Chapter 9 - The Last Caruso Heir
Time seemed to slow down to a crawl.
I saw the masked gunman’s finger tighten on the trigger. I saw Hannah squeeze her eyes shut, pressing Grace’s face into her shoulder to shield her from the inevitable.
I didn't think. I raised my Sig Sauer, steadied my breathing, and pulled the trigger.
CRACK.
The bullet caught the gunman squarely behind the right ear. He spun around like a broken doll and crashed heavily onto the nursery rug, his pistol sliding across the polished floorboards.
Silence descended on the room, broken only by the hiss of smoke from the shattered window and Grace’s sudden, startled wail.
Hannah opened her eyes, gasping for breath, looking up at me as I lowered my smoking weapon and stepped across the threshold.
“Are you hurt?” I asked, my voice rough as gravel as I dropped to my knees beside them.
“We’re... we’re okay,” Hannah sobbed, checking Grace frantically. The baby was crying, but completely unharmed. “She’s okay, Michael.”
I let out a breath I felt like I had been holding for eighteen months. I reached out and gently stroked Grace’s soft dark hair, feeling the steady, strong beat of her tiny heart against my hand.
Behind me, Frankie stepped into the nursery, wiping blood from a graze on his forearm. “Sector clear, Boss. The last of Moretti’s men are dead or captured in the courtyard.”
I stood up slowly, looking around the bullet-scarred room that had been meant to be a safe haven for my family. The war was over. Vincent Rizzo was in a cell. Victor Moretti’s strike team had been wiped off the map.
Downstairs in the master medical suite, my brother Julian was resting safely, finally reunited with the world he had sacrificed everything to protect.
And here, in my arms, the newest generation of the Caruso family was breathing, crying, and reaching out for her father’s brother with those exact, unforgettable gray eyes ringed with gold.
I lifted Grace into my arms, holding her against my chest right over my heart. She stopped crying almost instantly, grabbing my lapel with her tiny hand just like she had the first day she crawled under my office desk.
“Let’s go see your father, little one,” I whispered, kissing the top of her head.
May you like
The empire was bloody, the road had been long, and the scars would never truly fade. But as I walked down the grand staircase toward the light, carrying my niece into a future we had fought tooth and nail to secure, I knew one thing with absolute certainty:
Nobody would ever touch a Caruso again.
