Chapter 5 - BLOOD ON THE MARBLE
Panic clawed at my throat as I clutched Matteo to my chest. The baby woke instantly, screaming in terror at the sirens and the staccato rhythm of gunfire echoing through the halls. I didn't hesitate. Dominic had drilled the emergency protocols into my head on my second day.
I bolted out of the nursery and down the hallway, sprinting toward the master suite where the reinforced safe room was hidden. Dust rained down from the ceiling as another explosion shook the foundation. The Falcones had breached the outer perimeter.
"Silas!" Dominic's voice bellowed behind me, barking orders into a comms unit. "Lock down the East Wing! Nobody gets upstairs!"
I reached the master bedroom, my lungs burning. I kicked the door shut and slammed the heavy deadbolt into place, then sprinted toward the walk-in closet. My hands shook violently as I punched the six-digit code into the keypad hidden behind a full-length mirror. The mirror clicked and swung open, revealing a steel-reinforced bunker.
I rushed inside, pulling the heavy steel door shut behind me. It locked with a definitive, hydraulic hiss, cutting off the deafening noise of the alarms and gunfire, leaving us in a stifling, terrifying silence.
I collapsed onto the small cot in the corner, rocking a sobbing Matteo. "Shh, baby, I've got you. You're safe. I won't let them hurt you."
Time lost all meaning in that steel box. I had no phone, no connection to the outside world, only the emergency rations and medical kit Dominic had stocked. Every vibration in the floor sent a spike of terror through my veins. Was Dominic dead? Was the mansion overrun? If they breached the safe room, what would I do? I looked at the heavy fire extinguisher on the wall, calculating how much damage I could do with it.
Hours passed. Matteo eventually cried himself to exhaustion, falling asleep against my chest. My muscles cramped, but I didn't dare move.
Finally, a heavy thud sounded against the steel door. I froze, my blood running cold.
A muffled voice came through the intercom speaker. "Elara. Open the door."
It was Dominic. But his voice sounded wrong—strained, weak.
I scrambled up, laid Matteo gently on the cot, and punched the exit code. The door hissed open.
Dominic stumbled into the safe room and collapsed onto the floor.
"Dominic!" I gasped, dropping to my knees beside him.
He was a mess. His white shirt was soaked in crimson, plastered to his side. His face was pale, slick with sweat, and his breathing was shallow and ragged. He had dropped his gun outside the door.
"The perimeter... is secured," he choked out, coughing. A fine mist of blood hit his lips. "Silas... is cleaning up. They... they didn't get to the stairs."
"Shut up and let me look," I ordered, my panic instantly replaced by cold, clinical focus. I ripped his ruined shirt open, sending buttons flying.
A bullet had caught him in the right flank, just below the ribs. Blood was pulsing steadily from the wound. It wasn't an arterial spray, but it was deep, and he was losing blood fast.
"We need to call an ambulance," I said, already grabbing gauze from the emergency medical kit on the wall and pressing it hard against the wound.
Dominic grabbed my wrist with surprising strength, his grip bruising. "No hospitals. The police... the rival families... it's a death sentence. Patch me up. Here."
"I am not a doctor, Dominic! I can't do surgery!"
"You know how to stop bleeding," he ground out, his eyes flashing with stubborn fury. "Do it, Elara. Or I bleed out on this floor."
I stared into his eyes, realizing he was absolutely serious. He would rather die here than show weakness to his enemies. Swearing under my breath, I turned to the medical kit. Dominic was paranoid, which meant the kit was effectively a mini-trauma center. Suture kits, local anesthetics, combat gauze, hemostatic agents.
"This is going to hurt," I warned him, snapping on a pair of latex gloves.
"I've had worse," he grunted, though his jaw was clenched so tight I thought his teeth might shatter.
I cleaned the wound as best as I could with iodine. The bullet had exited through his back—a clean through-and-through, miraculously missing his kidney and spine. "You're lucky. It's a flesh wound, but the muscle is torn badly. I have to stitch it to stop the internal bleeding."
I drew up a syringe of lidocaine and injected it around the wound margins. Dominic flinched, his hand violently gripping the edge of the cot. I threaded the suturing needle with trembling hands. Deep breaths. You can do this. You have to do this.
I worked quickly, my hands finding their old rhythm. I stitched the deep muscle tissue first, tying off the bleeding vessels, then moved to close the skin. The metallic smell of blood filled the small room, mixing with the sharp scent of antiseptic. Dominic didn't make a sound, but his breathing was ragged, and his eyes never left my face.
"You're beautiful when you're focused," he rasped suddenly, his voice thick with pain and exhaustion.
I paused, needle in hand, my cheeks burning. "You're going into hypovolemic shock. You're hallucinating."
"I'm completely lucid," he whispered, reaching up with a bloody hand to tuck a stray lock of hair behind my ear. His touch sent a jolt of electricity straight to my core. "I knew you were strong. I just didn't know you were my salvation."
"Keep still," I muttered, my voice trembling. I finished the last stitch, tied it off, and secured a heavy pressure dressing over the wound. I checked his back, stitched the exit wound, and bandaged it.
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When I finally sat back, stripping off the bloody gloves, I was exhausted. Dominic lay on the floor, his breathing evening out, the bleeding finally stopped. I grabbed a blanket from the cot and draped it over him to prevent shock.
He reached out from under the blanket and grabbed my hand, lacing his fingers through mine. I didn't pull away. I sat on the cold floor beside the most dangerous man in Chicago, our hands intertwined in the bloody aftermath of a war, realizing with absolute certainty that I was falling in love with him.
