Chapter 6 - THE QUEEN’S GAMBITThe blood drained completely from Adrian’s face.
For the first time since I had met him, the terrifying mafia boss looked utterly paralyzed. The gun in Victor Morosco’s hand was pressed firmly against the temple of Isabella Kane, the matriarch of the Kane family.
“Drop your weapons, Adrian,” Victor Morosco sneered, his voice dripping with malice as he stepped out of the elevator, keeping Isabella tightly shielded in front of him. Two more armed thugs flanked him, keeping their weapons trained directly on Adrian. “Or your mother joins your father in the cemetery before sunset.”
“Victor,” Adrian said, his voice dropping into a register so cold and lethal it felt like liquid nitrogen. Every muscle in his body coiled like a striking viper. “Let her go. This is between you and me.”
“Is it?” Victor laughed harshly, his eyes darting around the open office until they landed on me sitting frozen at my desk. “Well, well, well. What do we have here? The pretty little secretary who’s been auditing my shipping routes. Word on the street is, the boy thinks she’s his new mommy.”
My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird.
Isabella Kane, despite having a gun pointed at her head, didn't flinch. She shot her son an icy, dignified look. “Adrian, if you let this gutter rat blackmail you, I will disown you in my will.”
“Shut up, old woman!” Victor snarled, pressing the barrel harder against her temple.
Adrian took a slow step forward, his gray-blue eyes locked onto Victor with murderous intent. “Name your price, Victor. Money, ports, territory. Anything. Just step away from her.”
“I don't want territory, Kane,” Victor smiled viciously. “I want everything. I want your empire, I want your blood, and—oh, let’s make it interesting.” He tilted his head, looking directly at me. “Let’s have the secretary walk over here and hand me the encrypted flash drive from your desk. Do it now, or mama gets a new piercing.”
I looked down at my desk. The encrypted flash drive containing the cartel audit files was sitting right beside my caramel macchiato.
If I gave it to Victor, the Kane family empire would crumble, and Adrian would lose everything he had spent a decade building. If I didn't, an innocent woman would die right in front of us.
Adrian looked at me, his eyes dark, sending a silent, agonizing plea: Don't move.
But I wasn't just Adrian’s secretary anymore. I was the woman his son wanted as a mother, and the woman who had just survived a shootout in a panic room. I wasn't going to cower anymore.
Slowly, deliberately, I reached out my hand and picked up the flash drive.
“Smart girl,” Victor grinned, lowering his guard by a fraction of a millimeter as he motioned for me to walk toward him.
Adrian took a half-step forward, his muscles bunched, ready to launch himself across the room.
I stood up from my desk, walking slowly toward Victor, holding the flash drive out in my open palm.
“That’s it,” Victor purred, his eyes locked on the prize. “Hand it over, sweetheart, and maybe I’ll let you—Agh!”
He didn't get to finish his sentence.
Because as I stepped close enough, I didn't hand him the flash drive—I drove the sharp heel of my stiletto straight down onto the top of his foot with every ounce of fury I had built up over two years of abuse, late nights, and mafia crossfires.
Victor roared in pain, his grip on Isabella loosening for a split second.
That microsecond was all Isabella Kane needed. With vicious, practiced agility, the seventy-year-old mafia matriarch drove her elbow backward into Victor’s ribs, swept his legs out from under him, and shoved him violently away.
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Bang!
A wild shot went off, embedding itself harmlessly into the ceiling tile as Adrian crossed the distance like a bolt of lightning, tackling Victor to the ground and burying his fist into the syndicate boss’s jaw with a sickening crunch.
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