Chapter 6 - The East River Bulkhead
We sprinted through the dark, water-logged tunnel, our boots kicking up plumes of black silt and rusted scale. The distant sound of shouting echoed behind us down the arched brick corridor, bouncing off the walls like the barking of hounds on a scent.
"Faster!" Russo shouted over his shoulder, grabbing my hand and hauling me forward through a narrow, low-ceilinged section where the brickwork had partially collapsed into a jagged opening.
We scrambled over a mound of wet rubble, sliding down a muddy embankment that smelled strongly of river salt and decaying kelp. Ahead of us, a pale rectangle of grey moonlight cut through the darkness—the exit.
The tunnel opened directly into an abandoned concrete maintenance slip on the East River bulkhead. The tide was out, exposing slick wooden pilings covered in barnacles and green slime. Tied to a rotting timber pier bobbed a sleek, black twin-engine Zodiac RIB (Rigid Inflatable Boat) with its navigation lights dark and its engine idling with a low, throaty purr that vibrated through the concrete floor.
"Get in!" Russo yelled, shoving me toward the bow of the boat as he kept his gun trained on the tunnel opening behind us.
I scrambled over the rubber pontoon, clutching the ancient journal tightly to my chest, and tumbled onto the diamond-plate deck.
Russo leaped into the stern, his fingers flying over the console dashboard, flicking toggle switches and slamming the throttles forward. The twin outboards roared to life with a deafening twin-engine growl that drowned out the shouts echoing from the tunnel behind us.
The Zodiac surged backward out of the concrete slip into the open waters of the East River, spinning a hundred and eighty degrees in a churn of white foam before rocketing northward beneath the steel girders of the Williamsburg Bridge.
I sat in the bow, the cold spray of the river stinging my cheeks, my fingers locked around the leather binding of the Codex of the Iron Threshold.
As we cleared the shadow of the bridge, the glittering skyline of Manhattan rose up around us like a jagged ridge of crystal teeth against the dark, smoke-streaked sky. Millions of windows glowed with the warm, safe light of a city that had no idea what was crawling beneath its foundations.
Russo kept one hand on the steering wheel while his eyes scanned the radar screen on the console.
"We made it off Manhattan," I shouted over the roar of the engines, wiping salt spray from my eyes. "Where are we going?"
"A secure facility in the Adirondacks," Russo yelled back, his face hard and focused in the green glow of the instrument panel. "An underground vault your father helped me build fifteen years ago before everything went wrong."
He glanced down at the journal resting in my lap.
"And now," Russo said, "the real work begins. Because the symbols on that page don't just talk about a keeper and an heir, Olivia."
"What do they mean?" I asked, leaning closer so my voice could cut through the wind.
May you like
Russo looked over at me, his grey eyes reflecting the city lights dancing across the dark water.
"They mean the machine isn't historical fiction," he said. "It’s still down there. And it’s waiting for the bloodline to turn the key."
