Chapter 20 - The Final Stand at Elmhurst
The thug barely had time to raise his hands before my iron bar struck him across the collarbone, sending him crashing backward onto our manicured lawn. I vaulted over the hood of my wrecked car, sprinted up our front steps, and kicked the front door open. Thick, acrid smoke filled the entryway. "June!" I screamed, coughing violently as I wrapped the collar of my trench coat around my mouth and nose. "Mom! I'm in the kitchen!" Her muffled voice called out from the back of the house. I rushed down the hallway, ignoring the small localized fire someone had hastily set near the living room rug. I kicked open the pantry door where a makeshift barricade had been jammed against the handle—June had used her art easel to block the door from the inside, keeping herself safe from the smoke and intruders. She tumbled out into my arms, coughing and crying, clinging to my jacket like a lifeline. "I've got you, baby, I've got you," I sobbed, lifting her into my arms and sprinting back toward the shattered front doorway. We burst out onto the front lawn just as the wail of approaching police sirens—triggered by our neighborhood automated security grid—echoed down Elmhurst Lane. Red and blue lights flashed against the autumn trees, casting strobing shadows over our ruined front yard. As I held June tightly against my chest, watching firefighters rush toward our smoking front porch, my phone buzzed in my coat pocket once more. With trembling fingers, I pulled it out and looked at the screen. A single text message from an unknown number flashed in the dark: *This isn't over, Nora. We own the shadows.* Before I could type a reply, the screen flickered, a strange, cascading code filled the display, and the phone permanently shut down, melting its internal battery in a plume of acrid smoke.
