Chapter 3 - Three Bullets and a Vow
Ten feet. It was the longest distance I had ever traveled in my life.
The air was alive with lethal metal. A stray round clipped my apron strings, spinning me slightly off balance, but I kept my eyes fixed on the small, huddled form of the boy.
If he dies, Victor dies inside. And Julian... Julian needs me.
I threw my body over Leo just as a heavy volley of fire shattered the remaining glass panels of the sunroom roof.
The impact was instantaneous and agonizing.
The first bullet hit my right shoulder with the force of a speeding locomotive, tearing through muscle and bone before exiting out the back. A white-hot flash of pain blinded me for a microsecond.
Clack-clack-clack.
The second round drove straight through my lower ribs, puncturing something vital. A hot, metallic taste flooded my mouth, and I coughed, spraying bright red droplets onto Leo’s yellow sweater.
Then came the third. It struck my lower back, right above my hip, pinning my breath inside my lungs.
I collapsed over Leo, using my own spine, my own ribs, my own blood, as a living shield. I wrapped my arms tightly around his trembling torso, tucking his head beneath my chin.
"Don't look," I choked out, my voice raspy and drowning in fluid. "Clara's here. I've got you, Leo. I've got you."
The boy sobbed into my chest, his small hands clutching the back of my ruined gray uniform. "Clara... you're leaking..."
"Shh... shh..."
The gunfire outside suddenly cut off, replaced by the heavy, tactical boots of Victor’s reinforcements sweeping the perimeter and returning suppressing fire until the black SUV’s tires blew out and its doors were riddled with lead.
Heavy, frantic footsteps echoed across the shattered glass of the sunroom.
"Leo!"
The voice didn't belong to a crime lord. It belonged to a terrified, desperate father whose entire world had just been put on the line.
Victor Romano skidded into the room, his expensive suit jacket torn at the shoulder, a SIG Sauer pistol still smoking in his right hand. His pale eyes scanned the carnage—Miller’s body, the shattered glass, the smoking walls—and then landed on us.
For a second, the breath left Victor’s massive frame. He dropped his gun.
He lunged across the floor, falling to his knees beside us. "Leo! Look at me, baby, look at Dad—"
"Don't move me," I gasped out. My vision was tunneling, the edges of the room fading into a deep, velvety black. Every breath felt like inhaling shards of glass.
Victor froze. He reached out to pull me away, but as his hand brushed my back, his fingers came away slick, warm, and completely soaked in dark blood.
He stared at his blood-stained palm. Then he looked down at his son, whom I was still shielding with my dying weight.
The most feared man in Chicago—a man who had never shed a tear for his murdered wife, a man who executed traitors without blinking—began to shake. His jaw worked silently, a muscle twitching violently beneath his skin.
With infinite, trembling care, Victor reached down and pulled Leo free from my embrace, gathering the shaking boy into his arms. He handed Leo blindly to a lieutenant who had just rushed in behind him.
"Get him to the panic room. Now," Victor ordered, his voice cracking with a raw, primal fury.
Then, Victor turned back to me. He dropped down into the glass and blood, pressing his bare palm directly against the massive exit wound in my back, trying desperately to stem the flow.
For the first time in eight months, Victor Romano truly looked at me. His pale eyes, usually cold as glacial ice, were wide, wild, and burning with a terrifying intensity.
"You don't get to die," he rasped, his face inches from mine. "Do you hear me? Not after this."
"My... my brother..." I whispered, the darkness finally rushing in to pull me under. "Julian..."
Victor’s blood-covered hand closed tightly around mine, anchoring me to the earth just as my consciousness slipped away.
May you like
His face was the last thing I saw, dark and fierce as a storm. And then he leaned down, his lips brushing my ear, whispering words that sounded like a death sentence and a resurrection all at once:
"From this moment on, nobody touches you. You belong to me."
