Chapter 7 - The Breach
The peace was short-lived.
Three nights later, at 2:00 AM, a silent alarm went off across the estate.
Grace was jolted awake in her bedroom by the sound of muffled explosions near the front gates, followed by the rapid rattle of automatic gunfire echoing across the courtyard.
Titan and Nero, who slept on rugs at the foot of her bed, immediately sprang up, letting out deep, ferocious barks, their body language instantly shifting into combat mode.
The bedroom door burst open.
Matteo rushed inside, wearing a tactical vest over his dark clothes, a heavy handgun drawn in his right hand.
"Grace! Get up!" Matteo commanded, grabbing her arm and pulling her toward the back closet. "Carmine’s men cut the power grid and breached the south wall. They have RPGs and heavy weapons. Marco is holding the front stairs, but we need to move you to the safe room in the basement!"
"What about the dogs?!" Grace cried, pulling her robe around her.
"They come with us," Matteo barked. "Titan, Nero, heel!"
They hurried down the dark, carpeted corridor of the east wing. Shadows flickered across the walls as gunfire shattered the stained-glass windows in the main foyer below. The smell of cordite and burning wood filled the air.
Suddenly, two masked gunmen stepped out from the secondary staircase at the end of the hall, their rifles raised.
"THERE HE IS! GET MORETTI!" one shouted.
Before Matteo could raise his weapon, Titan let out a blood-curdling roar and charged down the hallway like a silver bullet. Nero followed right at his flank.
The eighty-pound dogs hit the first gunman at full sprint, tackling him through the wooden banister and down onto the marble landing below. The second gunman panicked, spraying bullets wildly into the ceiling as Nero pinned his arm to the floor with bone-crushing force.
"Titan! Nero! Cover!" Grace screamed, running down the hall despite the danger.
Matteo fired two precise shots, neutralizing the remaining threat near the stairs, then grabbed Grace’s hand, pulling her toward the heavy steel door of his private quarters, where the underground safe room access was hidden.
"In here! Fast!" Matteo yelled, punching an eight-digit code into the electronic keypad beside the steel door.
The heavy steel door slid open with a hiss of hydraulic pressure.
"Inside, Grace!" Matteo pushed her through the threshold.
"Matteo, come on!" Grace screamed, turning back.
"I have to go back for Marco and the boys!" Matteo said, his eyes fierce. "I don't leave my people behind!"
"Matteo, NO!" Grace shrieked as a stray bullet ricocheted off the doorframe, spraying sparks across the hall.
Before Matteo could turn back toward the stairs, a heavy figure lunged out of the smoke from the side parlor.
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It was Don Carmine himself, holding a heavy revolver, his face twisted in psychotic fury.
"MORETTI!" Carmine screamed, raising the gun directly at Matteo’s chest from six feet away. "This ends tonight!"
