Chapter 8 - THE SIEGE OF THE CARUSO ESTATEBy 9:00 PM, the Caruso estate looked like a war zone from a Tom Clancy novel.
Four black armored SUVs blocked the main iron gates, their high-beam headlights cutting blinding shafts of white light through the freezing, snow-flecked darkness. Inside the perimeter, a dozen armed syndicate enforcers crouched behind stone planters and marble fountains, their assault rifles trained on the treeline.
Outside the gates, parked along the winding country road, were three unmarked dark vans belonging to the Red Scorpions—and behind them, flashing blue and red lights from half a dozen municipal police cruisers that didn't dare cross the property line without a tactical warrant.
Inside the mansion’s fortified panic room, Dr. Alan Vance adjusted his surgical loupes under the harsh, glaring lights of the medical bay.
"Are you absolutely sure about this, Mr. Caruso?" Dr. Vance asked, his hands trembling as he held a sterile handheld RFID scanner over the top of Titan’s massive, brindle skull. "If I cut too deep, I could hit the motor cortex. That dog might never walk again."
"I don't care about the chip, Doctor," Vincenzo said, standing beside the stainless-steel examination table with his hand resting on Arya’s shoulder. "I care about the target on my daughter's back. Cut it out."
Titan lay completely still on the table. He hadn't been sedated. The vet had tried to administer a dose of ketamine large enough to drop a horse, but the dog's high metabolic rate and sheer nervous system resilience had burned through it in ten minutes. He was awake, his single amber eye fixed steadily on Arya, who was gently stroking the rough, scarred fur between his massive ears.
Bip. Bip. Bip.
The scanner emitted a sharp electronic tone as it passed over a tiny, scar-tissue bump just behind the dog’s left ear.
"Found it," Dr. Vance whispered. He picked up a surgical scalpel, his hand steadying as he pressed the cold steel against the skin.
CRASH!
A tremendous explosion rocked the western wall of the estate. The lights in the mansion flickered and died, plunging the medical bay into the blood-red glow of the emergency backup strobes.
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"They breached the wall!" Paulie’s voice screamed over the intercom. "RPG! They've got rocket-propelled grenades! Fall back to the main foyer! Fall back!"
Gunfire erupted outside—a deafening, stuttering roar of automatic weapons fire echoing across the fourteen-acre lawn as the Red Scorpions made their final, desperate push to take the estate.
