Chapter 9 - The Ledger Cleared
Paul Marino burst into the living room a minute later, carrying an emergency tactical medkit and holding a smoking pistol in his hand.
“Boss! Boss, are you—holy hell,” Paul stopped short, seeing the unconscious mercenary tied up on the floor and Victor bleeding heavily on the rug. He dropped to his knees beside us instantly. “Get the compress, Emily! Press hard right here!”
For the next twenty minutes, the cabin turned into a makeshift triage center.
Working together under Paul’s urgent direction, we managed to clean and stitch Victor’s wound using the military-grade sutures from the medkit. By the time the storm outside finally began to break, clearing the mountain air with a cool, rainy breeze, Victor was resting on the cabin’s rustic leather sofa, pale and exhausted, but stable.
I sat on a wooden stool beside him, a damp cloth in my hand as I wiped the sweat and soot from his forehead.
“You’re an idiot,” I whispered softly, though my voice trembled with overwhelming relief. “You could have been killed.”
Victor opened his eyes, a faint, weary smile touching his lips. “And you’re an even bigger idiot for running out from behind the fireplace.”
“I couldn't just watch him shoot you,” I replied, looking down at the cloth in my hands.
Victor reached out, his warm fingers wrapping gently around my wrist. “The syndicate council in Palermo... they sent him because they knew the internal leaks had failed. But with the Executioner captured and the data drive secured, their entire network in this country is exposed.”
“Does that mean it’s over?” I asked, holding my breath. “Are we safe?”
“It means the war is over,” Victor said, his voice carrying the absolute finality of a king reclaiming his throne. “And as for your brother’s debt... the ledger is permanently closed.”
Three days later, we returned to the Hayes estate.
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The transition back felt entirely different this time. Mrs. Daley and the compromised staff had already been quietly arrested and removed from the property. Liam had been released from holding, thoroughly chastised by Paul Marino, and promptly packed off on a one-way bus to start a legitimate job in a distant city, his $180,000 debt officially written off as a closed corporate loss.
As for me? I no longer carried a bucket of cleaning supplies through the marble corridors.
