Chapter 5 - The Catacombs of the Estate
Darkness enveloped the underground service tunnels. Water dripped from ancient stone arches, echoing like falling lead. Sophia led the small group through the claustrophobic maze with an uncanny sense of direction, her bare feet moving silently over the damp gravel.
"Sophia, slow down," Elena panted, clutching her side as she struggled to keep pace. "Where does this lead?"
"To the old boat house by the lake," Sophia whispered back without stopping. "My dad used to fix the diesel engines down there before he got sick. There's a motorboat with a full tank. I checked it yesterday when I was exploring."
The consigliere checked his weapon, his breath ragged in the tight space. "An eight-year-old girl is running tactical logistics for the Moretti family. I'll be damned."
Suddenly, the beam of a heavy flashlight cut through the tunnel ahead of them.
"Freeze!" a harsh voice barked.
Two men in black tactical gear stepped out from an intersecting drainage conduit, blocking the path to the boathouse. They weren't Savino thugs; they wore the private crest of Uncle Marco’s personal guard on their sleeves.
Elena screamed, pulling Sophia behind her.
Sophia didn't panic. Instead, she looked up at the rusted steam valve directly above the guards’ heads. It was a massive, corroded iron wheel connected to the estate’s secondary heating grid—a relic from the 1950s that Rocco’s father had installed.
"Hold the baby," Sophia whispered, thrusting the bundle into the consigliere's arms before he could react.
Before the guards could raise their rifles, Sophia scrambled up a rusted iron ladder attached to the brick wall, her small frame slipping into the shadows of the overhead pipes.
"What the—" one guard muttered, raising his weapon toward Elena.
Clang!
Sophia threw her entire body weight against the rusted iron wheel of the steam valve. With a screech of tortured metal, the seal broke. A massive jet of pressurized, boiling steam hissed out of the pipe, enveloping the two guards in a blinding white cloud of scalding heat.
The men dropped their weapons, screaming in agony as they stumbled backward into the stone walls, completely incapacitated.
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Sophia dropped lightly back to the gravel floor, brushing the dust off her knees as if she had just stepped off a playground. She held her arms out for the baby.
The consigliere stared at her, utterly speechless, before carefully handing the newborn back to her. "Remind me never to get on your bad side, kid."
