Chapter 10 - The Ambush
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Nadia clutched the journal to her chest, her mind spinning wildly. She had to tell Dante. This changed everything. She wasn't a prop to hold the commission together; she was their rightful queen.
She ran out of the library, heading toward the private elevator to descend to the war room.
As the elevator doors opened on the ground floor, the deafening shatter of reinforced glass echoed through the lobby.
“Get down!” Leo, the underboss, roared, diving across the marble floor.
Rizzo’s men hadn't waited for midnight. They had launched a brazen, daylight assault on the Leone tower.
A hail of automatic gunfire shredded the lobby. Marble columns exploded into dust. Dante was pinned behind the reception desk, returning fire with a heavy pistol, his face a mask of absolute, violent focus.
Nadia threw herself onto the floor of the elevator, bullets sparking against the steel doors.
“Boss, they’re flanking the east exit!” Leo shouted over the gunfire.
Dante leaned out to fire, completely exposed to the second wave of attackers flooding through the shattered revolving doors.
Nadia didn't think. The blood of the matriarch flared in her veins. She scrambled out of the elevator, grabbing a fallen guard’s weapon from the floor. She had never fired a gun in combat, but the training Dante had forced upon her clicked into place.
She raised the weapon, bracing herself against a pillar, and squeezed the trigger.
The burst of suppressing fire forced the flanking attackers to dive for cover, giving Dante the exact three seconds he needed to fall back behind the reinforced security barricade.
Dante whipped his head around, seeing Nadia clutching the smoking rifle, her face pale but entirely resolute.
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The gunfire abruptly stopped as police sirens wailed in the distance. Rizzo’s men retreated, peeling away in black SUVs.
Dante dropped his weapon and sprinted across the ruined lobby, pulling Nadia fiercely into his arms.
