90 "**“STOP WAVING YOUR HANDS! YOU'RE EMBARRASSING ME!”

The execution of Don Valenti sent a seismic shockwave through the city’s underworld.

The illusion of Luca’s death had broken, but the war had officially begun. The Volkov Syndicate, realizing their inside coup had failed catastrophically, retaliated with unbridled brutality. Over the next forty-eight hours, three Moretti warehouses on the east river were bombed, and two of our distribution trucks were ambushed on the interstate.

The Moretti estate was now a war room.

Maps of the city were pinned to the walls of the grand salon, radio frequencies constantly hissed with updates from our street captains, and the smell of gunpowder and black coffee permeated the halls.

I stood on the second-story balcony overlooking the courtyard, watching a fresh convoy of armored trucks arrive. Isabella was standing beside me, holding a pair of heavy binoculars, her keen eyes scanning the treeline of the surrounding forest. Ever since the gala, her senses had become razor-sharp. She was no longer just the sheltered princess; she had become our guardian angel.

She lowered the binoculars and tugged on my sleeve.

*BIRDS,* she signed rapidly, pointing toward the eastern ridge of the property, where a dense cluster of pine trees met the security wall. *BIRDS FLY AWAY. NO WIND.*

My stomach dropped.

In the country, birds didn't scatter from the canopy in a sudden, uniform burst unless something heavy was moving beneath the brush.

"Marco!" I shouted over the balcony railing into the courtyard below.

Marco looked up instantly.

"The eastern perimeter!" I called down, pointing toward the ridge. "Isabella spotted a disturbance in the treeline. The birds just flushed!"

Marco didn't question an eight-year-old’s instincts for a single second. He raised his radio to his mouth, barking an urgent code: "Red Alpha! Breach on the east wall! All units, defensive posture!"

Before the words had fully left his mouth, a deafening explosion shattered the quiet afternoon air.

The eastern concrete gate was blown inward by a massive shaped charge. A shockwave rattled the windows of the manor, showering plaster down from the ceiling. Black smoke billowed into the sky as three heavy, militarized gun-trucks smashed through the smoldering debris, their mounted heavy machine guns opening fire immediately.

Bullets tore through the courtyard, chewing through concrete pillars, shattering the armored vehicles below, and sending Moretti soldiers scrambling for cover.

"Elena! Isabella!" Luca’s voice roared from the hallway behind us.

He kicked the balcony door open, his assault rifle raised. His face was a mask of furious concentration, his tactical vest pulled tight over his bandages.

"Inside! Now!" he roared.

I grabbed Isabella by the arm, dragging her across the balcony threshold just as a hail of high-caliber rounds pulverized the stone balustrade where we had been standing seconds before. Stone shards exploded through the air like shrapnel, slicing across my cheek and leaving a hot sting of blood.

Luca pulled us down beneath the heavy oak wainscoting of the corridor, his body shielding ours completely. "It’s the Volkovs. They brought an entire strike team. They know we executed Valenti, and they're going for total annihilation."

"How did they bypass the outer road sensors?" I asked, panting, checking Isabella’s limbs for injuries. She was unharmed, her teeth gritted, holding onto my arm like a vise.

"They didn't bypass them," Luca snarled, peering around the corner to return a controlled burst of fire toward the staircase as enemy mercenaries breached the ground floor. "They sacrificed fifty men at the front gate just to punch this assault team through the back. They want my head, Elena."

"They won't get it," I whispered, reaching down to my ankle holster—a compact Glock Luca had taught me to clean and load only three days prior.

Luca looked at the weapon in my hand, then looked into my eyes. There was no terror in my gaze, only the wild, unyielding ferocity of a mother protecting her child.

"The safe room in the basement," Luca ordered, his voice raw. "Marco is holding the central stairwell. You take Isabella through the servant passage behind the library. You lock the blast door from the inside and you don't open it for anyone but me."

"I am not leaving you!" I shouted over the deafening rattle of automatic fire echoing up the grand staircase.

Luca grabbed my face with his bloodied, gunpowder-stained hand, pressing his forehead against mine. "Elena, you are my heart. If they kill me, you run this family. If they kill you, I burn this entire world to ash. Save our daughter. Let me do what I was born to do."

He pressed a fierce, bruising kiss to my mouth, then turned to Isabella.

*OBEY ELENA,* he signed with lightning speed. *I LOVE YOU.*