Chapter 5 - 3:17 A.M.
Adrian Moretti could not sleep.
The negotiations with the Genovese family had gone sour, the docks were under federal scrutiny, and the migraine building behind his left temple felt like a rusted nail being driven into his skull. He had poured three fingers of Scotch, swallowed two aspirins, and paced his private quarters for an hour before deciding to fetch a glass of water from the second-floor kitchen.
He typed the bypass code into his panel, unlocked the heavy deadbolt, and pulled the door inward.
He took half a step forward into the pitch-black corridor, and his left boot struck something soft, dense, and yielding.
Adrian reacted before his conscious mind could register what had happened.
In a fraction of a second, his weight shifted backward, his right hand whipped beneath his silk bathrobe to the Glock 19 tucked into his waistband, and he dropped into a low combat crouch, his finger hovering over the trigger guard.
His first thought: *They got past the dogs.*
His second thought: *Kill it.*
Lightning flashed through the tall arched window at the end of the hall, illuminating the corridor in stark, blinding monochrome.
Adrian froze.
Lying curled on the white marble floor, tangled in a moth-eaten green blanket, was Claire Bennett.
Beside her limp, shivering right hand lay the antique brass fireplace poker from the second-floor drawing room. Her hair had tumbled loose from its customary tight bun, falling across her pale shoulders in thick, dark waves. Her eyes were wide, bloodshot, and filled with a terror so raw and profound it hit Adrian in the chest like a physical blow.
Adrian stared down at her, his Glock still drawn, the smell of cordite and rain hanging in the hallway air.
He looked at the blanket.
He looked at the small feather pillow wedged between her hip and the baseboard.
She hadn't just collapsed here. She had built a nest.
“What the hell are you doing outside my bedroom?” Adrian demanded, his voice slicing through the thunder.
Claire tried to speak. Her lips moved, dry and chapped from the cold, but only a dry, whistling breath escaped. She shrank back, pressing her spine flat against the stone wall, pulling the blanket over her chest as if to hide her body from his furious gaze.
“Claire,” Adrian’s voice dropped an octave, vibrating with an intensity that made the floorboards hum. “Answer me.”
A single tear broke over her lower lash line, carving a shiny path through the dust on her cheek.
“Dean,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “Dean is coming.”
Adrian went utterly still. The Glock did not lower an inch, but his entire posture transformed from confused rage to lethal, cold calculation.
“What did you say?”
“He’s coming through the terrace,” she choked out, her hands trembling violently as she pointed the heavy brass poker toward the far corridor. “The cameras... they cycle for two minutes at 3:30. The window latch was loosened. I... I heard them in the pantry grate. Dean and someone else. They’re coming to kill you, Mr. Moretti.”
Adrian stared at her. The clock in the gallery downstairs began to chime the quarter-hour.
It was 3:18 A.M.
Adrian looked down at her bare feet, mottled blue from hours against the freezing stone. He looked at the heavy brass poker—a pathetic, useless piece of metal against four trained hitmen with automatic weapons.
*She sat here,* he realized, the breath leaving his lungs in a cold, ragged rush. *She had no weapon. She had no armor. She knew they were coming, and she placed her own body between them and my door.*
The entire empire he commanded—the twenty armed guards patrolling the fence, the millions of dollars in electronic surveillance, the armored sedans and concrete walls—had failed to detect the rot inside his house.
The only security system that had functioned tonight was an insecure, terrified housekeeper sitting on the floor with a fireplace tool.
“Claire,” Adrian said, his voice terrifyingly calm.
He bent down, hooked his powerful arm beneath her shoulders and knees, and lifted her off the marble floor in one swift, effortless motion.
Claire gasped, instinctively wrapping her arms around his neck, burying her face into the crook of his warm, bare throat. She was heavy, soft, and shivering uncontrollably, her full curves pressing entirely against his chest. Adrian held her against him like she weighed nothing at all.
May you like
“You’re safe now,” he whispered against her hair, kicking his bedroom door open and carrying her inside his sanctuary. “Now stay down, and let me deal with Russo.”
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