Chapter 12 - Blood on the Snow
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The bulletproof glass was designed to stop high-caliber sniper rounds, not anti-armor explosives. The massive windows blew inward, raining deadly shrapnel across the luxurious penthouse. The winter wind howled into the room, bringing a freezing vortex of snow and smoke.
Chloe’s ears rang with a deafening, high-pitched frequency. She was pinned beneath Dominic’s heavy, Kevlar-clad body. He had shielded her entirely from the blast.
“Are you hit?” Dominic demanded, coughing through the thick smoke, his hands rapidly checking her arms and legs for blood.
“No,” she gasped, terrified and disoriented. “I’m okay.”
“Stay on the floor!” he barked, rolling off her and drawing his pistol.
The helicopters hovered dangerously close to the gaping hole in the building. Russian mercenaries began firing heavy suppressing fire into the ruined living room, preparing to repel down into the penthouse.
Silas and Marcus were already returning fire from behind the overturned marble kitchen island. The roar of automatic weapons in the enclosed space was mind-shattering.
“They’re going to overwhelm us, Boss!” Silas yelled over the gunfire, taking down a mercenary who had just touched down on the carpet. The man fell backward, plummeting forty stories to the street below.
“We need to move to the secondary extraction point!” Dominic yelled, grabbing Chloe by the back of her sweater and hauling her to her feet. He kept his body between her and the window, firing precise, lethal shots at the helicopter doorway.
He dragged her toward the reinforced steel door leading to the hallway. Marcus kicked the door open, leading the way into the smoke-filled corridor.
“The stairwell is compromised!” Marcus shouted, looking down the hall.
“The service elevator,” Dominic ordered, pushing Chloe forward. “It runs on an independent generator.”
They sprinted down the hallway as the penthouse behind them was completely overrun by Russian mercenaries. They reached the rusted metal doors of the service elevator. Dominic smashed the emergency override button, and the doors slid open.
They piled inside just as heavily armed men rounded the corner, firing blindly. A bullet sparked against the metal frame inches from Chloe’s head before the doors slammed shut.
The elevator plummeted downward, the sudden drop making Chloe’s stomach lurch. She looked at Dominic. His pristine white dress shirt was soaked in dark, wet crimson.
“Dominic, you're bleeding!” she cried, pointing to his shoulder.
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Dominic glanced down at the shrapnel wound, his face completely devoid of pain. He simply reloaded his weapon.
“It’s a scratch,” he said coldly. “Volkov just destroyed my home. I am going to destroy his entire bloodline.”
