Everyone watched Victoria raise her hand against a helpless elderly woman, but only one waitress dared to stop her—and seconds later, Chicago’s most powerful billionaire walked straight toward them.

They entered through an auxiliary maintenance airlock, kicking aside decades of accumulated debris, broken glass, and rusted chains.

The interior of Foundry Nine smelled of petrified coal dust, oxidized metal, and damp earth. Massive steel catwalks crisscrossed the cavernous ceiling hundreds of feet above, disappearing into impenetrable black shadows. In the center of the vast hall stood the colossal dormant blast furnace, a towering iron leviathan that looked like an ancient pagan altar.

Mateo and three security men fanned out, securing the catwalk access stairs with claymore charges and motion sensors.

"Vincent," Emma called out softly, her eyes drawn to a rusted control pulpit overlooking the foundry floor. "Look at the dust."

Vincent froze, his tactical light tracking where Emma pointed.

On the concrete floor leading toward the central blast pit, the thick layer of grey coal dust was disturbed. Not by old drafts, but by fresh, boot-tread patterns—heavy military lug soles.

"We're not the first ones here," Mateo hissed, instantly raising his weapon toward the catwalks.

"Take cover!" Vincent roared.

The darkness above erupted in gunfire.

Muzzle flashes strobed like violent lightning across the rusted iron rafters. High-velocity 5.56mm rounds chewed through the concrete floor around them, sending up blinding clouds of pulverized stone.

One of Moretti’s vanguard operators caught a burst to the shoulder, spinning to the deck with a muffled cry. Mateo immediately laid down suppressive fire, his submachine gun barking rhythmically into the shadows above.

Vincent tackled Emma behind the curved steel rim of a twenty-ton slag ladle, pulling his Kimber .45 from his holster.

"They were waiting," Emma gasped, pressing her back against the freezing steel as ricochets screamed off the metal plate inches from her head. "They knew your father's coordinates!"

"No," Vincent spat, leaning around the edge and firing three rapid, perfectly placed shots into a sniper nest sixty feet above. A dark figure tumbled from the catwalk, crashing through a skylight and plummeting to the concrete floor with a sickening crunch. "They didn't know the coordinates. They set an ambush at the entrance because they knew I was the only one who could open the vault."

From the shadows near the far end of the furnace, a voice amplified by a megaphone echoed through the cavernous foundry, smooth, cold, and dripping with venom.