Chapter 8 - THE CONFRONTATION
We landed in Chicago under the cover of a massive thunderstorm.
The Moretti mansion was dark. The power had been cut. Rain lashed against the windows of the SUV as we pulled up to the service entrance.
"Emma, you stay in the car with Leo," Luca ordered, racking the slide of a heavy automatic pistol.
"No," I said, my voice shaking but firm. "Mrs. Carter saved my life when she stepped in front of Vanessa's glass. I'm not hiding while she's in there."
Luca looked at me for a long second, then nodded once. "Stay behind Antonio."
We moved through the dark service corridors, the only sound the thunder rolling outside. The mansion was eerily quiet. We reached the main dining room—the same room where this entire nightmare had started just forty-eight hours ago.
The heavy oak doors were cracked open. Light flickered from a dozen candles scattered across the mahogany table.
Sitting at the head of the table was Victor Bellini. He was an older, sharper version of Vanessa. Ruthless, immaculately dressed, holding a silver revolver.
Vanessa sat beside him, rubbing her bruised wrists, looking smug.
And tied to a chair at the far end of the room was Mrs. Carter. She looked exhausted, a nasty bruise swelling on her cheek, but she sat perfectly straight.
Surrounding them were ten heavily armed Bellini soldiers.
"Welcome home, Luca," Victor called out into the darkness. "I understand you took a trip to Switzerland. I'm afraid you wasted your time."
Luca stepped into the candlelight, his weapon lowered but ready. Antonio stepped out of the shadows beside him, holding a shotgun.
Victor's smug smile faltered when he saw Antonio.
"Antonio," Victor said smoothly. "Put the gun down. You know who your real father is."
"I do," Antonio said, racking the shotgun with a deafening CH-CHAK. "And he's been dead for twenty years because of you."
"You want the old woman?" Victor asked, pressing the barrel of his revolver against Mrs. Carter's temple. "Sign over the Moretti ports, the shipping lanes, and the offshore accounts. Do it tonight, and she lives. Refuse, and I kill her, then I track down the boy and finish what I started six years ago."
Luca didn't flinch. "You don't have the leverage you think you have, Victor."
Vanessa laughed. "We have an army outside, Luca! You have a maid and a brainwashed guard!"
"No, Valerie," Mrs. Carter said. Her voice was raspy, but it cut through the room like a knife. "He has the lunch lady."
Victor frowned, pressing the gun harder against her head. "Shut up, old woman."
Mrs. Carter looked directly at me, standing in the shadows by the door. She gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod toward the kitchen.
I realized what she meant. The gas lines. When Vanessa threw the decanter, it had struck the wall panel near the kitchen's main gas valve.
I slipped backward, unnoticed in the dark, and ran to the kitchen. I smelled it instantly. The heavy, rotten-egg stench of leaking gas filling the enclosed pantry space.
Mrs. Carter hadn't just been sitting there. She had used her foot to kick the service door shut, trapping the gas in the kitchen right behind the Bellini soldiers.
I grabbed a heavy cast-iron skillet from the counter, crept to the service door, and looked back at the dining room.
"I'm not signing anything, Victor," Luca said. "Because you're not leaving this room."
Victor sneered. "Kill them."
"NOW!" Mrs. Carter screamed.
I swung the cast-iron skillet with all my strength, smashing it against the heavy metal sparking-switch on the industrial stove.
BOOM.
The trapped gas ignited in a massive fireball that blew the heavy kitchen doors completely off their hinges, sending a shockwave through the dining room.
The Bellini soldiers were thrown to the floor in the chaos.
In the confusion, Antonio moved like lightning. He crossed the room, grabbed Victor by the throat, and slammed him into the mahogany table, knocking the revolver from his hand.
Luca took out the remaining guards with swift, brutal precision.
Within thirty seconds, it was over. The Bellini army was subdued, the fire sprinklers were raining down on the dining room, and Victor was pinned beneath the brother he had kidnapped three decades ago.
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Vanessa scrambled backward, screaming, slipping on the wet marble floor. She looked up, only to find me standing over her, holding the heavy cast-iron skillet.
"Kitchen's closed, Valerie," I said.
