Chapter 5 - The Freezing Trap
A heavy iron bolt slid into place with a mechanical finality that echoed off the concrete walls like a gunshot.
“Hey!” Benny shouted, throwing his shoulder against the corrugated steel door. The metal didn't even vibrate; it was reinforced with a three-inch steel frame from the outside. “Open this up, you cowards!”
Inside the locker, the temperature began to drop rapidly. A rhythmic, industrial humming sound vibrated through the floorboards as the overhead refrigeration units hissed to life, pumping sub-zero air down from the ceiling vents.
Nell looked up from her father, terror stripping the color entirely from her face. “They turned on the freezer. Papa won’t survive an hour in here—his lungs are already weak from the fire.”
Carmine surveyed the room with lightning speed. There were no windows. The walls were solid insulated steel panels. The only exit was the locked sliding door, and outside, they were walking straight into an ambush.
“Benny, give me your Glock,” Carmine ordered, stepping up to the door seam.
Benny didn't ask questions. He pulled his sidearm and handed it over hilt-first.
Carmine aimed the barrel directly at the thick steel locking mechanism where the heavy iron bolt had dropped into place.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Three deafening shots cracked inside the confined metal box, sending sparks flying across the concrete. But the hardened steel housing absorbed the impact, flattening the bullets harmlessly against the deadbolt. The lock didn't budge.
“Reinforced plate,” Benny muttered, gritting his teeth as the freezing air began to bite through his shirt sleeves. “They knew we were coming.”
“It wasn't a trap for us,” Carmine said, his voice dangerously low as he turned back toward Nell and her father. He looked up at the ceiling vents, where a thick plume of white frost was already beginning to spill outward. “It was a burial vault.”
Emmett Fontaine shivered violently, his teeth chattering so hard he could barely form words. “Nellie... go... leave me...”
“Shut up, Papa, I’m not leaving you!” she cried, wrapping her own jacket around his frail shoulders while her bare hands desperately clawed at the thick plastic zip-ties binding his wrists. Her fingers were already turning red and numb from the plummeting temperature.
Carmine knelt beside her, pulling a heavy-duty pocket knife from his trousers and sawing furiously through the industrial plastic until the bonds snapped free.
“Can he walk?” Carmine asked.
“I—I think so,” Nell stammered, helping her father out of the metal chair. The old man staggered forward, his knees buckling before Benny caught him under the arms to bear his weight.
The room was already freezing. Breath plumed in white clouds before their faces. The digital thermometer mounted near the ceiling flickered downward: 32 degrees. 28 degrees. 24 degrees.
“We have five minutes before hypothermia sets in for the old man,” Benny said, his breath fogging as he scanned the walls. “There’s gotta be an emergency release on the exterior housing.”
“There isn't,” Carmine said coldly, staring up at the refrigeration control box mounted high on the wall, where a digital timer was counting backward from fifteen minutes. “Salvator didn't install an emergency release. He installed a timer.”
The timer flashed red against the frosted wall: 14:59.
Nell looked from the countdown clock to Carmine, her gray eyes burning with a desperate, terrifying realization. “They aren't coming back to let us out, are they?”
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Carmine stepped closer to her, his hand reaching out to gently brush a lock of damp hair from her forehead. His touch was warm against her freezing skin.
“No,” Carmine said quietly. “They aren't.”
