Chapter 16 - Blood on the Nursery Floor
"Mama," Sophia whispered, her voice cracking for the first time.
Elena shook her head frantically behind the heavy duct tape, her eyes wide with terror, signaling her daughter to run. But Sophia didn't move. Her feet seemed glued to the French oak floorboards as the older man—the one Julian called Uncle Victor—stepped slowly toward her, his heavy leather boots clicking against the floor like a death march.
"Loyalty is a disease, little girl," Victor said, his voice smooth and dripping with venom. "Your mother spent twenty years scrubbing floors for a monster who treats human lives like chess pieces. And how does he reward her? By making you a pawn in a war you can never win."
"She’s more family to this house than you'll ever be," Sophia said, her voice steadying as the adrenaline surged back through her veins.
Victor laughed, a cold, humorless sound. "Family? Let me show you what family means in our world."
He snapped his fingers. From the doorway behind Sophia, two armed mercenaries materialized, grabbing her by the arms and twisting them behind her back with brutal force. Sophia didn't scream, though the pain shot through her shoulders like fire. She kept her eyes locked on Victor, her mind calculating every second, every angle, every escape route she had mapped out on her blueprints.
"Search her," Victor commanded. "She knows where Rocco keeps the secondary vault keys."
Before the mercenaries could pat her down, the massive arched windows of the nursery shattered inward in a deafening cascade of safety glass and lead.
From the courtyard below, a rapid-fire sequence of suppressed gunshots lit up the room in flashes of white-hot fury. The two mercenaries holding Sophia dropped instantly, their bodies crashing hard against the floorboards.
May you like
Victor spun around, drawing his sidearm, but a heavy slug punched through the doorframe, grazing his shoulder and sending him sprawling behind the oak writing desk.
Stepping through the shattered window frame, dangling from a heavy tactical rappelling line secured to the roof, was Leo Moretti.
