Chapter 12 - The Whisper Beneath the Water
The digital pulse of the micro-transponder synced instantly to Daniel’s satellite phone, flashing an incoming encrypted ping. The caller ID displayed eight zeroes.
Daniel ushered Lily into the safe room disguised behind the library bookshelf—a reinforced panic room lined with Kevlar and steel—giving her a sketchbook and her favorite stuffed bear. "Stay right here, Lily-bug. Don't open this door for anyone except me."
"Is Mommy hiding in the ocean?" Lily asked suddenly, her voice barely above a whisper.
Daniel froze, his hand trembling on the titanium door latch. "What did you say?"
"Before the bad lady threw me in the water," Lily whispered, her wide hazel eyes reflecting the dim emergency strip lighting, "she told me Mommy was trapped in a cage beneath the waves. She said Mommy was screaming for me."
Ice ran through Daniel’s veins. He closed the vault door, engaged the biometric lock, and answered the vibrating phone.
"Who is this?" Daniel growled, his voice laced with feral desperation.
"Listen to me carefully, Daniel," an altered, synthesized voice distorted through static. "The woman who claimed to be Victoria’s accomplice didn't die in the harbor explosion. The Coast Guard pulled a decoy corpse from the water. You think you won back Mercer Global? You merely walked into the crosshairs of the Apex Syndicate."
"What does this have to do with my wife?" Daniel snarled, stalking toward the armory cabinet in his study, loading a SIG Sauer 9mm with practiced military precision.
"Claire discovered that Mercer Global’s automated shipping containers weren't carrying high-tech medical gear. They were moving human biological blueprints and offshore cartel capital. When she threatened to blow the whistle, they didn’t kill her. They used her brilliant mind. She is being held at the deep-water rig known as Platform Tartarus."
"Why tell me now?"
"Because thirty minutes ago, a strike team crossed your perimeter fence. Look out your eastern window, Mercer. Run."
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Daniel dropped the phone as the exterior glass of the living room shattered in a thunderous detonation. Flashbangs blinded the lower hall with searing white light, followed by the deafening percussion of suppressed submachine gun fire tearing through mahogany furniture.
***
