Chapter 5 - Through the Shattered Glass
The concussive blast blew the remaining breath from my lungs, sending me skidding across the splintered wood floor. Glass shards rained down like jagged diamonds, glittering in the amber emergency lights that flickered on automatically as the estate’s main power grid finally failed.
“Hannah! Get down!” I screamed, scrambling blindly through the settling dust and smoke.
Hannah had thrown herself over Leo, curling her body into a tight human shield against the base of the crib. Blood trickled from a shallow cut on her forehead where a flying shard of glass had grazed her skin, but she didn't make a sound. She just held the baby tighter, her eyes wide with unyielding defiance.
I kicked Marcus’s discarded MP5 across the room, out of his reach, and dragged him up by his tactical vest, slamming his back against the shattered window frame.
“The name, Marcus! Now!” I roared over the wailing of the estate’s backup fire alarms.
Marcus choked, blood pooling in the corners of his mouth. He looked past my shoulder toward the shattered window, his eyes glazing over. “It’s… it’s too late, Lorenzo… look at the courtyard… they’re already here.”
I whipped my head around.
Below us, in the sprawling cobblestone courtyard bathed in the harsh glare of security floodlights, three black SUVs idling with their headlights off were parked haphazardly across the fountain plaza. Armed men in identical tactical gear were pouring out of the vehicles, moving with terrifying synchronization toward the mansion’s side entrance.
They weren't here just to poison an infant in his crib anymore. Now that the stealth operation had failed, they were here to wipe out the entire estate.
“Mr. Rossi!” Hannah cried out, struggling to her feet while cradling Leo, who had finally started crying—a healthy, angry, lusty wail that tore through the smoky air.
It was the best sound I had ever heard in my life. He was hungry, he was angry, and he was alive.
“Can you run?” I asked her, grabbing her arm and pulling her toward the private service stairwell located inside the nursery’s en-suite bathroom—a secret exit only family members and senior security chiefs knew about.
“Yes! I can run!” she shouted back, her fear completely eclipsed by a fierce, maternal instinct that defied logic. She looked down at Leo with a fierce intensity. “I’m not letting anyone touch him.”
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“Good. Stick behind me.”
I fired my last two rounds down the hallway to buy us a few seconds of cover, then shoved Hannah through the hidden bathroom door just as heavy combat boots began stomping up the main corridor outside.
