Chapter 27 - THE ESCAPE ON ROUTE 9
The sheer force of the released floodwater knocked the mercenary off his feet, sweeping him backward out of the mouth of the culvert like a ragdoll. His rifle clattered against the rocks, firing a wild burst into the sky before sinking into the churning mud.
Margaret had braced her feet against the rusted iron rungs of the valve mount, holding Lily with both arms above the rushing swell. The icy water surged up to her chest, chilling her to the bone, but she held on with feral, unbreakable fury.
As the surge subsided into a swift, knee-deep current, Margaret dropped down, scooped the shivering, gasping child into her arms, and surged out of the mouth of the pipe into the torrential rain.
Outside, the gully was a nightmare of torn hemlocks and raging mud. The second mercenary was thirty yards downstream, frantically trying to pull his drowned partner out of the surging creek. He hadn't seen Margaret emerge.
"Run, Lily!" Margaret gasped, setting the girl’s feet on the muddy embankment and scrambling upward through the thorny briars that lined the highway shoulder.
Brambles tore at Margaret’s face, ripping her cardigan and slashing her palms, but she felt no pain. She crested the ditch and fell onto the black asphalt of Route 9.
The highway was deserted, glistening like a ribbon of black glass under the storm clouds. In the distance, up on the ridge, the sky glowed a violent, apocalyptic crimson as the Vance family estate burned to the ground. The flames were visible for miles, shooting fifty feet into the air.
Suddenly, two headlights appeared through the thick wall of rain, coming from the north.
Margaret froze in the middle of the road, her hand shielding Lily behind her. Was it another mercenary patrol? Was it the local police Julian had bribed? She had no weapons, no strength left to run, nowhere to hide.
The vehicle slowed down. It wasn't a tactical SUV or a police cruiser. It was an ancient, beat-up blue Chevrolet station wagon with rust around the wheel wells and a bumper sticker that read: *PEACE BE WITH YOU*.
The car pulled to a stop on the shoulder ten feet from them. The passenger window rolled down.
Behind the wheel sat an elderly man wearing a black clerical collar, his white hair plastered against his forehead by the mist blowing through the window.
"Margaret Vance?" the priest asked, his voice shaking with disbelief as he looked at the bloodied, soot-covered woman and the trembling little girl.
Margaret stared at him, Arthur’s dying words echoing in her ears like thunder. *Ask for Father Thomas. Tell him the Bloodline Clause has been enacted.*
"Father Thomas?" Margaret whispered, her knees finally giving out as she collapsed onto the wet asphalt.
May you like
"Praise God," the priest breathed, leaping out of the car into the rain and running toward them. "Arthur called me twenty minutes ago from a satellite phone. He said if his line went dead, I had to drive toward Blackwood Pass and wait by the culvert. Get in! Quickly! Before they realize you survived the blast!"
***
