Chapter 6 – THE RECKONING IN THE DARK

“Gabriel,” Teresa sobbed, reaching out.

Gabriel didn’t look at her yet. He kept the shotgun aimed down the stairs.

“Luca,” Gabriel said, his voice tight. “Get Mom and the girl to the safe room.”

“There are twenty men down there,” Luca replied, stepping beside his brother. He pulled a handgun from his holster.

“Then we have a lot of work to do,” Gabriel said.

Michael scrambled to his feet. “You’re crazy! They’ll slaughter us!”

Gabriel turned, striking Michael across the jaw with the butt of the rifle. Michael crumpled.

“That’s for selling out Mom,” Gabriel spat.

He looked at me. “You’re Hannah?”

I nodded, terrified.

“You kept her alive,” he said softly. “Thank you.”

Suddenly, bullets ripped through the drywall near the stairs.

“Go!” Luca yelled, firing back down into the darkness.

I grabbed Teresa’s arm, and together we hurried back to Sophie’s room.

I pulled Sophie from the closet. She was crying silently.

“We have to go to Daddy’s office,” Sophie whispered. “The secret door.”

I hadn’t known there was a safe room, but Sophie did.

We rushed down the back servants’ stairs. The sound of gunfire echoed through the massive house.

We reached Luca’s study. Sophie pushed a hidden panel behind a bookshelf, revealing a heavy steel door. She punched in a code.

The door hissed open. We piled inside.

It was a small, reinforced room with monitors showing the security cameras.

Teresa collapsed into a chair, gasping for breath.

I looked at the screens. Night vision showed Luca and Gabriel fighting side by side, systematically taking down Bellini’s men.

They moved with a synchronized, terrifying grace. Two brothers who hadn’t spoken in five years, protecting their home.

But on one camera, I saw Vanessa.

She was creeping through the kitchen, holding a gas canister.

“She’s going to burn the house down,” I gasped.

Teresa looked up. “The ledger. If Bellini can’t have it, he ordered her to destroy the house.”

I looked at the steel door. If the house burned, we would suffocate in here.

“Stay here,” I told Sophie and Teresa.

“Hannah, no!” Teresa cried.

I grabbed a heavy bronze bookend from a shelf in the safe room and slipped back out into the study.

I crept through the darkened halls toward the kitchen.

The smell of gasoline hit me before I saw her.

Vanessa was pouring fuel over the expensive hardwood floors.

“You’re crazy,” I whispered.

She spun around, a lighter in her hand.

“You ruined my life, you little peasant!” she screamed.

She sparked the lighter.

I threw the bookend as hard as I could.

It struck her wrist. The lighter flew from her hand, skittering across the dry floor away from the gas.

Vanessa shrieked and lunged at me.

She tackled me to the ground, her perfectly manicured hands wrapping around my throat.

“I’ll kill you myself!” she hissed.

I couldn’t breathe. Black spots danced in my vision.

Then, Vanessa was suddenly yanked off me, thrown across the kitchen island like a ragdoll.

I gasped for air, looking up.

Gabriel stood there, breathing heavily, blood on his shirt.

He looked down at Vanessa. “You don’t touch my family.”

Share