Chapter 4 - The Escape“Go to hell,” Victor spat, blood leaking from a cut on his forehead. “My men are slaughtering yours right now. You’re not leaving this mountain alive.”
Outside the window, the firefight raged with terrifying intensity. Tracer rounds lit up the night sky. My strike team was elite, but they were outnumbered five to one. Time was rapidly running out.
I grabbed Victor by the collar, hauling him up just enough to slam him back down against the floorboards.
“If my daughter dies in this room because of your thermite charge, Victor, I promise you, I will keep you alive for a year. I will peel your skin off an inch a day.” My voice wasn't a threat; it was a promise carved in stone. “Open the door.”
The sheer, psychotic conviction in my eyes finally cracked him. The arrogant underboss realized he had pushed a monster too far. Trembling, he reached up with his thumb and pressed it against the biometric scanner next to the iron door.
The scanner flashed green. The heavy bolts clunked open.
I kicked the door wide open.
The room was small, lit by a single dim lamp. It looked like a luxury prison cell—toys scattered across the floor, a small bed in the corner, and barred windows.
Huddled in the corner, clutching a worn teddy bear, was a little girl.
She looked up at me. My breath caught in my throat.
It was Lily.
She was older, taller, but she had Isabella’s nose, and my grandmother’s piercing green eyes. She looked terrified, trembling as she stared at the giant man in tactical armor holding a gun.
“Lily?” I whispered, dropping to my knees and letting my weapon fall to my side. I pulled off my tactical helmet, exposing my face.
She stared at me, her big green eyes wide. “Daddy?”
The word broke me. Two years of suffocating grief, two years of eating alone in a silent mansion, shattered in an instant. Tears streamed down my face as I held my arms out.
She didn't hesitate. She dropped the bear and ran to me, burying her face in my armored chest. I wrapped my arms around her tiny body, pulling her impossibly close, burying my face in her hair. She was real. She was alive.
“I’ve got you,” I sobbed quietly. “Daddy’s got you. You’re safe now.”
“They told me you were dead,” Lily whispered into my vest, her little hands gripping my tactical gear.
“They lied to you, baby. I never stopped looking for you.”
“Boss!” Marcus roared from the stairwell, snapping me back to reality. “They’re pushing into the house! We need to exfil now!”
I stood up, lifting Lily effortlessly into my arms and tucking her head against my shoulder. “Close your eyes, sweetie. Don't look.”
I turned back to the hallway. Victor was crawling toward his dropped pistol, desperate and bleeding.
I didn't even slow down. I raised my weapon with one hand and fired a single shot. The bullet shattered Victor’s right kneecap. He screamed in agony, collapsing onto the floor in a pool of his own blood.
“That’s for Isabella,” I said coldly.
I didn't kill him. Death was too quick an escape for a man who had stolen two years of my daughter's life. I wanted him to rot in a federal black site, crippled and powerless, for the rest of his miserable existence.
I ran down the hallway, carrying my world in my arms. Marcus and the surviving members of my strike team formed a protective phalanx around us as we breached the back door of the compound.
“To the treeline!” Marcus ordered, throwing a smoke grenade to cover our retreat.
We ran blindly through the thick, acrid smoke, bullets whizzing past us, shredding the bark of the pine trees. I shielded Lily with my own body, ignoring the burning sting as a stray bullet grazed my left shoulder.
We reached the extraction zone just as the Black Hawk descended, its rotors creating a hurricane of dirt and leaves. My men laid down heavy suppressive fire as I climbed into the chopper, strapping Lily securely into the seat next to me.
As the helicopter pulled away into the night sky, leaving the burning compound behind, I looked down at my daughter. She was shaking, but she was holding onto my hand with a grip so tight I knew she would never let go.
We were going home.
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But as my adrenaline began to fade, a new, terrifying realization dawned on me. Victor had known we were coming. He had prepared an ambush. Which meant someone else back at the mansion had tipped him off.
And Grace and Amara were still there.
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