Barefoot except for one pink sock, clutching a stuffed rabbit beneath one arm, Maisie crossed the rain-dark grass behind the DeLuca estate and stopped in front of the old garden shed.

For the next two hours, the safehouse was a nerve center of silent, high-stakes warfare.

Roman sat at a curved control console, tapping into secondary, hardwired satellite networks that bypassed the estate’s jammed towers. The wall of monitors hummed to life, displaying thermal feeds, external camera loops, and encrypted comm logs.

Nora sat nearby, wrapped in a tactical blanket, holding a sleeping Maisie in her lap. She watched Roman’s focused profile. He was a creature of absolute control, moving pieces across an invisible chessboard with frightening speed.

“Found them,” Roman said, his voice dropping an octave.

Nora leaned forward. “Who?”

Roman pointed to a screen displaying encrypted audio wave files captured by his off-site servers. He hit play.

A smooth, silver-tongued voice echoed through the metal bunker.

“Is it done?”

A second voice, rough and nervous—Julian, the security chief—responded: “The shed is down. He was tied inside. No one survived.”

“And the staff?” the first voice asked.

“A maid and her kid got caught in the perimeter. We locked them in with him to clean up the edge. No loose ends, Uncle Vance.”

Nora felt the blood drain from her face. Her knuckles turned white as she clutched Maisie tighter. Uncle Vance.

Vance DeLuca. Roman’s uncle, the senior director of the family’s international shipping cartel and the man who had sat at Roman’s dinner table just three nights ago, sharing wine and laughing.

Roman didn’t shout. He didn’t slam his fists on the desk.

His reaction was far worse.

A total, absolute freeze overtook his body. His dark eyes turned into two shards of black ice. The quiet rage radiating off him was so thick it felt like the air pressure in the room had dropped.

“Vance,” Roman said quietly, pronouncing the name like a death sentence.

“Your own family?” Nora whispered, horror in her voice.

“In my business, family is just the enemy you share blood with,” Roman replied calmly. He stood up, turning to the weapons rack mounted on the wall. He unclipped a sleek, black rifle, slammed a magazine into place, and slung it across his back. He attached two extra handguns to a tactical harness.

“Where are you going?” Nora asked, her heart spiking with panic. “You can’t go out there alone! They have a squad!”

“They think I’m dead,” Roman said, pulling a dark tactical jacket over his bandaged chest. “That gives me an advantage I intend to use immediately. Vance is gathering the regional bosses at the Manhattan penthouse tomorrow night to declare himself head of the family.”

“And what are you going to do?”