Chapter 6 - THE SINS OF THE FATHER
The steady beep-beep-beep of the fetal monitor had degraded into a chaotic, rapid stutter, matching the terrifying speed of Dominic’s own heart.
“Harrison!” Dominic roared over his shoulder, his voice echoing out into the red-lit hallway. “Get in here now!”
Dr. Harrison burst through the doors a second later, flanked by two trauma nurses. He took one look at the amount of blood soaking the sheets and the sheer agony warping Amelia’s face, and his professional composure cracked.
“The Thallium is forcing a catastrophic immune response,” Harrison said, pulling on sterile gloves with shaking hands. “Her body thinks the pregnancy is the source of the toxicity. It’s rejecting the fetus to save her life. She’s in active, precipitous labor.”
“Stop it,” Dominic ordered, gripping Amelia’s hand as she cried out through another brutal contraction. “Give her something to stop the contractions.”
“I can’t,” Harrison said, his voice rising in panic. “Her blood pressure is through the roof. If I give her a tocolytic, her heart will give out. We have to deliver. Now.”
“She’s only twenty-four weeks!” Dominic shouted, his terrifying control finally shattering. “You told me his lungs aren’t ready! If you take him out, he dies!”
“If I don’t take him out, they both die within the next ten minutes!” Harrison yelled back, matching the mob boss’s intensity. The doctor looked down at Amelia, who was sobbing in Dominic’s grip. “Dominic, the placenta is fully tearing away. We need an emergency C-section, but we can’t do it here. This room isn't sterile, and the backup generator won't support the surgical equipment.”
“Where?” Dominic demanded.
“The sub-basement,” Harrison said. “There’s a fortified surgical bunker left over from the Cold War. It operates on a closed-loop mechanical generator and independent oxygen scrubbers. We can do it there.”
“Move her,” Dominic commanded.
He didn't wait for the nurses. He unhooked the IV pole himself, his jaw set in a rigid line of absolute determination. The nurses unlocked the wheels of the bed, and together, they pushed Amelia out into the crimson-lit hallway.
David was gone. The spot where he had been lying on the floor was empty, save for a smear of blood.
Dominic didn't care. David was a dead man walking; the only thing that mattered now was the woman screaming on the bed.
They navigated the labyrinth of the dark hospital, the red emergency lights casting eerie, elongated shadows on the walls. They reached the freight elevator. Dominic manually cranked the heavy metal grate open, and they pushed the bed inside.
As the elevator descended slowly into the depths of the building, Amelia’s grip on Dominic’s hand tightened.
“Dom,” she gasped, her face slick with sweat. She reached up with her free hand, pulling a heavy gold pocket watch from the neckline of her ruined dress. It was Dominic’s grandfather’s watch, a talisman he had given her for luck when she first found out she was pregnant.
She pressed the warm gold into his palm.
“If... if it comes down to a choice,” she whispered, her eyes locking onto his with terrifying clarity. “If you have to choose between me and the baby...”
“Stop talking,” Dominic said sharply, his voice cracking. “There is no choice. You are both surviving this.”
“Dominic, listen to me,” she sobbed, forcing him to take the watch. “Save him. Promise me you will save our son. Do not let Victor Romano take another child from this world.”
Dominic pressed his forehead against hers, a single tear escaping his eye and landing on her cheek. “I swear on my soul, Amelia. I will burn the world down before I let Victor touch him.”
The elevator jolted to a halt. The doors opened to the sub-basement.
The air down here was cold, smelling of concrete and old ozone. The surgical bunker sat at the end of a long, narrow corridor, its heavy steel doors already propped open by a waiting nurse.
They rushed the bed inside. The bunker was blindingly bright, powered by the massive, humming mechanical generator sitting in the adjacent utility cage.
“Get him out of here,” Dr. Harrison ordered the nurses, pointing at Dominic. “I need a sterile field!”
“I’m not leaving her,” Dominic growled, anchoring himself to the floor.
“You will if you want your son to live!” Harrison snapped. “You are covered in street mud and blood. You are a walking infection risk. Get out into the hall. I will save your wife.”
Dominic looked at Amelia. She nodded weakly, her eyes pleading with him to trust the doctor.
Slowly, agonizingly, Dominic let go of her hand. He stepped backward, out of the bunker. The heavy steel doors slammed shut in his face, the locking mechanism engaging with a loud, metallic clank.
Dominic stood alone in the cold, concrete corridor. He was the most powerful man in the city, a king who controlled thousands of lives, yet he was completely, utterly powerless.
He looked down at the gold pocket watch in his hand. The steady ticking was a brutal reminder of time slipping away.
Suddenly, his encrypted phone vibrated.
It wasn't a text message this time. It was a phone call.
The caller ID read: Victor Romano.
Dominic’s thumb hit the answer button. He pressed the phone to his ear, his breathing deadly slow.
“Victor,” Dominic said. The name was a curse.
“Dominic,” Victor’s voice came through the speaker, surprisingly calm, echoing slightly. “I see you found the bunker. Clever doctor, that Harrison.”
“I’m going to peel the skin from your face,” Dominic stated, a quiet, factual promise.
“Perhaps,” Victor replied. “But not tonight. Tonight, you are going to feel exactly what I felt fifteen years ago when your father’s men gunned down my boy in the snow.”
“My father’s sins are his own,” Dominic said, his grip tightening on the phone. “My wife and child have nothing to do with it.”
“Sins are inherited, Dominic,” Victor countered bitterly. “Blood pays for blood. That is the law of our world.”
“Where are you?”
“Look to your left, Dominic.”
Dominic turned his head.
At the far end of the narrow concrete corridor, standing near the heavy metal doors of the utility cage, was Victor Romano. He was dressed in a dark overcoat, flanked by two massive enforcers.
In Victor’s hand was a small, black radio detonator with a blinking green light.
“The mechanical generator powering the bunker,” Victor said, his voice echoing both in the hall and through the phone. “I wired it with two pounds of C4 before I called you. It’s enough to blow the generator to pieces without compromising the structural integrity of the bunker.”
Dominic’s blood ran completely cold.
If the generator blew, the bunker would lose power instantly. The surgical lights would die. The incubators would shut down. The oxygen scrubbers would fail. Amelia and his premature son would die in the dark, trapped behind locked steel doors.
“You want my life?” Dominic asked, dropping his phone and taking a slow step down the corridor toward Victor. “You have it. Detonate the bomb, and I will rip your throat out before the blast even settles. But leave them alone.”
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Victor shook his head slowly. He didn't look angry. He looked broken.
“I don't want your life, Dominic,” Victor said softly, his thumb resting gently over the detonator button. “I want you to live. I want you to wake up every morning in an empty house, knowing you couldn't save him. Just like I do.”
