
“You saved them.”
“No. You did.”
“I read a blueprint.”
“You found the route.”
Audrey looked toward the building.
“Where did Marcus go?”
Roman’s phone rang.
It was Victor Sloane.
Roman put it on speaker.
Victor’s voice was amused.
“You’ve become sentimental, Roman.”
“Sloane.”
“Marcus was right about that.”
“Where is he?”
“Closer than you think.”
Then Victor said something that made Roman’s face change.
“Ask Audrey about the house.”
Audrey went cold.
“What house?”
Victor laughed.
“Her house.”
The call ended.
Audrey and Roman looked at each other.
Her home.
The one place nobody believed Marcus would return.
Because it had already been searched.
They reached it twenty minutes later.
The front door stood open.
On the kitchen island, where Audrey had left her wedding ring, sat a red folder.
Roman opened it.
Inside was one photograph.
Marcus.
Standing beside Audrey’s bedroom window.
Taken less than ten minutes earlier.
On the back he had written:
You took my family.
Now I take yours.
Roman looked at Audrey.
“What family?”
Audrey didn’t understand.
Then her phone rang.
Her mother’s name appeared on the screen.
Audrey answered.
“Mom?”
A man spoke instead.
Marcus.
May you like
“Hello again, Mrs. Hayes.”
Audrey stopped breathing.
