Chapter 4 - The Ambush Inside the House
The mansion was completely silent, but it was the silence of a hunting ground.
Clara sprinted down the grand staircase, her socks slipping on the marble. She reached Noah’s suite and burst through the doors. The little boy was sitting up in his bed, clutching his blankets, his dark eyes wide with fear. He had heard the muffled gunshot.
“Noah, we have to go. Now,” Clara whispered frantically, rushing to the bed and scooping him into her arms.
Noah didn't fight her. He wrapped his arms tightly around her neck and buried his face in her shoulder, sensing the absolute terror radiating from her body.
Clara ran into the hallway, but she immediately heard heavy footsteps echoing from the foyer. Silas’s men had breached the house. Without Dominic’s loyal guards—who had likely been reassigned or eliminated by Hargrove—the mansion belonged to the traitors.
“Check the east wing! The old witch said the maid is on the run!” a gruff voice echoed up the stairs.
Clara ducked into the servant’s corridors, a narrow labyrinth of hallways hidden behind the main walls of the estate. She had memorized these routes during her brief time as a maid. It was pitch black, smelling of dust and old linen. She moved slowly, feeling her way along the walls, keeping one hand securely pressed against the back of Noah’s head.
“It’s okay, baby,” she breathed into his ear. “I’ve got you. Just like I promised. I won't let them hurt you.”
They reached the kitchen pantry on the ground floor. Clara carefully pushed the hidden door open, intending to slip out the back service exit toward the garage.
But as the door creaked open, a massive hand reached into the darkness, grabbed Clara by the throat, and violently yanked her into the kitchen.
Clara choked, dropping to her knees as Silas’s top lieutenant, a scarred brute named Marco, lifted her off the ground by her neck. Noah tumbled from her arms, hitting the tile floor with a thud.
“Look what we have here,” Marco sneered, tightening his grip, cutting off Clara’s airway. “Silas wants the kid alive for leverage, but he said we could have fun with you.”
Clara kicked, her hands clawing desperately at Marco’s thick wrists. Black spots danced at the edges of her vision. She couldn't breathe. The air was burning in her lungs. She looked down and saw Noah sitting on the floor, paralyzed by fear, watching the man choke the life out of the only person who had ever made him feel safe.
Clara managed to force out a single, raspy whisper. “Run... Noah... run...”
Noah did not run.
The traumatized, silent four-year-old, who had not spoken a single word since the night he watched his mother die in twisted metal, stood up. His small hands balled into fists. His chest heaved. The fear in his dark eyes vanished, replaced by the exact same terrifying, unyielding rage that made his father the most dangerous man in Chicago.
Noah pointed a trembling finger at Marco, opened his mouth, and screamed at the top of his lungs.
“LEAVE MY MAMA ALONE!”
The raw, deafening shout echoed off the stainless steel appliances. It was so loud, so unexpected, that Marco flinched, his grip on Clara’s throat loosening for a fraction of a second.
It was all Clara needed. She grabbed a heavy cast-iron skillet resting on the stove and swung it with every ounce of strength she had left, smashing it directly into the side of Marco’s head. The brute collapsed to the floor like a felled tree, unconscious before he hit the tiles.
Clara fell to her hands and knees, gasping violently for air, coughing and clutching her bruised throat.
Before she could recover, the kitchen doors burst open. Silas stood there, his suit covered in rain and blood, holding a heavy revolver. Behind him stood a bleeding Mrs. Hargrove.
“Well, well,” Silas chuckled, aiming the gun at Clara’s head. “The little mute finally speaks. Touching. But Dominic is dead at the docks, and you two are out of time.”
“You’re wrong,” a voice whispered from the shadows behind Silas.
Silas froze.
Dominic Vale stepped out of the darkness of the dining room. He was soaked in rain, his white dress shirt stained with the blood of Silas’s men. In his hand was a custom tactical shotgun, aimed directly at Silas’s spine.
Clara realized Dominic hadn't been ambushed at the docks. He had figured it out.
“You underestimated me, Silas,” Dominic said, his voice a lethal, vibrating purr. “And you underestimated the girl.”
Dominic fired.
The blast shattered the kitchen windows. Silas dropped to the floor, screaming in agony as his kneecaps shattered. Mrs. Hargrove shrieked, dropping her weapon and falling to her knees in surrender, begging for her life.
Dominic didn't spare them a second glance. He stepped over his former best friend, ignoring the carnage, and dropped to his knees on the kitchen floor right in front of Clara and Noah.
Noah looked at his father, then at Clara. The boy threw his arms around Dominic’s neck, burying his face in his father’s chest.
“Daddy,” Noah sobbed. “Daddy.”
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Dominic closed his eyes, tears mixing with the rain on his face as he held his son for the first time in two years. He reached out his other arm and pulled Clara into the embrace, burying his face in her hair.
“I’ve got you,” Dominic whispered, echoing the exact words Clara had used in the foyer. “I’ve got you both.”
