Chapter 6 - The Siege of Bellmore Ridge
“Where is Harold taking the girls?” Bea asked, her adrenaline spiking, her voice completely steady despite the blaring klaxons.
“Sub-level three,” Dominic answered, racking the slide of his pistol. “Reinforced titanium door. Independent oxygen supply. Cassian can’t breach that without high-grade military explosives, which he doesn't have. But he’ll try to secure the house and force me to surrender the keys.”
Gunfire erupted outside on the gravel driveway—the sharp, staccato chatter of automatic rifles echoing off the limestone facade of the mansion.
Dominic grabbed Bea’s wrist, his grip iron-firm. “You’re coming with me to the security hub.”
“No,” Bea said firmly, pulling against his grip.
Dominic stopped in the doorway, staring at her as if she had lost her mind. “Beatrice, this isn't a classroom. Men are dying outside.”
“I know,” Bea said, her eyes flashing with razor-sharp clarity. “And Cassian knows the layout of this house, doesn't he? He knows about the panic room. What he *doesn't* know is that there is a service tunnel connecting the classroom directly to the sub-level air ducts. If his men breach the secondary corridors, they’ll cut the auxiliary power to the vault. I saw the wiring junction in the crawl space. It’s vulnerable.”
Dominic stared at her, completely stunned.
He was an underworld kingpin with twenty years of tactical experience, yet this schoolteacher who had spent two weeks in his house had mapped the structural vulnerabilities better than his own lieutenants.
“The crawl space has an access hatch above the lower generators,” Dominic realized, his eyes narrowing. “If they kill the auxiliary power, the vault seals permanently. My daughters will suffocate in six hours.”
“Then you go to the front,” Bea said, grabbing a heavy brass fire iron from the hearth beside the piano. “You hit Cassian’s men where they expect you. I will go through the interior passages and secure the manual override on that generator before anyone gets close to it.”
Dominic grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her so close their chests collided.
“Listen to me, Beatrice,” he commanded, his pale eyes burning into hers with raw, unfiltered possessiveness. “You survive this. Do you understand me? You don't play the hero. If anyone gets in your way, you bash their skull in with that iron. Because when this night is over, I have things to say to you, and I will not say them to a headstone.”
Without waiting for her reply, Dominic captured her mouth in a fierce, crushing kiss.
It was hot, demanding, and tasted of danger and adrenaline. For three glorious seconds, Bea leaned into him, her hands gripping the lapels of his heavy jacket, kissing him back with all the pent-up fire and passion she had buried beneath years of caregiving and grief.
Dominic pulled back, his chest heaving, a savage, predatory smile curving his lips. “Go.”
Bea didn't look back. She sprinted down the corridor toward the classroom, the heavy brass fire iron gripped firmly in her right hand.
The house had become a battleground.
Smoke from stun grenades began to drift through the upper hallways, smelling of sulfur and burnt rubber. The sound of shouting men and splintering wood echoed from the grand entrance hall. Dominic’s loyal guards were fighting fiercely, but Cassian Vance had brought hired mercenaries who moved with military precision.
Bea reached the classroom, kicked open the wainscoting panel, and squeezed her curvy frame into the narrow crawl space.
She didn't care about the dust. She didn't care about the cobwebs in her hair or the splinters digging into her knees. Her entire focus was locked on two little girls trapped beneath twenty feet of reinforced concrete.
She crawled rapidly through the dark shaft, following the thick bundle of black electrical cables.
Ahead of her, below an iron service grating, she heard voices.
“Cut the secondary junction,” a cold, familiar voice ordered.
Bea crept forward and peered down through the slats.
Cassian Vance was standing in the lower generator room, surrounded by three heavily armed men in black tactical gear. His silver hair was perfectly combed, but his face was tight with desperate malice. He held a high-caliber pistol in a gloved hand.
“If Dominic won't hand over the ledger, we let the air run out in the vault,” Cassian sneered. “He’ll trade every port in New York for those two little brats.”
“The override switch is high on the wall, sir,” one of the mercenaries said, stepping toward the main electrical box. “I’ll sever the main relay.”
Bea didn't have a gun.
She didn't have tactical training.
What she had was five-foot-six of solid, determined weight, a thirty-pound brass fire iron, and the righteous fury of a woman defending her children.
Bea kicked the iron grate with both boots.
The heavy metal grate tore free from its rusted screws, dropping ten feet straight down onto the mercenary reaching for the relay switch. The heavy iron struck the man squarely across the skull and shoulder, knocking him senseless to the concrete floor with a sickening crunch.
Before Cassian or the other guard could react, Bea dropped through the opening.
She landed heavily, using her momentum to swing the brass fire iron in a vicious, horizontal arc. The heavy metal bludgeon struck the second mercenary across the knees. The man shrieked, collapsing backward into a rack of steel toolboxes.
Cassian Vance spun around, his pistol raising directly toward her face. “You fat little bitch—”
Bea didn't give him the chance to pull the trigger.
She lunged forward with all the power in her broad hips and legs, tackling Cassian Vance like a freight train. The sheer force of her weight slammed the traitorous underboss against the concrete wall, knocking the breath from his lungs and sending his handgun clattering across the floor.
Cassian gasped, clawing at her face, but Bea pinned his gun arm with her forearm, her knees digging into his thighs, using every ounce of her size and strength to crush him against the stones.
“That is for Elena!” Bea roared, driving her fist directly into his aristocratic nose.
Cartilage shattered. Cassian screamed, blood spraying across his pristine white collar.
The heavy steel door of the generator room was suddenly kicked off its hinges.
Dominic Bellmore entered the room like an avenging demon. His shirt was torn, his knuckles were bloody, and his eyes were wild with lethal intent.
He saw the mercenary unconscious under the grate. He saw the second guard groaning on the floor with broken knees.
And he saw Beatrice Hale, her hair wild, her dress torn at the shoulder, holding his treacherous underboss against the wall by his throat.
Dominic lowered his weapon. A slow, terrifying, and deeply reverent smile spread across his face.
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“Step aside, Beatrice,” Dominic said softly. “Let me finish this.”
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