Part 9: The Harbor Fire
## Part 9: The Harbor Fire
The windowpane didn't just rattle; it cracked.
A dull, heavy boom echoed from the lower pier, followed by a sudden flash of orange light that turned the gray Boston fog into a wall of fire.
Theodore had hit the transformer.
The lights in the Custom House loft went completely dead, leaving only the dark orange glow from the burning fuel tanks below to light up the room.
"Cora, stay behind the pillar," Liam ordered, his hand reaching into his suit jacket as he moved toward the service exit.
"Marcus! Get the tactical units to the south pier! Cut the main line!"
I didn't stay behind the pillar.
I walked to the window, looking down at the burning concrete of the terminal.
The massive yellow crane was jammed into the steel grid of the power station, its cabin crushed, its engine throwing thick sheets of black smoke into the rain.
A figure crawled out of the broken window of the crane.
Theodore.
He was wearing his tuxedo trousers, but his jacket was gone, his white shirt covered in grease and soot, his jaw wrapped in a bloody hospital bandage that had unraveled in the wind.
He was holding a red jerrycan of marine fuel in his uninjured hand.
He was moving toward the storage vaults where my grandfather’s historical textile archives were kept.
"He’s going to burn the records, Liam," I shrieked, my hand flying to the iron door handle.
"He knows the original design books are in the vault!"
Liam caught my arm, his grip hard enough to leave a white mark against my silk dress.
"The vault is reinforced steel, Cora," he hissed.
"It can handle a fuel fire."
"The vault ventilation lines are copper, Liam!" I cried, turning my face to look at him through the orange glare.
"If the temperature hits four hundred degrees, the silk inside will turn to ash within three minutes!"
"My grandfather’s life is in that room!"
Liam looked out the window at the figure trailing fuel along the concrete wall.
The gray ice in his eyes turned into a lethal, solid black.
"Marcus," he said into his earpiece, his voice dead and level.
"Take the shot."
CRACK.
The sound of the tactical rifle from the roof was a single, clean note that cut through the roar of the fire.
The red jerrycan in Theodore’s hand didn't explode—it flew out of his grip as his shoulder spun backward from the force of the bullet.
He hit the wet asphalt of the pier, his white shirt immediately staining with a dark circle of crimson that spread toward the river.
He didn't get up.
He lay near the edge of the water, his fingers twitching against the stone as the police sirens began to echo from the South End highway.
Liam let go of my arm, his face turning back to the mahogany table where his mother’s shroud lay beneath the protective glass sheets.
May you like
"The storm is over, Cora," he said softly.
"Let’s go collect your grandfather’s books."
