Chapter 6 - The Trap is SprungBefore I could answer, the security monitor on the desk flashed red. An emergency alert siren wailed across the estate.
On the screen, Paulie and two guards were running toward the underground wine cellar beneath the main dining hall. In the center of the camera feed, a secret panel in the stone wall had been blasted open from the inside.
"He's in the old smuggling tunnels," Adrian growled, his grief instantly vanishing, replaced once more by the cold, calculated fury of the waterfront boss. He drew his backup firearm from his holster, checking the chamber with a practiced click. "Lock the room, Hannah. Do not open it for anyone except me."
"Adrian, wait!" I cried out, grabbing his sleeve. "It's a trap. The voice on the intercom... it knew I was in here. It wanted you to go down there."
Adrian paused, looking down at my hand clutching his forearm. A strange, tender expression flickered across his hard features for a fraction of a second. He covered my hand with his own large, warm palm.
"If I don't end this tonight, neither you nor Lucas will ever leave this island alive," he said quietly. Then, he gently unpeeled my fingers, turned, and strode out of the room, locking the heavy steel door behind him.
I stood alone in the fortified silence, the muted hum of the security monitors my only company. I watched the multi-split screen as Adrian descended the spiral stone stairs into the dark, damp catacombs beneath the mansion.
Ten guards followed him, their flashlights cutting jagged beams through the suffocating darkness of the tunnels.
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Then, screen nine went black. Then screen twelve.
One by one, the camera feeds in the subterranean tunnels flickered, hissed with static, and died.
