Chapter 3 - THE THREE-INCH GAPThe click of the hammer cocking back sounded like a thunderclap in the silent dining room.
Mateo’s hand hovered instantly over his holster, but a fraction of a second too late. Isabella’s finger was locked white around the trigger, her eyes wild and dilated with adrenaline.
"Don't move a muscle, Mateo," Isabella snarled, never breaking eye contact with Aleandro. "One twitch and I splatter his heart all over this expensive Persian rug. You think you're untouchable, Aleandro? You think because you built a three-billion-dollar empire on blood and imported steel that you can't bleed?"
Aleandro didn't look down at the dark, cold steel pressed against his chest. He didn't flinch. He looked straight into Isabella’s dilated pupils, searching for the woman he had loved for two years, finding only a stranger fueled by vengeance.
"You could have pulled that trigger two days ago when we were alone in the study," Aleandro said, his voice terrifyingly calm. "Why wait until tonight? Why wait for a dinner party where half my capos are stationed outside in the courtyard?"
Isabella’s lips curled into a twisted, triumphant smile. "Because a bullet to the heart in an empty room makes you a martyr, Aleandro. But dying tonight—while your empire crumbles around you—makes you a failure."
Before Aleandro could process her words, a dull, concussive thud echoed from the front gates of the estate, followed by the shattering of reinforced glass and the rat-tat-tat of automatic gunfire.
Ambush.
"They're here," Isabella whispered triumphantly.
Mateo drew his weapon, diving behind a massive marble pillar as a hail of submachine gun fire chewed through the leaded dining room windows, sending crystal shards raining down like deadly confetti.
"Boss! Sokolov’s hit squad breached the western perimeter!" Mateo roared over the deafening roar of gunfire. "We're compromised from the inside out!"
Isabella used the chaos to shove Aleandro backward with all her might. He stumbled against the mahogany table, and in that split second of lost balance, she sprinted toward the French doors leading out to the back gardens.
"Isabella!" Aleandro shouted, recovering his footing with terrifying speed.
He didn't draw his gun to shoot her—even now, a dark, primal part of his brain refused to let him put a bullet in her head. But as she reached for the brass handle of the garden door, a tiny, high-pitched scream cut through the gunfire.
"Miss Isabella is a bad lady!"
From the shadow of the butler's pantry, four-year-old Emma stepped out, holding her stuffed rabbit out like a shield. She had wandered down from the nursery, drawn by the terrifying noise, and was standing right in Isabella’s escape path.
Isabella froze, her eyes locking onto the child. For a brief second, hesitation flickered across her face. Then, driven by desperation and the roar of Sokolov’s approaching hit squad, she raised her heavy Glock and pointed the barrel straight at the little girl.
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"Out of my way, brat!" Isabella screamed.
Aleandro’s world stopped. The gunfire faded into a distant hum. The rain ceased to exist. There was only the gap between Isabella’s gun and an innocent child who had saved his life twenty minutes ago.
