Chapter 25 - Blood on the Crystal Glass
The drive back to the estate tore through the midnight highways at breakneck speed. Julian drove the armored Maybach himself, with Salieri running tactical surveillance from the passenger seat, while Clara and Constance checked their sidearms in the back.
"Who had the master override codes for the perimeter?" Clara demanded, her mind racing through the roster of inner-circle lieutenants.
"Only three people," Constance said, her face carved of granite. "Me, Julian, and Marcus Brody—my late husband’s oldest foster brother and our chief of domestic operations."
"Brody has been with this family for forty years," Julian snarled, slamming his fist against the steering wheel. "He carried me on his shoulders when I was five!"
"Which makes his betrayal all the more fatal," Clara said coldly. "He knew our patrol rotations. He knew the layout of the underground vaults. If he sold us out to Elena and the Council, he won't be running away. He’ll be opening the gates to finish what last night's strike team started."
As the Maybach crested the final private road leading to the estate, their worst fears were confirmed.
The massive wrought-iron gates were swung wide, their electronic locks hanging mangled and dead. Ahead, smoke rose in thick, greasy plumes from the eastern wing of the mansion.
"Ambush positions!" Salieri yelled as muzzle flashes erupted from the tree line.
High-caliber rounds peppered the Maybach’s reinforced windshield, spider-webbing the thick ballistic glass. Julian slammed the accelerator, ramming through a blockade truck, sending it spinning into the ditch, and skidded the heavy sedan onto the grand cobblestone turnaround.
"Move! Move!" Julian roared, kicking his door open and laying down suppressive fire with his submachine gun.
Clara and Constance spilled out of the rear doors in synchronized motion. Bullets pinged off the stone fountain, sending deadly shards of carved marble whistling through the air.
Clara spotted an enemy sniper positioned on the second-story balcony. Without pausing, she raised her pistol with both hands, aligned her sight, and fired twice. The sniper tumbled over the stone balustrade, crashing onto the hood of a parked SUV.
"To the private vault!" Constance shouted, firing her weapon with deadly calm. "Brody will be after the blood ledgers! If he hands those over to the Council, our entire allied network collapses!"
They fought their way through the shattered glass doors of the grand salon. The interior of the house was a war zone—priceless oil paintings were shredded by gunfire, crystal chandeliers lay smashed across the blood-spattered rugs, and the bodies of Vance loyalists lay alongside enemy operatives.
Suddenly, a shotgun blast tore through the wooden doors of the private library.
Constance was thrown backward by the concussive force, hitting the floor hard as shrapnel grazed her shoulder.
"Constance!" Clara screamed.
From the smoke-filled doorway emerged Marcus Brody, an older man with silver-streaked hair, wearing tactical body armor, holding a combat shotgun. His eyes were wild, consumed by bitter greed.
"I built this empire with your husband, Constance!" Brody roared, raising the barrel toward the downed matriarch. "And you handed the keys to a little street whore and a soft boy!"
Before Brody’s finger could complete the trigger pull, Clara lunged forward.
She didn't run away; she threw herself directly into the line of fire. She hit the floor in a baseball slide, kicking Brody’s front knee with all her strength. The joint snapped with a loud crack, and Brody howled, his shotgun discharging harmlessly into the ceiling plaster.
Clara scrambled atop him, knocking the heavy weapon from his grasp with her forearm, drawing her combat blade from her ankle sheath, and pressing the cold steel directly against Brody’s jugular.
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"Call me whatever you want, old man," Clara breathed into his ear, her emerald eyes burning with an unholy fire that froze Brody’s soul in his chest. "But in this house, I am the law. Who did you give the master keys to?"
***
