Chapter 9 - The Reckoning
I closed the distance in a fraction of a second.
I grabbed Frank’s wrist before he could clear his blade, twisting his arm back until the bone snapped with a sickening crack. Frank screamed out in agony, dropping to his knees on the nursery floor.
I grabbed him by his collar, dragged his heavy frame across the room, and slammed him against the mahogany bookshelf, shattering the wooden frame.
"This is for Isabella," I growled, driving a brutal right hook straight into his jaw, knocking three teeth loose.
Frank spat blood onto the floor, choking out a bitter laugh. "Go ahead... kill me, Dominic... do it in front of your kids' room... prove to them that you're the monster Lucia thinks you are!"
I raised my fist to deliver the lethal strike, my knuckles white, every dark instinct in my body screaming for his blood to paint the room.
Then, behind the locked bathroom door, I heard a tiny voice call out.
"Daddy?" Lucia’s voice was soft, trembling through the wood. "Daddy, please stop."
My hand froze in mid-air, inches from Frank’s face.
I looked at my bloodied fist. I looked at the broken, pathetic traitor pinned beneath my grip. For fourteen months, I had let rage and violence define my existence, believing that blood was the only currency that could honor my wife's memory. But killing Frank in front of my daughters wouldn't bring Isabella back. It would only validate the horror that had robbed my children of their childhood.
I slowly lowered my fist.
I dragged Frank by his collar toward the doorway, throwing his broken body out into the hallway just as the sound of heavy police sirens filled the long driveway outside.
"I'm not going to kill you, Frank," I said, looking down at him with absolute contempt as tactical lights from federal law enforcement vehicles swept through the grand windows. "Death is too quick for what you did. You're going to spend the rest of your miserable life in a federal supermax, knowing that your empire is gone, your money is gone, and my family survived you."
Special agents from the FBI and local police officers poured up the grand staircase, weapons drawn, taking Frank Lombardi and his remaining men into custody.
May you like
I turned back toward the nursery, wiping the blood from my hands, and opened the bathroom door.
Lucia, Valentina, and Mia ran out together, throwing their arms around my legs. I fell to my knees, holding them close, burying my face in their hair as the long, dark night finally came to an end.
