Chapter 4 - The Breakout
I didn't answer him. I didn't yell, and I didn't make a scene. When a Moretti stops fighting, it usually means they've decided to kill you.
I turned on my heel, walked out of the dining room before my father could issue another command, and strode straight through the grand foyer into the humid autumn night. Vincent’s town car was still parked near the fountain, keys in the ignition.
By the time Vincent jogged out onto the steps shouting my name, I had already thrown the car into reverse, clipped the stone pillar of the gatehouse, and launched the vehicle down the winding estate road toward the highway.
My phone was buzzing incessantly on the passenger seat—my father, Vincent, security chiefs, all screaming into the void. I picked it up, powered it off completely, and tossed it out the window into the dark woods.
If my family had tracked Naomi once, they had a digital trail. But if I moved fast enough, I could get to the Soho safe house, grab Julie and Lily, and get them out of the country before my father’s cleanup crew realized I had gone rogue.
The drive into Manhattan took thirty grueling minutes of aggressive lane-weaving and running late-night yellow lights. The city skyline rose before me, indifferent and glittering.
When I pulled up to the brownstone in Soho, the street was dead silent. No black sedans. No suspicious figures loitering in the shadows. Just the quiet hum of air conditioning units and the distant wail of a police siren miles away.
I vaulted out of the car, bounded up the brownstone steps, and punched the override code into the keypad. The heavy iron door clicked open.
"Julie?" I called out, stepping into the darkened foyer.
No answer.
I drew my Sig Sauer from my shoulder holster, flipping off the safety as I swept through the living room. The space was empty. The television was off. But on the marble kitchen island sat something that made my blood run cold.
A single purple crayon.
Beside it was a piece of hotel stationery with a message written in a hurried, trembling handwriting: She came back for us. We're at the apartment on Jane. Adrian, please don't let them take her.
I stared at the note, my mind racing through the terrifying variables. She came back. Naomi. Naomi had gone to the safe house, or Julie had called her out of panic, or—worse—my father’s men had intercepted them before they even reached the door.
I whirled around, sprinting back toward the town car, but as I burst through the front entrance, the headlights of two unmarked black SUVs swung into the narrow Soho alleyway, boxing my vehicle in on both sides.
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Four armed men stepped out of the vehicles, their jackets pushed back to reveal tactical gear and silenced carbines.
And standing between them, leaning against the hood of the lead SUV with a cigarette burning between his fingers, was Vincent.
