Chapter 9 - Locked Down in the Shadow of War
Panic did not belong in the Moretti lexicon, but the sheer suddenness of the rocket-propelled grenade attack at the perimeter wall sent shockwaves through the entire compound.
Smoke billowed into the gray sky from the direction of the wrought-iron gates, visible through the high windows of Vincenzo’s suite.
Leo rushed to his father’s side, his gaze flicking between the old man and Norah with frantic intensity.
“Get him down to the reinforced panic room behind the library immediately!”
Leo barked orders over his shoulder to the two suited guards, who instantly sprang into motion, unlocking a concealed panel in the wall.
Norah stood frozen for a fraction of a second, her hands still trembling from the physical exertion of supporting Vincenzo’s sudden drop.
“What about you?”
She asked, her voice cutting sharply through the cacophony of blaring sirens and distant shouting.
“I have to secure the perimeter and make sure the remaining loyal men aren't flanked,” Leo snapped back, his jaw locked like a vise as he checked the magazine of his rifle.
“Go with them, Norah!”
“It’s not safe out here!”
Instead of fleeing toward the panic room like a sensible civilian, Norah bent down and snatched her heavy canvas medical bag off the floor.
She slung the strap over her shoulder with grim determination.
“I am a trauma physical therapist, Mr. Moretti.”
Her voice carried a cool, undeniable authority that made Leo pause mid-stride.
“If your men take shrapnel or bullet wounds out there, you are going to need someone who knows how to pack a bleeding artery before the ambulance ever reaches these hills.”
“I am not hiding in a basement while people bleed to death upstairs.”
Leo stared at her through the haze of indoor smoke and blaring alarms, a profound surge of reckless respect flashing across his pale gray eyes.
“Stay behind me,” he ordered sharply, grabbing her arm and pulling her into the secure corridor behind the suite.
The estate had transformed into a vertical battlefield within minutes.
Heavy gunfire echoed from the front courtyard as Leo’s security detail engaged Santino’s vanguard in a desperate firefight.
Glass shattered somewhere on the lower landing as a stray bullet punched through a stained-glass window.
Leo pushed his father’s wheelchair down the private service elevator with blistering speed, pressing the basement sub-level button.
The hydraulic lift descended into the subterranean bowels of the ancient mansion, smelling heavily of damp stone, gun oil, and old wine.
When the doors slid open, they stepped into a massive, heavily fortified concrete bunker equipped with bank-vault doors, independent power generators, and rows of tactical gear lockers.
The two guards wheeled Vincenzo inside and parked him securely beside a steel medical cot.
Leo turned back to Norah, his hands gripping her shoulders tightly enough to leave bruises through her scrubs.
“You stay right here with him,” Leo commanded, his voice dropping into an intimate, urgent plea that betrayed his fierce composure.
“If I’m not back in thirty minutes, use the satellite phone in the corner to call the federal contact listed on the speed dial.”
“Leo—” Norah started to protest, but he cut her off by pressing a heavy tactical flashlight into her palm.
“Keep him alive, Norah.”
With those final words, Leo spun on his heel and plunged back up the elevator shaft into the smoke-filled chaos of the burning mansion above.
The heavy vault doors slammed shut with a hydraulic hiss, plunging the concrete bunker into an eerie, isolated quiet broken only by the hum of the emergency generator.
Vincenzo sat rigidly in his wheelchair, his chest heaving, his single dark eye fixed on the steel door with absolute, terrifying ferocity.
Norah placed her medical bag down on the steel cot, took a deep steadying breath, and pulled out a pair of sterile medical gloves.
She looked across the room at the mafia patriarch who had tried to crush her wrist two weeks ago.
“Well, Vincenzo,” she said quietly, snapping a latex glove onto her hand with a sharp pop.
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“Looks like we’re stuck waiting for your son to save the world.”
The old man let out a harsh, dry rasp that sounded almost like a laugh, raising his functioning left hand in a defiant fist.
