Chapter 33 - Six Seconds of White Fire
A violent hiss tore through the mountain silence. Blinding, incandescent white light erupted from Daniel's fist, turning the snowfield into a searing day of phosphorus and ash.
"Now!" Daniel roared.
He hurled the flare not at the car, but directly into the snowdrift twenty yards to the left of the road, creating an enormous heat flare that overwhelmed the Maybach's infrared sensor. Simultaneously, Leo mashed the frequency override on his console.
On top of the luxury vehicle, the automated turret whined in digital confusion. The red dot whipped erratically away from the child’s forehead, snapping toward the intense heat signature burning in the snow.
Daniel exploded from the tree line like a predator loosed from a chain.
His boots tore through knee-deep drifts, kicking up clouds of powder. The distance between the forest edge and the asphalt was thirty yards—an eternity under fire. Behind him, Julian provided suppression, firing two deafening rounds from his sidearm into the Maybach’s engine block to ensure the vehicle could not flee.
The bride screamed as Daniel closed the distance, but she did not pull away. Instead, as Daniel reached her, she fell forward into his chest, her arms unlocking just enough to thrust the bundled infant into his arms.
"Take her!" she sobbed, her voice broken, raw from terror. "Take her, Daniel! He has the detonator in the chassis!"
Daniel snatched the warm bundle against his chest, tucking the girl under his arm with iron grip. In the same fluid motion, his other arm hooked around the woman's waist, ripping her bodily away from the Mercedes just as a series of sharp, pneumatic clicks echoed from beneath the car’s undercarriage.
"Run!" the bride shrieked.
Daniel threw them both over the metal guardrail into the steep decline of the embankment.
They hit the snowbank hard, tumbling down the slope in a tangle of limbs and freezing powder. A split second later, the Maybach did not explode in fire—it detonated with a concussive electromagnetic blast. A high-voltage surge ripped through the car's systems, popping the tempered glass into millions of glittering diamonds and sending a shockwave that rattled Daniel’s teeth inside his skull.
When the snow settled, silence fell over the ravine. Only the ragged breathing of four survivors broke the quiet.
Daniel scrambled upright on his knees, shielding the blanket with his body. With trembling fingers, he peeled back the Sterling crest embroidery.
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Two dark, wide eyes blinked up at him through the cold. The baby let out a thin, indignant wail.
She was alive.
