Chapter 5 - A THREAT ON ASHLAND AVENUE
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The world turned into a blur of cold rain and screaming sirens.
Before I could even process the words, Luca had grabbed my wrist and pulled me toward the underground garage.
“Antonio, stay inside the panic room until Daniel confirms the perimeter is clear,” Luca ordered over his shoulder.
“Go get the girl’s mother, son,” Antonio replied, his cane planted firmly on the floor.
“Leave nobody standing.”
We leaped into a reinforced matte-black SUV.
Luca jammed the push-button start, and the engine roared to life like an angry beast.
The tires shrieked against the concrete as we blasted out of the estate gates and into the stormy Chicago night.
I sat in the passenger seat, clutching my phone with white knuckles.
I dialed my mother’s number three times, but it went straight to voicemail every single time.
“She isn’t answering!” I cried, tears blinding my vision.
“Luca, please, she can’t run!”
“She just had surgery four months ago!”
Luca drove like a professional stuntman, weaving through midnight highway traffic at over ninety miles per hour.
Wipers slapped frantically against the windshield against the pouring rain.
“My men are already inside the building, Emma,” Luca said, never taking his eyes off the slick asphalt.
“They were stationed on the second-floor landing when Bellini’s crew hit the lobby.”
“Why would they attack my mom?” I sobbed, completely overwhelmed by guilt.
“She has nothing to do with any of this!”
“This isn’t about your mother,” Luca replied through gritted teeth.
“Marco Bellini knows Vanessa is trapped inside my house.”
“He wanted a hostage to trade for his daughter.”
“And he knew you were the only person in that dining room who caused his entire plan to collapse.”
The realization hit me like a physical blow.
My bravery under the dining table had painted a target directly onto my mother’s back.
If anything happened to Clara Hayes tonight, I would never forgive myself.
Luca reached across the center console and grabbed my trembling hand.
His grip was steady, warm, and unbreakable.
“Look at me, Emma.”
I turned my tear-streaked face toward him.
“I promised you that nobody would touch your family,” Luca said, his voice fierce with conviction.
“I do not break my promises.”
“We are three blocks away.”
He pulled a sleek black semi-automatic pistol from beneath his steering column and checked the chamber with a crisp metallic snap.
As we turned the final corner onto Ashland Avenue, the flashing lights of broken streetlamps illuminated a nightmare.
Two black sedans were parked crookedly across the sidewalk outside my mother’s brick apartment building.
Smoke was pouring out of the ground-floor lobby windows.
The unmistakable rattle of automatic gunfire echoed down the empty residential street.
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Luca slammed the SUV directly into the rear bumper of the lead sedan, spinning it across the wet street.
“Stay down!” Luca commanded, kicking open his door into the torrential downpour.
