“I know, sweetheart. But he’s helping us.”
Rosa touches my shoulder gently. “Come sit down, dear. You both must be exhausted from the flight and everything.”
But I can’t sit. I fix my eyes on the monitors showing the estate grounds instead.
On one screen I can see Dante moving through the house with his gun drawn, his movements fluid and controlled. On another, men in black camouflage cutting through the fence on the east side with determination. On a third, Dante’s security team taking positions throughout the property.
“How many?” I ask Rosa without looking away from the screens.
“It looks like six men breaching the perimeter.” Her voice is calm like this happens all the time. Like armed invasions are just part of the daily routine over here. “Mr. Moretti’s team is very good. They’ll handle it.”
Six armed men had tracked me across the country and found me within hours of landing in New York. Someone really wants me dead. And they brought a whole team to finish the job.
On the monitor, the intruders move through the grounds undaunted. They don’t seem like random thugs hired off the street. They’re trained professionals moving in coordinated formation, covering each other’s angles, and communicating with hand signals. Whoever sent them paid good money.
Dante’s security team engages them near the east wing and suddenly the screens explode with violence.
I immediately grab Luca and turn him away from the monitors. “Close your eyes, baby. Keep them closed for me, okay?”
“Why?”
“Because Mama said so. Come here.” I pull him onto my lap and hold his face against my shoulder, one hand covering his eyes. “Don’t look at the screens. Just keep your eyes closed.”
“Okay, Mama.”
But I can’t stop looking.
On the monitors, Dante moves through the chaos like something that crawled out of hell. He shoots one man in the chest before the guy even sees him coming. Then drops low when another attacker fires at him. He returns fire with deadly accuracy that drops the second man instantly.
A third man gets close enough for hand-to-hand combat and I watch Dante disarm him skillfully. One move to break the man’s wrist and send the gun flying. Another to slam his head into the wall hard enough that I can see the impact even on the grainy security footage. A third to put a bullet in his skull before the body even hits the ground.
All of it takes maybe ten seconds.
“Jesus,” I breathe.
Rosa is watching the monitors too with an expression that’s almost bored. Like she’s seen this a hundred times before and it doesn’t even register anymore. Maybe she has.
Two more attackers go down under fire from Dante’s security team. They were ruthless in their execution.
But the last man doesn’t die.
I watch Dante take him down with a shot to the leg. The man screams and goes down hard on the gravel driveway. Dante is on him in seconds, zip tying his hands behind his back while the man writhes and curses. Then Dante drags him toward the house.
“Where’s he taking him?” I ask Rosa, even though part of me doesn’t want to know the answer.
“The interrogation room.” Her voice is flat. “You might want to turn away from the monitors now, dear.”
“Why?”
She doesn’t answer. Just looks at me with something like pity in her eyes and that’s when I know whatever I’m about to see is going to be bad.
On the screen, Dante drags the screaming man into a room I can see from another camera angle. It seems soundproofed as I can no longer hear a single thing. There’s a chair bolted to the concrete floor with a drain in the center.
My stomach turns because I know exactly what that drain is for.
“Mama, can I look now?”
“No, baby. Keep your eyes closed. I’ll tell you when you can look.”
