Chapter 6 - Steel and Fire
Rounds kicked up plumes of frozen dirt around Georgie’s socks. One bullet grazed the wool fabric of her trousers, singing the fibers, but she didn’t slow down. She threw her entire body weight against the heavy steel utility post, slamming open the metal housing of the manual railyard override.
Her father had taught her this during the great rail strike of 1998, when stranded trains had blocked the entire port for two weeks: every yard switch in Baltimore had a secondary pneumatic purge valve.
She grabbed the heavy iron lever, braced her feet against the concrete foundation, and pulled down with every ounce of strength she possessed.
The pneumatic lines hissed like a dying dragon.
Underneath the advancing Marcone gunmen, the heavy steel tracks groaned, shunted sideways, and locked into an emergency detour siding.
At that exact second, the automated diesel switcher engine—a three-hundred-ton, unmanned railyard locomotive idling half a mile up the line—received the false clearance signal. Its massive turbochargers screamed to life, and the giant machine came barreling out of the darkness at thirty miles an hour, completely unannounced, slamming directly into the flank of the two vans the Marcone shooters were using for tactical cover.
The sound of the impact was like an artillery shell detonating in an enclosed room.
The vans were obliterated, sent cartwheeling across the gravel into the railyard drainage ditch. The gunmen scattered in absolute, frantic disarray, their firing lines shattered by the sudden, roaring wall of steel freight cars slicing the yard in half.
Through the smoke and flying debris, four black Fontana SUVs burst through the southern perimeter fence, tires spinning dirt, their headlights cutting through the chaos.
Elio Fontana was the first man out of the lead vehicle.
He didn’t take cover. Moving with lethal, terrifying precision, he brought up a heavy assault carbine, firing three controlled, devastating bursts that sent the remaining attackers diving into the shadows for their lives. Within ninety seconds, the railyard went completely silent, save for the hissing steam from the locomotive and the groaning metal of crushed vehicles.
“Clear!” Tonio’s voice echoed through the fog.
Elio lowered his weapon. His eyes swept across the carnage, past the burning wreckage of the vans, straight to the switch pole where Georgie Marino was sitting on the frozen dirt, her knees tucked to her chest, shivering uncontrollably.
Elio dropped his rifle onto the hood of his SUV and sprinted toward her.
He dropped to his knees in the mud and gravel, entirely unconcerned with his bespoke overcoat, his large hands immediately grabbing her shoulders, checking her arms, her neck, her face for blood.
“Where are you hit?” he demanded, his voice thick with an emotion she had never heard from him before—raw, unchecked terror. “Georgia, look at me! Where are you hit?”
“I’m not,” she whispered, her teeth chattering so violently she could barely form the words. “I’m just... my shoes. I lost my shoes.”
Elio froze. He looked down at her mud-stained, ripped black dress socks, then looked back at her dirt-streaked face.
Slowly, the murderous tension drained from his broad shoulders. He let out a ragged breath, pulled her tightly against his chest, and buried his face in her dark, tangled hair. His heart was hammering against his ribs like a war drum.
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“You insane, brilliant woman,” Elio muttered against her skin, his arms locking around her like an unbreakable steel vault. “You absolute lunatic.”
Georgie rested her head against the crisp lapel of his coat, breathing in the scent of cedar and cordite, and for the first time in twenty-four hours, she felt completely, undeniably safe.
