The Chardon Chronicles: Season Two --- The Winter
Page 54
Chapter Two
In the wee hours of the morning, Chloe and Keith drove toward the warehouse on Oxbow road. The Cuyahoga coiled around a set of old office buildings and old red brick warehouses. There was a good view of the buildings from a steep hill that plunged down to the trench like road. The building had a solitary door that was well lit. They drove around it slowly to see if there were any other ways inside, but it had no windows.
Chloe said, “I’m going up on the roof.”
Keith sighed and looked at the building. “Man that’s high.”
She rolled her eyes and said, “Like I’m gonna fall. That sprinkler supply line is like a ladder.”
He handed her a sub compact pistol. She checked the safety and tucked it in her jacket. He said, “I guess I’ll keep watch. I’ll text if there’s anything strange going on. Is it on quiet mode? No vibrate?”
She nodded and pulled a balaclava over her face, then kissed him on the cheek. “I’m going.”
He saw her trot into the shadows, then lost sight of her. She was in all black and she stuck to the patches of shadow. He thought he saw her moving quickly toward the back of the building, then saw a shape go over the roofline. He snickered at how fast she was, then focused his attention around the neighborhood to see if anyone else was out and about, but this corner of the city was dead as a graveyard.
Chloe stayed low on the roof and tried to stick to shadows. She found a roof access hatch and tried the handle, to her surprise it opened. She smirked and looked down into the darkness. There was a ladder that went down to a drop ceiling. She went inside and pulled the hatch closed and gave her eyes time to adjust to the darkness.
There was actually light streaming around the tiles of the ceiling. She ventured to pull one of the tiles up. She was actually high in the air above the structure that housed the reflector. Near her, a steel ladder was mounted to the wall. She wasn’t quite able to reach it from her perch, and the space was a little too tight to really leap. She looked around for anything structural to grab onto and had to go hand over hand on a sprinkler supply pipe, but once on the ladder she was able to quickly descend. She activated the video camera on her phone and started quickly roaming the structure. She went through the interior of the reflector then went through the control room and the lounge area.
She saw a text from her dad. “GET OUT NOW. ONE GUARD SIDE ARM.”
She heard the crunching of tires on the parking lot gravel outside the building. She scrambled back up the ladder and out the access hatch. She texted back. “On roof. Clear?”
“GO NOW!” He sent back. She slid down the sprinkler supply lines and was on the ground in a few seconds. She saw a security guard’s car parked by the door. The door of the car was open and the engine was running. She chuckled and jumped in the car and crunched the front bumper against the single door of the warehouse, took the keys and ran back to her dad’s car.
She was giggling when she hopped onto the seat. “Good gods that was fun!”
He was laughing, “That poor guard!”
“All’s fair in war!” She jingled the keys.
He drove back toward the Farm and she tossed the keys by the side of the road. Their adrenaline was flowing and he turned up some classic rock. Usually she hated it, but she started singing along. “Oh Black Betty bam ba lam.”