Chapter 18 - Cold Storage
A dense, freezing fog hung over Baltimore Harbor as the midnight tide rolled in.
Rusted shipping containers towered like iron canyons along Pier 14. Ethan and Elena moved quietly along the exterior wall of Warehouse 9, the old cold-storage facility smelling of brine, diesel, and decaying timber.
Inside, the industrial refrigeration units hummed at a low, monotonous drone. Frost coated the overhead ammonia pipes, and breath plumed in thick white clouds before their faces.
"He's near the loading crane," Elena whispered, pointing toward a faint orange ember glowing fifty yards away in the gloom—the tip of a burning cigarette.
Julian Vance sat on a wooden crate beneath an idle gantry hook, shivering inside a stolen dockworker’s parka, clutching a snub-nosed revolver in his shaking hands.
"You should have caught the midnight train to Canada, Julian," Ethan’s voice cut through the hum of the compressors, calm and fatal.
Julian jumped, spinning around, raising the revolver blindly toward the darkness. "Stay back! Stay back, Ethan! I have nothing left to lose!"
"You lost everything the moment you targeted a child," Elena said, stepping out from behind a row of hanging plastic freezer curtains.
May you like
Julian squinted through the frost, his eyes hollow and bloodshot. "The little sister... the righteous heir. Did Ethan give you your shiny trust fund yet? Did he tell you how Father discarded your mother when he finished building his empire?"
"My mother lived a life of dignity, Julian," Elena replied, walking forward with measured, fearless steps. "Something you have never possessed for a single second of yours."
