Chapter 7 - The Fire in the North Wing
The service quarters at the rear of the Lake Forest estate were dark, quiet, and filled with the smell of fresh linen and floor wax.
Too quiet.
Alexander burst through the swinging mahogany doors into the ground-floor hallway, his boots slamming against the tile.
The door to Sophia Romano’s small private room at the end of the hall was splintered inward. The lock had been blown with a tactical charge or kicked open with brutal force.
“Sophia!” Alexander roared, drawing his Sig Sauer P226 from his shoulder holster as he lunged into the room.
The scene inside made his blood run cold.
The small twin bed was overturned. Pillows were slashed open, white feathers drifting through the air like snow. A heavy-set man in a black tactical jacket was rummaging through Sophia’s small wardrobe, while a second man stood by the window holding a roll of duct tape.
And huddled in the corner near the radiator, shielding little Lila with her own body, was Sophia, her face bruised, her hands bound behind her back with plastic ties.
“Boss!” the man by the wardrobe yelled, spinning around with a suppressed Glock.
He didn't get a second chance to aim.
Alexander’s Sig Sauer barked twice in the confined space—a deafening, concussive roar. Both rounds caught the man square in the chest, dropping him instantly to the linoleum.
The second man panicked, dropping the duct tape and reaching for his sidearm, but before he could clear leather, a heavy brass table lamp came flying across the room, thrown with desperate force by Sophia, catching him squarely in the temple.
As the man staggered, Alexander closed the distance in two strides, bringing the heavy polymer butt of his pistol down across the man’s jaw with bone-crushing force. The enforcer collapsed unconscious to the floor.
Silence rushed back into the room, broken only by the sound of little Lila crying softly into her mother’s shoulder.
Alexander holstered his weapon, dropped to his knees beside them, and pulled a small pocket knife from his trousers, cutting the plastic ties off Sophia’s wrists.
“Are you hurt?” Alexander asked, his voice rough, urgent, and stripped of all its icy armor.
“We’re... we’re okay,” Sophia sobbed, pulling Lila tightly into her arms. Her wrists were raw and bleeding from the restraints. “They broke in... they said Miss Vance sent them—”
“I know,” Alexander said, his eyes burning with a dark, lethal fire. He helped them both to their feet. “Can you walk?”
“Yes,” Sophia nodded, wiping a tear from her cheek.
“Get to the basement security bunker,” Alexander commanded, his voice absolute and unyielding. “Lawrence’s terminal has an armored panic room with a direct satellite link to the port warehouses. Lock the heavy steel door from the inside and do not open it for anyone except me.”
“And you?” Sophia asked, looking up into his scarred, intense face with sudden terror. “Where are you going?”
“To finish this,” Alexander said softly.
He reached down, gently patting little Lila’s dark curls. The little girl looked up at him, her hazel eyes wide, and reached out to press her yellow plastic duck—the one with the missing wheel—into his massive, calloused palm.
“Keep it safe for me, tall man,” Lila whispered.
May you like
Alexander closed his fingers around the broken toy, feeling an ember of pure, living fire ignite inside his chest where the ice had lived for three years.
He turned and walked out of the service wing into the cold Chicago night.
