Chapter 4 - THE BARRETT CONSPIRACY
“Hold on!” Luca roared from the driver’s seat.
He wrenched the steering wheel violently to the left. The heavy armored SUV tires screamed against the wet pavement, fighting the momentum. The garbage truck clipped our rear quarter panel with the force of a wrecking ball.
The sound of twisting metal and shattering reinforced glass was deafening. Clara threw herself over the boys, shielding their bodies with her own as the SUV spun out of control, slamming hard against a brick storefront. The airbags deployed in a cloud of white powder and the sharp scent of burning chemicals.
For three seconds, there was only the sound of hissing steam from our radiator.
Then, the distinctive clack-clack of assault rifles chambering rounds echoed from the street.
“Everyone stay down!” I shouted, kicking my jammed door open. I drew the heavy SIG Sauer from my shoulder holster.
Luca was already moving, blood streaming down the side of his face from a gash on his forehead. He kicked out the shattered windshield and provided covering fire, squeezing off three rapid shots into the darkness.
“Boss, we’re pinned!” Luca yelled over the returning gunfire that pinged harmlessly off our armor plating. “It’s Marco’s men! They have Barrett shooters with them!”
I looked back at Clara. She was pale, but her eyes were fiercely focused. She had her small suppressed pistol drawn, her arms wrapped protectively around the four terrified boys who were huddled on the floorboards.
“Can they breach the armor?” Clara asked, her voice eerily calm over the gunfire.
“Not with small arms,” I replied, checking my magazine. “But Marco knows the vehicle specs. He’ll bring heavy ordinance if we sit here.”
I grabbed my phone. The screen was cracked, but it functioned. I dialed the one number Marco wouldn’t be monitoring.
“Hello, Dominic.”
Sloane Barrett’s voice was as smooth and unbothered as a glass of expensive champagne.
“Call off your dogs, Sloane,” I snarled into the receiver. “I have Clara. I have the boys. If your men scratch my vehicle again, I will burn your family’s entire operation to the ground before sunrise.”
Sloane laughed softly. “You always were dramatic, Dom. But I’m afraid you’re a bit confused. I didn’t order a hit on you. My father wants those boys alive and unharmed.”
“Then why are Marco and your enforcers currently shooting up my SUV?”
There was a brief, terrifying silence on the other end of the line.
“Marco is there?” Sloane’s voice lost its playful edge. It turned sharp, calculating. “Dominic, Marco doesn’t work for the Barretts. He never has.”
My mind raced, struggling to process the shifting loyalties. “He set up the ambush. He gave Clara the marriage certificate. He handed Leo the napkin!”
“Yes,” Sloane agreed. “But he didn’t do it for my father. Marco approached us three years ago with a proposition. He promised to deliver your heirs to us to solidify a peace treaty. But his ultimate goal wasn’t peace, Dominic. It was the throne. If you die tonight in a tragic crossfire with the Barretts, Marco steps up as the grieving right-hand man to take over the Moretti family. He’s using my shooters as a false flag to cover his own coup.”
The betrayal ran deeper than I could have ever imagined. My father hadn't sold me out. Marco had framed my father, manipulated Clara, and weaponized the Barrett family’s desperation for an heir, all to orchestrate a war that would leave him in control.
“If you want the boys alive,” I said coldly, “you pull your shooters out. Right now.”
“I can’t,” Sloane replied, genuine frustration in her voice. “Marco is commanding that squad. If I call them off, Marco will realize I know his true agenda, and he’ll kill the boys himself to eliminate the evidence of his treason.”
“Then what good are you to me?”
“Look in the glove compartment of your SUV, Dominic,” Sloane said.
I frowned, keeping my head down as another volley of bullets struck the doors. I reached over and popped the glove box.
Sitting on top of the vehicle registration papers was a heavy, antique silver pocket watch. It belonged to my grandfather. I hadn’t seen it since the day my father supposedly locked it in the family vault.
“Marco gave that to my father as a token of good faith,” Sloane explained. “But my father is a cautious man. He had a micro-tracker installed inside the casing. The Barretts aren't shooting at you right now, Dominic. They’re converging on Marco’s position to execute him for trying to play us. Give us three minutes.”
The line went dead.
I stared at the pocket watch. The ticking was loud in the small, chaotic space of the wrecked SUV.
“Dominic!” Clara shouted over the noise. “They’re moving up! They have a breaching charge!”
I looked out the shattered window. Two men in tactical gear were advancing behind ballistic shields, carrying a heavy explosive charge meant to blow our armored doors off their hinges.
“Luca, get ready to move the kids!” I ordered, bracing my weapon on the door frame.
I took a breath, preparing to step out and draw their fire to give Clara a chance to run. But before I could move, the harsh roar of a dozen high-powered motorcycle engines echoed from the opposite end of the street.
A fleet of black motorcycles swarmed the intersection. The riders didn't hesitate. They opened fire on Marco’s men with ruthless, coordinated precision. The Barrett strike team had arrived.
The two men carrying the breaching charge dropped instantly. The rest of Marco’s squad scrambled for cover, entirely overwhelmed by the sudden flank attack.
“Now!” I yelled.
Luca kicked the back door open. I grabbed Leo and Eli, while Clara grabbed Sam and Max. We poured out of the ruined SUV and sprinted across the rain-slicked pavement into the darkness of an adjacent alleyway, the sounds of a full-blown mafia war erupting behind us.
We ran until my lungs burned and the boys couldn't keep up. We ducked into the basement stairwell of an abandoned tenement building, hiding in the shadows.
The boys were sobbing quietly now, burying their faces in Clara’s coat. She held them tightly, whispering fierce, comforting promises into their hair.
I stood at the top of the stairs, my gun raised, watching the street.
“Dominic,” Clara whispered from the darkness below.
I looked down at her. She was holding the silver pocket watch I had grabbed from the glove box. She had pried the back casing open with a hairpin.
“Sloane lied to you,” Clara said, her voice shaking with a terrifying new discovery.
I hurried down the stairs. “What do you mean? The tracker—”
“There is no tracker in here,” Clara said, holding out the open watch.
Inside the casing, there was no blinking light. There was no microchip.
Instead, folded neatly inside the silver housing, was a tiny, faded photograph.
It was a picture of Marco, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with a younger Sloane Barrett. They were smiling. And Marco had his arm wrapped intimately around Sloane’s waist.
“Marco isn't trying to steal the throne from you, Dominic,” Clara realized, her eyes wide with horror. “He’s trying to share it. Sloane and Marco are working together.”
My blood turned to ice. Sloane hadn't sent the motorcycles to save us.
She had sent them to herd us.
A heavy, metallic click echoed from the top of the stairwell.
I looked up.
May you like
Standing at the top of the stairs, silhouetted by the streetlights, was Sloane Barrett. She was wearing a stunning white engagement gown, an assault rifle resting casually against her hip.
“You really should have proposed on time, Dominic,” Sloane smiled. “It would have saved us all so much running.”
