Chapter 6 - SHATTERED GLASS
Warren dropped flat against the damp concrete floor.
At the exact same microsecond, the high-pressure fiberglass skylights fifty feet overhead imploded in a thunderous shower of safety glass and cold rainwater.
Crack-crack!
Two muffled, synchronized rifle shots tore through the ceiling. The two armed guards flanking the catwalk collapsed instantly, their weapons clattering down the metal stairs onto the floor below.
Before Sterling could comprehend what had happened, Marcus Vance rappelled through the shattered ceiling on a tactical line, kicking violently off an iron support girder and landing with bone-crushing momentum directly onto Victor Sterling.
The impact sounded like a car wreck. Sterling let out a strangled gasp as the gun flew from his hand, skittering across the slick floor toward the edge of the drainage canal. Sterling hit the concrete hard, his face slamming into the puddles of dirty rainwater, Marcus’s knee pinned firmly into the small of his back.
"Chicago Police and Federal Marshals are breaching the south gate!" Marcus barked into his tactical radio, his forearm locked around Sterling’s throat. "Secure the perimeter!"
Warren didn't wait. He scrambled across the wet floor on his hands and knees, reaching Selene’s chair. He pulled a pocket utility knife from his belt and sliced through the thick nylon cords binding her wrists and ankles.
"Selene," he gasped, catching her as her limp body slid from the chair.
She was burning with a fever, her skin clammy and translucent, but her eyes fluttered open. "Warren... you're here..."
"I'm here. I’ve got you," Warren said, wrapping his arms around her frail frame and lifting her against his chest. She weighed barely eighty pounds. He pulled his heavy coat around her, pressing his forehead against hers. "I'm never letting you go again. Do you hear me? Never."
Across the warehouse, heavy steel doors were battered open with hydraulic rams. Flashing red and blue lights illuminated the darkness as a dozen tactical SWAT officers swarmed the interior, weapons raised.
Behind them rushed a team of emergency paramedics pushing a high-tech mobile trauma gurney.
"Over here!" Warren shouted, his voice echoing over the sirens. "She's in septic shock! Acute renal crisis!"
The paramedics swarmed around Selene, carefully transferring her to the gurney, securing an oxygen mask over her face and adjusting intravenous lines.
Victor Sterling, his nose broken and his tailored suit soaked in filthy industrial mud, was hoisted to his feet in handcuffs by two federal agents. As he was dragged past Warren, he spat blood onto the floor, his eyes wild with venomous hatred.
"You think you won, Maddox?" Sterling snarled, coughing violently. "Look at her! Her kidneys are completely destroyed! The experimental treatment was an unverified trial run by a shell company I controlled! She’s AB-negative with rare panel antibodies! The national donor registry won't find a compatible match in time! She has less than forty-eight hours! You can't buy biology, Warren! You can't cook your way out of organ failure! She dies anyway!"
Warren stepped forward, towering over the broken billionaire. His face was completely devoid of fear—only pure, absolute resolve.
"Take him away," Warren commanded the federal agent.
He didn't look at Sterling again. He turned and ran alongside the gurney as the paramedics rushed Selene out into the flashing rain toward the waiting critical-care ambulance.
"Where are we going?" Warren demanded of the lead paramedic as they loaded her inside.
"Northwestern Memorial," the paramedic replied, closing the rear doors. "Her vitals are crashing. If we don't stabilize her core temperature and start continuous hemodialysis within twenty minutes, her heart will stop."
Warren climbed into the back of the ambulance, grabbing Selene’s limp, freezing hand between both of his.
"Step on it!" Warren yelled through the partition to the driver.
As the siren wailed and the vehicle tore through the rain-drenched Chicago night, Warren pulled out his phone with his free hand. He dialed Arthur Vance.
"Arthur," Warren spoke through heavy breaths. "Bring Tessa to Northwestern Memorial Hospital immediately. And call Dr. David Chen, Chief of Transplant Surgery. Tell him I am pledging a fifty-million-dollar endowment to their surgical research center tonight."
"Chef," Arthur’s voice sounded hesitant over the line. "David Chen is the best in the country, but Sterling wasn't lying about the antibody match. If Selene's immune system rejects standard donor tissue, an organ can't just be bought. It requires a living donor with genetic compatibility."
Warren looked down at Selene's pale, beautiful face, then remembered the little girl with the pink backpack who had walked into his dining room with a bowl of macaroni and cheese.
"Test me," Warren said, a tear dropping onto Selene's knuckles.
"Chef?" Arthur asked. "The odds of a non-relative being a direct match are one in a hundred thousand—"
"I don't care about the odds!" Warren shouted, his voice cracking with desperation. "Test my blood! Test my antigens! Do it the second I walk through those hospital doors!"
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The ambulance screeched around the corner of Michigan Avenue, racing toward the towering glass spires of the hospital. But inside the cabin, the heart monitor hooked to Selene’s chest suddenly let out a shrill, continuous, flatline tone.
The lead paramedic surged forward, ripping open her gown. "V-fib! She’s in cardiac arrest! Charge the paddles to two hundred! Clear!"
