THE MAFIA BOSS WHO CARRIED HIS INJURED MAID THROUGH THE BLIZZARD: BLOOD, BETRAYAL, AND THE SINS OF THE ROMANO DYNASTY

The blinding white light cut through the dark cabin, throwing elongated, dancing shadows against the rough fieldstone walls.

Vincent reacted instantaneously.

He caught Margaret by the arm and pulled her down into the recessed stone hearth beside the cast-iron stove.

"Stay low, behind the masonry!" Vincent commanded.

He lunged across the small room, catching Lily by her waist and hauling her off the cot onto the wooden floorboards behind the heavy oak desk.

A second later, the stillness of the Adirondack night was shattered by a deafening storm of automatic rifle fire.

High-velocity rounds punched through the cedar shingle walls and shattered the front window panes into a thousand glittering shards.

Glass rained down onto the floor like frozen hail.

Bullets chewed through the wooden cabinets, splintering canned goods, tearing open bags of dry flour, and sending clouds of white dust swirling through the air.

The heavy stone hearth and the solid oak desk absorbed the impact of the lead, the wood groaning and splintering under the ferocious barrage.

"Vincent!" Marco Vane’s voice boomed through an external vehicle loudspeaker, cutting over the roar of the idling plow engine outside.

"You're out of room to run, boss!"

"The fire department isn't coming. The state police won't be dispatched up this mountain until tomorrow afternoon!"

"Throw the old woman and the drive out the front door, and you and the girl can walk down to the county road untouched!"

"He’s lying," Lily whispered, her hand clamping down on Vincent’s arm through his torn shearling coat.

"He killed my father to clean up loose ends. He won't leave witnesses."

"I know," Vincent murmured, his eyes scanning the room with cold, calculating precision.

He pulled his Glock from his belt and checked the remaining rounds.

Nine cartridges left in the magazine.

The SIG Sauer on the desk had four rounds.

Thirteen bullets against an armored plow and at least four heavily armed mercenaries.

"They won't rush the door blindly," Vincent whispered to Lily, keeping his head tucked behind the edge of the desk.

"They know I'm in here with a weapon."

"They’ll spray the walls to pin us down, then throw tear gas or incendiary canisters through the broken window."

Lily looked around the cramped, dust-filled space.

Her eyes darted to the iron conduit running from the landline telephone down into the floor, then to a massive, yellowed electrical breaker box mounted on the back stone wall.

"Vincent," Lily whispered, her breathing fast but steady.

"The state forestry outposts in this sector run on high-voltage three-phase power lines fed from the southern pumping station."

Vincent looked at her, his brows knitting together.

"What about it?"

"My father taught me industrial wiring when I was twelve," Lily said, her voice sharp with sudden, desperate clarity.

"That external conduit near the porch connects directly to the lightning arrester on the roof antenna."

"If you cut the secondary ground wire and bypass the breaker with that heavy copper fire poker beside the stove, the entire metal porch railing outside will carry four hundred and eighty volts of raw current."

"They're coming up the front porch steps right now," Vincent realized, listening to the heavy crunch of boots on the snow-covered timber outside.

"Can you do it?" Vincent asked.

"Cover me for fifteen seconds," Lily said, pulling herself along the floorboards toward the breaker box on her elbows, dragging her immobilized right leg behind her.

Vincent didn't waste a heartbeat questioning her.

He rose to a half-kneeling position behind the shattered window frame, bringing his Glock up into the frigid air.

Outside, two men in black tactical gear were advancing up the four wooden steps of the porch, their rifles raised to breach the door.

Behind them, parked twenty yards back in the snow, the heavy orange plow sat with its spotlight blazing into the cabin.

Vincent acquired his first target and squeezed the trigger twice.

The front gunman took a round through his right collarbone, spinning violently backward off the porch into a deep snowbank.

The second man dove behind the porch’s heavy timber railing, returning fire with a deafening burst of automatic fire that chewed away the top of the desk.

Inside the cabin, Lily had wrenched open the rusted iron face of the breaker box.

Her hands were covered in black grease and dust, but her fingers moved with mechanical precision.

She pulled an insulated screwdriver from an old tool kit on the bottom shelf, jamming it into the main contact lugs.

"Vincent! Hand me the iron fire poker!" Lily shouted over the deafening roar of gunfire.

Margaret, moving with surprising agility from her crouched position by the hearth, grabbed the heavy, pointed iron poker and slid it across the floorboards like a spear.

Lily caught the iron rod, wrapping her wool sleeve around the handle to insulate her hands.

She slammed the pointed iron tip across the primary three-phase busbars inside the panel.

A blinding, sapphire-blue arc of electricity exploded from the breaker box with a violent, concussive crack.

Sparks cascaded down the stone wall like a fountain of molten gold.

Outside, the heavy copper conduit running to the porch shuddered as four hundred and eighty volts surged through the metal fixtures.

The mercenary crouching behind the timber railing was leaning his gloved hand against the heavy iron support brace.

The high-voltage surge tore through his body in an instant.

A brilliant blue flash illuminated the porch, accompanied by a horrifying, agonized scream as the current locked the man’s muscles rigid.

The mercenary was thrown backward off the porch railing, his tactical vest smoking as he crashed motionless into the snow below.

"Breaker tripped!" Lily yelled, coughing through the ozone-scented smoke filling the room.

"The exterior circuit is dead!"

"That bought us our opening," Vincent growled.

He vaulted over the shattered desk in one powerful leap, landing on the splintered porch floorboards.

The spotlight on the plow swiveled instantly toward him, but Vincent was already moving.

He fired three rapid rounds through the driver-side window of the heavy machine.

The heavy laminated glass spiderwebbed with white fractures, forcing the driver to duck low behind the dashboard.

Vincent sprinted through the blinding white glare, closing the distance between himself and the plow in three seconds flat.

He leaped onto the heavy steel tread of the machine, wrenched the reinforced door open with his bare hands, and dragged the driver bodily out into the snow.

The man hit the frozen ground hard, but before Vincent could secure him, a heavy blow struck Vincent across the side of his helmet-less jaw.

Vincent stumbled back into the snowdrift, blood filling his mouth.

Standing in the glare of the plow’s headlights was Marco Vane.

Marco held no rifle now; he held a six-inch tactical combat blade, his face twisted into a mask of pure, murderous desperation.

"You should have stayed dead on that mountain, Vincent!" Marco snarled, stepping forward with lethal speed.