Chapter 4 - The Betrayal at MidnightBlood splashed across the windshield. The armored sedan lurched out of control, slamming violently into the stone pillars of the gatehouse.
"Duck!" Lucian roared, throwing his body over Mara as a barrage of heavy gunfire rained down upon the vehicle from the perimeter towers.
"Julian!" Mara screamed, blinded by the horror of the instant execution.
"He's gone! Stay low!" Lucian barked. He kicked open the heavy rear door, grabbing Mara by the arm, and hauled her out into the blinding storm of lead and shattered glass.
The estate guards—men who were supposed to be loyal to Lucian—were firing down upon them from the guard towers.
"The gate guards turned!" Lucian hissed, pulling a grenade from his vest. He pulled the pin with his teeth and tossed it through the open window of the primary guard booth.
A deafening explosion shook the earth, sending a plume of fire and concrete debris into the night air. The sniper fire momentarily ceased.
Lucian dragged Mara through the burning wreckage, sprinting toward the heavy steel doors of the main mansion. He slapped his hand against the biometric scanner beside the door. The heavy iron lock disengaged with a pneumatic hiss, and he shoved Mara inside before throwing himself through the gap and slamming the door shut.
The heavy steel doors locked behind them, sealing off the roaring gunfire outside.
Mara fell to her knees on the marble floor of the foyer, gasping for air, her lungs burning, her clothes drenched in rainwater and Julian’s blood.
"You... you led me into a trap!" she sobbed, looking up at Lucian with eyes full of terror and betrayal. "My uncle says you killed my father! Now your own men are trying to murder us! Who are you really, Lucian?!"
Lucian stood in the grand hallway, blood trickling from a graze on his temple down his sharp jawline. He reloaded his pistol with a crisp click.
"If I wanted you dead, Valeria, I wouldn't have spent five years sitting in a damp diner eating terrible cherry pie just to make sure you made it home safe every night at 3 A.M.," Lucian said softly, his voice cutting through her panic.
"Then why did my uncle say you killed him?!"
"Because your father ordered me to execute him if he ever lost his way," Lucian revealed, stepping closer to her. "Your father was dying of cancer five years ago, Valeria. He knew Victor was planning a coup. On the night your family was attacked, your father begged me to take his life before Victor could torture him for the syndicate's private ledger—the ledger that controls every asset in North America."
Mara stared at him, her mouth open in disbelief. "The ledger..."
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"Yes," Lucian whispered, kneeling down in front of her, taking her small, trembling hands into his blood-stained gloves. "And your father hid the key to that ledger in the only place Victor could never reach."
Lucian touched the silver locket hanging around Mara’s neck—the locket she had worn every day since she was a little girl.
