Chapter 16 - The Voice in the Garden
The surviving operatives scrambled backward out the shattered front doors, retreating in total disarray across the terrace toward the rose garden.
I walked out onto the stone balcony, the cool night air hitting my face, and raised my rifle, picking off the rear guards one by one with cold, surgical precision. Within two minutes, the surviving intruders were pinned down behind the stone border of the rose beds, crawling in the dirt like rats.
I stepped down from the terrace, walking across the grass with slow, heavy strides, the muzzle of my rifle pointed directly at the ground.
"It's over!" I called out, my voice carrying cleanly across the estate grounds. "Tell Viktor that his little Connecticut field trip is cancelled!"
From behind the stone fountain near the center of the garden, a single figure slowly stood up, hands raised high in the air, dropping an assault rifle into the mud.
It wasn't Viktor.
It was a man I recognized instantly—Marco Vane, Viktor’s chief of security, a cold-blooded Sicilian veteran who had managed the Syndicate's European logistics for decades.
"You're a hard man to kill, Whitaker," Marco spat out, blood trickling from a graze on his temple. "Viktor underestimated you. He thought you'd go to Providence like a good little dog."
"Viktor made a mistake," I said, stopping five paces away from him, my rifle leveled at his chest. "And you made the mistake of stepping foot on my property."
Marco let out a bitter, raspy laugh, shaking his head. "You think killing me changes anything? Viktor isn't in Providence, Whitaker. He's not even in the country. The entire European syndicate has already voted to liquidate your assets, your estate, and everyone inside it. Even if I die tonight, the machine is already moving."
"Let it move," I said quietly. "Because from this day forward, anyone who comes near my children will find out why they call this estate the Whitaker Graveyard."
Before Marco could speak another word, a sharp, deafening crack echoed from the tree line beyond the perimeter fence.
A high-caliber sniper round tore through the night air, striking Marco squarely in the chest. He collapsed instantly into the mud, his eyes wide, lifeless, staring up at the starlit sky.
My head snapped toward the tree line.
Through my night-vision scope, I caught a brief, vanishing flash of movement—a figure in tactical black disappearing into the dense pine forest beyond our property line, carrying a long-range suppressed rifle.
It wasn't one of Viktor's men.
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It was a professional clean-up detail—sent by someone higher up in the Syndicate to ensure Marco didn't talk if he was captured.
Viktor wasn't just fighting me; he was cutting off his own loose ends.
