Chapter 6 - Bloodlines and Betrayal
The pantry stairs were narrow, steep, and plunged in pitch-black shadow.
Theresa led the way, using the faint glow of her mobile phone screen to guide our steps. Above us, the mansion had become a war zone. The sharp, rapid cracks of small-arms fire were punctuated by the deeper, concussive thuds of shotguns and Dante’s bellowing commands.
Bruno’s ferocious barks echoed through the ventilation shafts, sounding like a demon unleashed in the hollow walls of the house.
Sophie clung to me, her breathing coming in ragged, hyperventilating gasps. "Mama, Mama, the bad men are going to hurt Bruno! They're going to hurt Mr. Dante!"
"Hold on to me, baby," I whispered frantically, my shoes slipping on the cold stone of the cellar floor as we reached the bottom. "Keep your eyes closed. Don't look at anything, okay? Just hold Mama."
The wine cellar was cavernous, smelling of aged oak, mold, and damp earth. Rows upon rows of vintage bottles stretched into the gloom like soldiers standing at attention.
Theresa moved with surprising speed for a woman in her sixties. She reached the third massive redwood rack at the far end of the cellar, reached behind a crate of 1982 Petrus, and yanked a concealed brass lever.
With a heavy, mechanical hum that operated on a backup pneumatic system, the entire redwood rack swung outward, revealing a heavy steel blast door set directly into the natural bedrock of the Long Island coast.
"Inside," Theresa commanded, pushing me toward the vault. "Both of you. Now."
"Theresa, you have to come in too!" I pleaded, stepping over the steel threshold.
Theresa paused, her revolver held loosely in her right hand. Her silver hair had come undone, falling around her sharp face, making her look like an ancient, vengeful fury.
"This vault locks from the outside via an electronic deadbolt," she said calmly. "If I go inside, Dante has to come down here to unlock it. If Enzo’s men make it to this floor, they will set charges against the steel. I have to lock you in from this console, then take the service lift up to the east wing to draw them away."
"No!" I shouted. "Theresa, that's suicide!"
"My husband built this empire on blood, Rachel," Theresa said, her voice dropping into a register of chilling serenity. "And my brother-in-law Enzo has been poisoning this family for thirty years. He killed your husband. He thought he could kill my son. I will not die hiding in a hole like a rat while a baker’s widow and an innocent child pay for our sins."
Before I could reach for her, Theresa slammed the heavy steel door.
The heavy pneumatic latch engaged with a deafening *CLANG* that rattled my teeth.
Darkness—total, suffocating, absolute darkness—swallowed Sophie and me.
"Mama!" Sophie wailed, her hands flailing in the pitch-black void until they found my face.
"I'm here, sweetheart. I'm right here," I pulled her down onto the cold, reinforced floor of the vault, wrapping both my arms around her, rocking her back and forth in the dark.
Every instinct in my body screamed at me. For three years, I had believed I was safe. I had believed that staying invisible, keeping my head down, scrubbing the marble floors and ironing the linen would keep the violence of the world from touching my little girl.
I had been so blind.
The world of men like Dante Moretti didn't leave room for innocent bystanders. You were either a weapon, a shield, or a casualty.
Outside the heavy steel door, the muffled sound of a grenade detonated on the floor above. The bedrock around us shuddered, dust sifting down from the reinforced ceiling into my hair.
Then, through the heavy seal of the vault door, I heard voices.
Not Dante's.
"Check the racks," a harsh, raspy voice barked, echoing through the wine cellar just inches from where we sat in the dark. "Julian said the old lady ran down here."
"The vault is sealed, Boss," another voice answered. "Heavy gauge. We’ll need thermite to punch through that plate."
"We don't need thermite," the first voice replied, and my blood turned to ice. It was an older voice, thick with nicotine and gravel. Enzo Moretti. "Theresa wouldn't hide in there. She’s too proud. She’s upstairs trying to buy time for her boy. The girl is in there. Michael’s kid."
A heavy metal object struck the exterior of the vault door.
*TAP. TAP. TAP.*
Sophie stiffened in my arms, her small body turning completely rigid.
May you like
"Little sparrow," Enzo’s voice called through the steel, sickeningly sweet, warped by the metal. "You remember Uncle Julian? He’s been tapping on your window every night, waiting for you to come out and play. Open the door, sweetheart. Bring Uncle Enzo your daddy’s star, and we’ll go get ice cream."
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