Chapter 28 - the sinking foundation
The crimson light on the console blinked once before the world fractured into deafening thunder.
Roman didn't hesitate. Before Clara could scream, his arm hooked around her waist, slamming her body against his chest as he threw them both behind a reinforced structural pillar. The limestone floor buckled with sickening violence. Shockwaves ripped through the subterranean vault, showering them in splintered stone and pulverized mortar. Julian shrieked as the heavy steel table overturned, pinning his legs beneath the crushed metal while the laptop skittered across the floor, its screen cracking down the center.
"Up!" Roman barked near Clara's ear, his voice slicing through the ringing in her head. "The lake intake is blowing out! The foundation is collapsing!"
Water erupted from the rear drainage arches like a unleashed leviathan. It wasn't a slow leak; it was the entire weight of Lake Michigan bursting through the sabotage charges Eleanor had buried inside the seawall decades ago. The freezing black water hit them at waist height within seconds, overturning supply crates and extinguishing the emergency floodlights into hissing steam.
Julian clawed at the water, spitting silt and bile. "Don't leave me! Roman! Clara, please! She planned this! She’s wiping every trace!"
Clara looked at him, water roaring around her chest. The memory of Julian’s smug sneer at the charity gala, his laughter when her gown was ripped to shreds, flashed through her mind—now reduced to a drowning rat pleading for breath. Roman reached down with one hand, hauled the iron slab off Julian’s broken legs, and shoved him toward the stone stairs that were crumbling into the basin.
"Crawl if you want to live," Roman snarled without mercy. "You owe Clara a courtroom testimony, and you're not dying until you give it."
Another blast roared overhead. The boathouse above was sinking directly into the subterranean chamber, bringing tons of timber, luxury vehicles, and shattered glass down upon them. Roman pulled Clara toward the northern submerged sluice gate. He pulled a compact oxygen breather from his tactical harness, shoved it between her teeth, and met her emerald eyes in the murky water.
May you like
"Hold on to me," he said against the rush of water. "Do not let go, Clara. Whatever you do, do not let go."
She nodded through the panic, tasting lake water and cordite. Roman kicked open the rusted iron grating, pulling her deep beneath the churn of collapsing concrete, diving directly into the black undertow of the lake.
