Chapter 13 - A Shadow in the Schoolyard
From the hidden compartment beneath the floor, Dominic lifted an oiled leather satchel. He unzipped it with a smooth, practiced motion that felt terrifyingly familiar to his hands.
Inside lay two Sig Sauer P226s, four spare magazines, a suppressed tactical submachine gun, and three ceramic body armor plates. He hadn't touched them in eighteen months. He had hoped they would rot in the sea dampness.
"Dominic..." Fiona’s breath hitched as she saw the dark steel gleam in the daylight of their humble living room.
"Put this on," he ordered gently, handing her one of the armor vests. "Over your sweater. Put Leo’s winter parka over him, then take him down to the root cellar beneath the kitchen pantry. Lock the bolt from the inside. Do not open it for anyone. Not even if you hear someone shouting for help."
"What if it's you?" she whispered, gripping his forearm with fingers that dug into his muscle. "What if it's your voice?"
"If I'm alive, I have the key," he replied, sliding a magazine into the first pistol with a sharp, sickening *clack*. "If the bolt doesn't turn with the key, do not open it."
Leo looked up from the table, his eyes wide. "Dad? Why do you have a gun like the movies?"
Dominic walked over, knelt down, and kissed the boy’s forehead. His skin was warm and smelled like sun and pine. "Because I'm a protector, Leo. Remember what I told you about dragons?"
Leo nodded slowly. "You said... dragons protect the mountain."
"That's right," Dominic whispered. "And you and your mama are my mountain. Now go with her. Be brave."
Fiona scooped Leo up, holding him tightly against her chest, and vanished through the door to the kitchen. Dominic heard the heavy oak door of the cellar lift, the creak of the wooden ladder, and the dull, solid thud of the brass drop-bolt engaging.
Alone in the silence of the house, Dominic took a single, long breath.
The carpenter was gone. The quiet man who drank weak coffee on the porch and planed pine boards was buried. The man who stood in his place was the apex predator of the Eastern Seaboard—a man who had spent twenty years conquering five families through calculated brutality and an iron will.
He checked the perimeter through the lace curtains.
Three men were ascending the cliff path from the beach. They wore tactical wet-weather gear, balaclavas, and carried short-barreled automatic rifles. They moved in standard fire-team formation—wide spacing, bounding cover, weapons held at the low-ready.
*Mercenaries,* Dominic assessed coldly. *Ex-military contractors. Lucian didn't send street thugs. He spent real money.*
Dominic didn't wait for them to reach the porch. He didn't allow them to set up a breach. In the rules of urban warfare, the defender who waits behind drywall is already dead.
He stepped out the rear mudroom door into the mist.
He kept low, utilizing the stack of winter cordwood as visual cover, circling around the northeast corner of the cabin where the spruce trees crowded close. The wet needles muffled his footsteps completely.
The first contractor reached the crest of the cliff, his weapon sweeping toward the front door. He raised a gloved hand to signal the two men behind him.
Dominic stepped out from the trunk of an ancient hemlock six feet behind him.
There was no warning. No demand for surrender. Dominic lunged, his left arm locking around the man's throat in a crushing choke, his right hand seizing the barrel of the mercenary's rifle, twisting it violently down and away. With a sharp, practiced wrench of his hips, Dominic snapped the man's cervical spine with a dry, muffled *pop*.
Before the body could hit the mud, Dominic eased it down, snatched the dropped rifle, and shifted his stance.
"Clear on the left?" a voice crackled through the fallen man's earpiece in a sharp German accent.
May you like
Dominic didn't answer. He raised the captured rifle, leaned around the cedar trunk, and found the second man crossing the open grass twenty yards away.
***
