"You stay the hell away from her, Vance!" Carl bellowed, his voice echoing off the aluminum backsplashes. He threw the heavy stainless steel spatula straight at Miller's chest.
It didn't do damage, but the flat metal slapped hard against Miller's slicker with a loud clatter, catching the supervisor off guard. Miller stumbled back half a step, swearing, his gloved hand coming up to wipe a smear of cold grease from his collar.
"Go, Nora!" Carl roared, lunging forward with his arms wide, intentionally throwing his bulk across the narrow aisle between the register and the ice bin to block Miller's lane. "Take the cellar! Move!"
I didn't think. I tucked the recorded radio into the bib of my apron, snatched the blue water-intake notice off the clipboard, and scrambled on hands and knees through the swinging aluminum door into the kitchen.
Behind me, the sound of boots scuffling on wet floor erupted into a violent thud as Miller shoved Carl back against the metal shelving. Cans of crushed tomatoes and institutional-sized green beans came crashing down onto the linoleum, rolling across the floor in a thunderous metallic avalanche.
The kitchen was pitch-black except for the red pilot lights on the deep fryers. The smell of hot grease and burnt bacon hung thick in the air. Outside the screened delivery door, a heavy boot kicked against the wood frame, splintering the pine casing.
"Miller!" a voice shouted from the alley. "The back door's latched! Should we take the frame out?"
"Get in here!" Miller’s voice bellowed from the dining room, strained with physical effort. "The woman's got the state sheets! Don't let her reach the lot!"
I dropped to my knees beside the three-bay dish sink. The wooden trapdoor to the old root cellar was swollen from forty years of steam and dishwater, its recessed iron ring slick under my trembling fingers. I hooked two fingers through the rusted iron and hauled upward with everything I had in my shoulders.
The oak boards groaned, wood fibers tearing as the seal gave way. A blast of cold, damp earth and the sulfurous reek of ancient grease rose up from the dark hole.
I didn't use the wooden ladder. I swung my legs over the opening, gripped the joist with my knuckles until the splinters bit deep into my skin, and dropped into the shallow pit.
The mud at the bottom took my knees with a wet, sucking sound that knocked the wind from my lungs. The cellar was less than four feet high, an old stone foundation passage built in the twenties to service the gravity-fed grease interceptor that ran out toward the state ditch.
Above me, the kitchen door splintered inward with the screech of pulling nails. Heavy boots pounded across the floorboards directly over my skull, shaking grit down into my hair.
"She ain't in the pantry!" a man yelled overhead. "Check the dish room! There’s a floor hatch!"
I forced myself forward on my stomach, dragging my body through four inches of cold runoff and decomposing leaves that had backed up into the drain trench. The stones scraped against my elbows, tearing the cotton sleeves of my uniform, but I kept my chin up, keeping the folded blue state document pressed hard against my collarbone.
Ten feet ahead, a faint gray circle of rainy night showed where the concrete drainage pipe broke through the foundation bank into the ditch behind the parking lot.
I hauled myself through the mouth of the culvert, scraping through a tangle of wet blackberry brambles, and rolled into the muddy hollow between the ditch slope and the rear tires of the center Suburban.
Rain hit my face like needles. The truck's engine was rumbling quietly above me, the tailpipe puffing steady gray plumes of exhaust into the downpour. Through the wheel well, I could see the diner's front lot. The third truck sat empty, its wipers still sweeping across a wet windshield.
Inside the diner, glass shattered—the display case by the register. Miller was tearing the place apart.
I stayed flat against the gravel, crawling on my elbows along the rocker panel of truck number four until I reached the front passenger door. The handle was cold chrome, smeared with wet road grime.