Chapter 12 - The Shadows of the Potomac
The storm that had battered northern New Jersey had moved south across the Potomac by midnight.
A relentless sheet of freezing rain washed over the Virginia highway.
Three unmarked government sedans moved south along the forested route toward the military base at Quantico.
Anna sat in the rear of the middle vehicle, sandwiched between Damon and Marcus.
James Marino sat in the front passenger seat, his sightless face turned toward the rhythmic slap of the windshield wipers.
Ahead of them, two federal marshals in a dark blue Ford Taurus scanned the wet curves of the road.
Damon checked the magazine of his customized tactical pistol, clicking the spring against his thumb.
“You shouldn't have that weapon in federal transport,” Marcus murmured from the corner.
Damon didn't look up from his gun.
“If I relied on federal transport to keep me alive, I would have died when I was twelve, Marcus.”
Anna looked out the side glass into the black pine woods flanking the road.
The heavy trees whipped in the gale like thrashing limbs.
“How did my mother die, Marcus?” Anna asked softly.
The question caught both men off guard.
Marcus hesitated, looking down at his missing fingers.
“She died of pneumonia, Anna.”
“Tell me the truth,” Anna demanded, her voice rising above the drone of the engine.
“My father had military training.”
“He could have taken her to any clinic in the county.”
“Why did she die in an unheated bedroom with wet sheets over her chest?”
Marcus closed his eyes, his weathered face tightening with old regret.
“Because three days before she got sick, two men from Blackthorne showed up at a diner six miles from your house.”
Anna felt the cold settle deep into her bones.
“They found us?”
“They were asking about a tall mechanic with a scar on his shoulder,” Marcus whispered.
“Sarah saw them through the diner window while she was buying groceries.”
“She ran home, packed your winter clothes, and took you into the abandoned barn behind the county reservoir.”
“You were four years old, Anna.”
“The temperature dropped below fifteen degrees that night.”
“Sarah gave you her wool coat and wrapped herself in burlap feed sacks.”
“She stayed awake for seventy-two hours in the snow to make sure you didn't freeze.”
Tears spilled over Anna’s eyelashes, hot and silent.
“By the time Anthony found you two, her lungs were full of fluid.”
“He tried to drive her to the regional medical center in Columbus.”
“She held his hands against her throat and begged him not to stop the car.”
“She told him: ‘If you take me into that hospital, they will run my prints, they will find your name, and they will take my baby.’”
“She died thirty miles outside the city limits with your head resting on her knees.”
Damon turned his head toward Anna.
His expression was stripped bare of every trace of arrogance.
He reached out and gently laid his hand over hers, his fingers locking into hers with protective fury.
“Anna,” Damon said softly.
Before she could answer, the lead federal vehicle exploded in a blinding wall of orange fire fifty yards ahead.
A heavy anti-materiel round tore through the engine block of the Ford Taurus, flipping the two-ton sedan into the air like a discarded toy.
The car crashed back onto the asphalt in a shower of burning metal, spinning sideways across both lanes.
The driver of Anna’s vehicle slammed on the brakes.
The tires shrieked against the wet highway, the sedan sliding ninety degrees before slamming against the steel guardrail.
“Ambush!” Marcus roared, drawing his revolver with his left hand.
Automatic fire raked the driver’s side of the car instantly.
The federal driver slumped forward against the steering wheel, his chest torn apart by high-velocity rounds.
Glass sprayed inward like diamonds.
Damon threw his entire upper body over Anna, shielding her head and neck with his own shoulders.
Anna felt the sickening thud of two heavy impacts slamming into the back of Damon’s Kevlar vest.
Damon grunted in agony, his breath exploding from his lungs in a ragged gasp.
“Out the passenger door!” Damon choked out, shoving Anna downward into the footwell.
“Move! Now!”
Marcus kicked open the right rear door and rolled out onto the wet asphalt, returning fire into the tree line with rapid, deafening blasts of his revolver.
James Marino reached back into the rear cabin, his fingers catching Anna’s wrist with astonishing accuracy.
“Out of the car, child! Into the drainage ditch!”
Anna scrambled out of the smoking vehicle into the freezing rain and mud.
Three tactical trucks with high-mounted light bars were tearing down the road toward them from the opposite direction.
Operatives in sterile gray combat gear stepped from the flatbeds, raising assault rifles.
“They aren't taking prisoners!” Marcus yelled, pulling an empty cylinder from his weapon.
“I have no more ammo!”
Damon rolled out behind Anna, dragging himself onto his knees, his gun raised.
Blood was trickling from his nose where the concussive force of the vest impacts had cracked his ribs.
“Take Anna and run toward the tree line!” Damon shouted at Marcus.
“I’m staying with you!” Anna screamed, grabbing the lapel of his torn coat.
“Listen to me!” Damon snapped, his face pale, his eyes burning with frantic desperation.
“My father helped create this nightmare!”
“I spent fifteen years protecting his bloody money!”
“For once in my miserable life, let me do something that a Marino can be proud of!”
Damon stepped out from behind the shattered car door into the open road.
He leveled his semi-automatic pistol at the oncoming tactical vehicles and began firing with steady, methodical precision.
Two operatives went down in the road.
A burst of automatic fire caught Damon across the left thigh, sending him down onto one knee.
He didn't stop firing.
“Move, Anna!” Damon roared over the gunfire.
“Keep moving! Pain later!”
Before Anna could lunge back toward him, a low, mechanical whistle tore through the night sky from the south.
Two heavy military searchlights ignited high in the black clouds above the highway.
A pair of Marine Corps attack helicopters dropped through the mist like giant predatory hawks, their heavy twin rotors beating the rain into violent mist.
A booming voice shattered the valley through high-decibel tactical loudspeakers:
“THIS IS THE UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS SECURITY FORCE BATTALION.”
“DROP YOUR WEAPONS AND STEP AWAY FROM THE MARINO VEHICLES IMMEDIATELY.”
“YOU ARE FIRING ON ACTIVE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE WITNESSES.”
The gray-clad contractors in the road froze.
May you like
The door gunners on both helicopters racked their heavy machine guns with a synchronized, mechanical roar that shook the very pavement beneath their feet.
The war for Anthony Marino’s legacy had just entered the sovereign territory of his brothers in arms.
