Chapter 5 - THE BETRAYAL IN BLOOD
The mansion was under siege. The opulent halls of the Rossi estate, usually echoing with silence and classical music, were now a warzone of shattering marble and screaming alarms.
Victor shoved Chloe and Leo into the reinforced walk-in closet, slamming the heavy mahogany door shut. "Stay away from the walls. Keep him quiet."
"Victor, wait!" Chloe grabbed his forearm before he could pull away. The fabric of his shirt was already stained with soot from the blast. "You said Marcus opened the gates? Your own Consigliere?"
"He’s the only one with the override codes for the security grid," Victor snarled, checking the magazine of his Glock. "He lied in the ballroom. He’s working with Seraphina’s father. They used the gala to get their men inside the perimeter. They’re coming to wipe out my entire bloodline tonight."
Victor stepped out, locking the closet door from the outside.
Chloe sank to the floor, pulling Leo into her lap. The little boy clamped his hands over his ears, trembling violently as the muffled pops of gunfire echoed through the walls. Chloe wrapped her arms around him, pressing kisses into his hair, whispering over and over that they were safe.
But her mind was racing.
Marcus was the traitor. Seraphina hadn't been lying when she said Marcus gave her the watch. Marcus had robbed Elena's grave. He had given Seraphina the watch to crush the poison, knowing she would get caught, thereby igniting a war between Victor and the Russians—a war Marcus intended to win.
But why did Marcus want the locket? What was inside it that was worth desecrating a grave?
Suddenly, the closet door handle rattled violently.
Chloe froze. She looked around desperately for a weapon. She grabbed a heavy, wooden shoe tree from a low shelf and stood up, pushing Leo behind a row of hanging winter coats.
The heavy deadbolt clicked open.
Chloe raised the wooden block, ready to swing.
The door swung open, and Victor stumbled backward into the closet. His white shirt was soaked with blood on the left shoulder. He turned quickly, firing three shots down the hallway before slamming the door shut and sliding the heavy steel deadbolt home.
He slid down the door, breathing heavily, dropping the empty gun.
"Mr. Rossi!" Chloe dropped the shoe tree and fell to her knees beside him. She instantly pressed her hands against the bleeding wound on his shoulder. "Keep pressure on it. Don't move."
Victor winced, his dark eyes focusing on her. Even wounded, the sheer force of his presence was overwhelming. "They breached the second floor. My men are holding the grand staircase, but we're outnumbered. They aren't taking prisoners."
"We have to get out of here," Chloe said, her hands slick with his blood. "There has to be a panic room. A safe passage."
"There is," Victor rasped. He reached into his pocket with his good arm. He pulled out a crumpled, blood-stained photograph. He stared at it for a second, a look of profound confusion crossing his hardened features.
"I shot Marcus in the hallway," Victor breathed. "He managed to escape down the service stairs, but he dropped his wallet. This fell out."
He handed the photograph to Chloe.
Chloe took it with a bloody hand. It was an old Polaroid, the edges yellowed with age. It showed two people sitting at a diner booth, smiling at the camera. One was a younger, arrogant-looking Marcus.
The other was a woman with kind eyes, holding a baby.
Chloe felt the breath leave her lungs. The room spun violently.
It was her mother. Holding a baby Chloe.
"I know every person in Marcus's life," Victor said softly, his dark eyes locking onto Chloe's terrified face. "He has no family. He has no attachments. So you are going to tell me, Chloe Vance, why my traitorous Consigliere is carrying a thirty-year-old picture of my son’s nanny."
Chloe stared at the photograph, her reality completely shattering.
"That's my mother," Chloe whispered, her voice trembling. "Her name is Sarah Vance. We... we have a mountain of debt. The bank is foreclosing on our house. The agency sent me to work for you because it paid so well."
Victor's jaw tightened. "The agency I use doesn't hire people with debt. They hire ghosts. People who can't be leveraged."
He leaned forward, ignoring the blood pouring from his shoulder. "Marcus placed you here. He bypassed the background checks. He put you in this house. Why?"
Chloe's mind spiraled. The foreclosure notices. The sudden, miraculous job offer from an elite agency that never recruited public school teachers. The strict instructions from her mother to take the job, no matter how scary it seemed.
"I... I don't know," Chloe stammered, tears springing to her eyes. "I swear to God, I didn't know."
Leo suddenly crawled out from the coats. He walked over and pointed his small finger at the photograph in Chloe's hand.
"That's the lady," Leo said quietly.
Chloe and Victor both froze.
"What lady, Leo?" Victor asked, his voice incredibly gentle despite the chaos outside.
"The lady from the park," Leo said, looking at his father. "The one who gave Mommy the locket. The day before Mommy went to sleep."
Chloe stared at the picture of her mother. Her mother had given Elena Rossi the silver locket?
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Before Chloe could process the massive revelation, the heavy closet door violently shuddered. Someone had planted a breaching charge on the other side.
Victor grabbed Chloe and Leo, throwing them to the floor and covering them with his own body just as the door exploded inward.
