Chapter 3 - The Blood of Beacon Hill
Time seemed to slow down into a crystalline focus.
Marco’s finger tightened around the trigger of his silenced pistol, his barrel pointed straight at Mia’s chest.
I didn't think. I reacted.
Driven by pure, instinctual fury, I lunged upward from the stone stairs, throwing my heavy frame across the floorboards!
PFFT!
The silenced shot discharged, the bullet whizzing past my ear and shattering a crystal decanter on my desk into a thousand sparkling shards!
Before Marco could cycle his slide for a second shot, I closed the distance between us. I grabbed his gun arm with my left hand, twisting his wrist violently downward until the steel bones cracked with a sickening SNAP!
Marco screamed in agony, dropping his weapon.
I didn't give him a chance to breathe. I slammed my right elbow directly into his jaw, shattering his teeth, then drove my heavy boot into his kneecap. Marco crashed hard onto the Persian rug, clutching his shattered leg, gasping for air.
I knelt over him, driving my tactical knife straight through his left shoulder, pinning him firmly to the oak floorboards!
"AAAAAGH!" Marco shrieked, blood spurting from his mouth.
"Where is Lorenzo?!" I snarled into his face, my hand gripping his throat until his eyes began to bulge from their sockets.
"In... in the infirmary..." Marco choked out, blood leaking down his neck. "He’s... he’s executing the informant right now... the Morettis paid him two million..."
I struck Marco across the temple with the butt of my heavy gun, knocking him instantly into unconsciousness.
I stood up, breathing heavily, my white dress shirt splattered with Marco’s blood.
Grace had crawled out of the vault on her hands and knees, pulling Mia and the baby into her arms, weeping uncontrollably as she shielded her children with her own body. Mia was staring at me, her small face pale, but her eyes held no fear of me—only awe.
"Grace," I commanded, stepping over Marco’s unconscious body. "Take the children into the panic vault. Lock the steel door from the inside. Do not open it for anyone except me. Do you understand?"
"Yes, Mr. Duca! Yes!" Grace cried out, scrambling backward into the hidden room, pulling Mia and the baby inside.
Mia looked at me one last time before the heavy wooden bookcase began to swing shut.
"Be careful, Mr. Duca," the little girl whispered softly.
CLICK.
The bookcase sealed flush against the plaster, hiding them safely inside two feet of reinforced concrete.
I turned around, racking a fresh magazine into my pistol. My grey eyes turned into dark, bottomless pit of absolute vengeance.
Lorenzo had brought war into my sanctuary. He had put a gun to a child's chest under my roof. And in the underworld of Boston, there was only one penalty for breaking the sacred law of the Duca house.
Death.
I stepped out into the quiet, dark hallway of the second floor, my leather shoes moving with silent, predatory grace toward the infirmary.
The door to the medical wing was wider open now. Inside, I could hear low, hushed voices arguing over the sound of a heart monitor's steady beep.
"Hurry up, you idiot!" Lorenzo’s slick, cowardly voice echoed from the room. "Inject the potassium into her IV line! It has to look like a cardiac arrest before Roman gets back from Providence!"
"I'm trying, boss!" a second voice replied. "The IV valve is locked!"
I reached the threshold.
Inside the sterile, white-tiled infirmary, a woman lay unconscious on a hospital bed, hooked up to an EKG machine. Lorenzo stood beside her, wearing a costly camel-hair coat, while a tall, thin hitman struggled to insert a syringe into her fluid line.
I didn't issue a warning. I didn't make a speech.
I stepped through the door and raised my gun.
BANG! BANG!
Two unsilenced, deafening gunshots shattered the quiet of the night!
The hitman holding the syringe was hurled backward by the immense force, his chest exploding in crimson as he collapsed dead across the tile floor!
Lorenzo shrieked like a panicked animal, stumbling backward, knocking over a tray of surgical instruments that clattered loudly against the floor!
"ROMAN!" Lorenzo screamed, throwing his hands into the air, trembling violently as he backed up against the wall. "Roman, wait! Please! It's not what it looks like! The Morettis forced me! They threatened my family!"
I walked toward him slowly, my weapon aimed directly between his terrified, wide eyes.
"You brought hitmen into my home, Lorenzo," I said, my voice cold, calm, and utterly devoid of mercy. "You struck an innocent woman. You pointed a gun at a six-year-old child."
"She's just a housekeeper's kid!" Lorenzo wept, dropping to his knees, clutching my trousers. "She's nobody, Roman! We're blood! We're Ducas!"
I looked down at my cousin with absolute disgust.
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"In this house, Lorenzo," I whispered, pressing the cold steel barrel directly against his forehead, "that child is under my protection. And you are nothing."
BANG.
