Chapter 16 - A Don’s Wrath
Margaret didn't hesitate. With an agility born of decades surviving inside the underworld, the elderly housekeeper hurled the boiling thermos of chamomile tea straight into the lead mercenary’s face.
The man howled in pain as the scalding water hit his eyes beneath his balaclava, his finger instinctively squeezing the trigger. A burst of suppressed rounds chewed through the plaster wall, showering the room in dust and debris.
"Elena, the fire escape! Run!" Margaret shouted, throwing her body into the second gunman’s knees, knocking him off balance.
"Margaret, no!" Elena screamed.
The first mercenary recovered, swinging the heavy butt of his submachine gun viciously. The steel struck Margaret across the temple. The elderly woman crumpled to the linoleum floor, motionless, blood trickling into her silver hair.
"Grab the girl!" the second man yelled, leveling his weapon directly at Elena’s chest. "Drake said alive if possible, but a corpse pays the same!"
Elena backed toward the window, her hand frantically reaching behind her along the kitchen counter. Her fingers closed around the heavy iron handle of a cast-iron skillet. As the mercenary lunged forward to grab her hair, Elena swung the skillet with all the adrenaline-fueled terror in her body.
The heavy iron slammed against the side of the gunman’s helmet with a loud crack, staggering him. But the lead mercenary grabbed her from behind, locking a thick, gloved forearm around her throat.
Elena clawed at his arm, choking, her heels kicking wildly against his shins. She looked toward the bedroom door. Her mother, Catherine, had emerged, clinging to the doorframe, her face pale as snow, gasping for breath as her weakened heart began to fibrillate under the sheer panic.
"Mom... stay... back..." Elena wheezed, black spots dancing across her vision.
"Let her go!" Catherine cried, collapsing to her knees as her chest seized.
"Wrap them up," the mercenary holding Elena grunted. "Set the building on fire. Make it look like an electrical—"
The hallway outside suddenly exploded.
It wasn't a tactical breach; it was sheer, unadulterated kinetic destruction. The entire doorframe, along with a four-foot section of the hallway wall, was obliterated inward as an iron breaching ram smashed through the structure.
A flashbang grenade arced into the room, detonating with a blinding, ear-shattering crack that stripped the mercenaries of their sight and balance.
Through the drifting white smoke stepped Dante Moretti.
He wore no body armor. He held a customized matte-black semi-automatic shotgun in his right hand. His face was not human; it was the visage of an archangel of death that had crawled straight out of the furnace of hell.
"You touched my wife," Dante said. The voice did not sound like it came from a human throat.
The mercenary holding Elena tried to raise his weapon, using her as a human shield. He was too slow. Dante closed the six-foot distance in a fraction of a second. His left hand clamped around the mercenary’s gun barrel, ripping the firearm from the man’s grip like a twig, while his right boot drove forward with bone-crushing force directly into the man’s knee.
A sickening snap echoed through the room, followed by a blood-curdling scream as the mercenary’s leg folded backward. Elena fell to the floor, gasping for air.
The second gunman tried to bring his submachine gun to bear, but Dante didn't even raise his weapon. He simply stepped inside the man’s guard, grabbed him by the throat, and slammed his skull through the drywall of the kitchen partition. Plaster and wooden studs splintered under the impact. Dante pulled him out and drove him headfirst onto the hardwood floor with a final, wet crunch.
The room fell terrifyingly still, save for the agonized whimpers of the mercenary with the shattered knee.
Dante didn't look at the fallen men. He dropped his weapon onto the sofa and fell to his knees beside Elena. His hands, trembling violently, hovered over her face, terrified that touching her might break what little was left.
"Elena... Elena, look at me," he begged, his voice cracked and raw with terror. "Are you hit? Did they shoot you? Tell me!"
Elena clutched her bruised throat, coughing raggedly. She looked into his eyes. There was no arrogance there. No mob boss pride. Only the terrifying, desperate love of a man who would burn the entire planet to ash just to keep her breathing.
"Margaret..." Elena choked out, pointing a trembling finger toward the floor. "And Mom... Dante, my mom!"
Marco and four Moretti combat medics swarmed through the ruined doorway, immediately tending to Margaret and rushing into the bedroom to administer emergency oxygen to Catherine.
"They're alive," Dante whispered, pulling Elena firmly against his broad chest, his arms wrapping around her like an impenetrable fortress of steel. "They're alive, Elena. I've got you. Nobody is ever taking you from me. Nobody."
Elena buried her face into his bloodstained charcoal vest, sobbing uncontrollably. The horror of the morning, the revelation of Margaret's words, and the sheer terror of the assault crashed over her in an overwhelming wave. And for the first time since that wooden crate had arrived, she didn't push him away. She held onto him as if he were the only solid thing in a world falling into the abyss.
Dante looked over her shoulder at the mercenary groaning on the floor. His eyes darkened into cold, absolute obsidian.
"Who paid you?" Dante asked.
May you like
The mercenary spat blood onto the floor, glaring defiantly. "Go to hell, Moretti."
Dante didn't raise his voice. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a small tactical knife, and stepped toward the man. "Marco. Take my wife into the hallway. I need sixty seconds with our guest."
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