Part 3
The first shot shattered the emergency light above the hallway.
Glass exploded across the concrete.
The corridor fell into darkness.
I hit the floor before I even realized I had moved.
Agent Ellis grabbed the front of my jacket and pulled me behind a stack of metal shelving just as two more shots tore through the storage door.
The steel rang like a church bell.
“Stay down!” she barked.
Outside, someone shouted, “He’s in there!”
Another voice answered, “Take him alive.”
Alive.
Not kill.
That terrified me more.
My father hadn’t been the target.
I was.
Ellis pressed a finger against the earpiece hidden beneath her hair.
“Bravo team, this is Ellis. We’ve been compromised. Route 9 Storage. Unit Seventeen. Multiple hostiles.”
Only static answered.
Her jaw tightened.
“They’re jamming us.”
A fourth bullet punched through the wall inches above my head.
Concrete dust filled the air.
Victor’s voice floated inside again.
“Julian.”
Calm.
Patient.
Almost fatherly.
“You’ve always trusted me.”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Every childhood memory fought against everything I’d just learned.
Victor teaching me to drive.
Victor cheering at my college graduation.
Victor standing beside me at my wedding.
None of it fit.
“Come outside,” he called. “You’re with strangers. I’m family.”
Ellis leaned close enough for only me to hear.
“That’s exactly why he’s dangerous.”
She slid another pistol across the floor.
“I hope your father taught you to shoot.”
I stared at the weapon.
“He taught me to hunt.”
“Good enough.”
A crash echoed from the opposite end of the building.
“They’re coming through the back,” Ellis whispered.
She opened the equipment case again and removed another object.
A thick manila folder marked MERCER.
