Chapter 9 - The Wolf at the Gates
The west wing of Moretti Manor was dark, the power lines having finally succumbed to the immense weight of the ice storm outside.
Only the eerie, blue-white flashes of lightning illuminated the long corridors of oil paintings and antique marble statues.
Inside the grand billiard parlor, Julian Moretti paced like a trapped rat behind a barrier of overturned mahogany card tables.
His silk necktie was undone, his expensive dress shirt soaked with sweat, and a snub-nosed revolver trembled in his right hand.
Beside him stood three private mercenaries he had hired under the guise of executive security, their faces tense as they checked the magazines of their semi-automatic pistols.
"He knows everything," Julian muttered frantically, wiping his forehead with a trembling sleeve.
"That stupid, incompetent old hag botched the tea, and now the entire banquet hall saw the chemical test."
"If we get caught in this house, we are going to federal prison for the rest of our lives!"
"The snowcats are fifty yards across the open courtyard, Mr. Moretti," his lead mercenary said, peering through the frosted glass of the terrace doors.
"The storm is whiteout conditions."
"If we make a break for the tree line now, we can reach the interstate before they clear the mountain pass."
"We aren't leaving without the briefcase in the game room safe," Julian snarled, his eyes bulging with desperation.
"The bearer bonds and the revised trust documents are in that vault."
"Without them, we are broke fugitives!"
Suddenly, the heavy double doors of the billiard parlor exploded inward with a deafening crash.
A flashbang grenade arced through the doorway, detonating with a blinding white flash and a concussive roar that shattered every crystal glass on the bar.
The three mercenaries staggered backward, clutching their ears and firing blindly into the smoke.
Through the haze, Lorenzo Moretti moved like an apparition of death.
He closed the distance before the first mercenary could re-aim, his left arm knocking the man’s weapon aside while his right fist drove an iron blow straight into the guard’s solar plexus.
The mercenary collapsed to the floor, gasping for air, instantly incapacitated.
The second guard raised his weapon, but a clean, non-lethal shot from Lorenzo’s private contractor took the man in the shoulder, spinning him into an antique bookcase.
The third mercenary dropped his weapon to the Persian carpet and raised his hands in immediate, terrified surrender.
Julian backed away frantically, his boots slipping on broken glass as he retreated toward the floor-to-ceiling windows.
He pointed his trembling revolver straight at Lorenzo’s chest.
"Stay back!" Julian screamed, his voice cracking into a high, hysterical screech.
"Stay back, Lorenzo, or I swear to God I will pull this trigger!"
Lorenzo didn't stop.
He walked steadily through the drifting smoke, his gun lowered at his side, his dark eyes fixed upon his cousin with complete, chilling indifference.
"You don't have the stomach to kill a man with your own hands, Julian," Lorenzo said, his voice cutting through the ringing silence of the room.
"You are a coward who hides behind old women, poison vials, and forged signatures."
"You poisoned an eighty-year-old man who raised you after your father drank himself into an early grave."
"You forced a starving, pregnant girl to the brink of death to protect your pathetic embezzlement."
"Pull the trigger, Julian."
"Show me what kind of man you are."
Julian’s hand shook so violently that the front sight of the revolver rattled against the cold air.
"It was supposed to be mine!" Julian shrieked, tears of rage and humiliation streaming down his flushed face.
"I was the elder cousin! My father gave his life to the shipping lines, and the old man gave everything to you!"
"You were always his favorite!"
"You had the ruthlessness, the mind, the favor!"
"I deserved that seat at the head of the boardroom table!"
"You deserved nothing," Lorenzo replied, taking another slow, deliberate step forward.
"Leadership is not an inheritance of greed, Julian."
"It is a burden of protection."
"And you couldn't even protect the honor of your own blood."
"Shoot him, Mr. Moretti!" the wounded mercenary groaned from the floor.
Julian closed his eyes, his finger tightening frantically on the trigger.
Before the hammer could fall, Lorenzo closed the remaining distance with blinding speed.
His hand clamped over the cylinder of Julian’s revolver, jamming the mechanical rotation with raw, crushing grip strength.
With a sharp, fluid twist of his wrist, Lorenzo wrenched the gun from Julian’s grasp, dislocating two of his cousin’s fingers with a sickening crack.
Julian screamed in agony, clutching his broken hand against his chest as he dropped to his knees on the glass-strewn floor.
Lorenzo ejected the cylinder, caught the six live rounds in his palm, and let the heavy steel revolver drop onto the table beside them.
He looked down at his broken, weeping cousin with nothing but cold disgust.
"The game room safe has already been opened, Julian," Lorenzo said quietly.
"The original testament from 2018 is safe."
"The offshore wire transfers have already been transmitted to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District."
"And the federal marshals are currently mounting snowcat convoys at the base of the mountain."
Julian looked up, his face twisted in horror.
"The... the original will?" Julian stammered, his lips trembling.
"Grandfather left fifty percent of the voting shares to Elena Vance’s lineage," Lorenzo revealed, watching the final vestige of hope drain from Julian’s eyes.
"And the child born in my master suite two hours ago is the sole living heir to that share."
"You didn't just fail to kill me, Julian."
"You delivered the true owner of this empire straight into my hands."
Julian let out a broken, pathetic wail, slumping forward onto the floorboards as Lorenzo’s security team moved in to bind his wrists with heavy tactical zip-ties.
Lorenzo turned his back on his cousin, walking toward the grand terrace windows that overlooked the storm.
In the far eastern sky, beyond the swirling white veil of the blizzard, the very first faint sliver of dawn was beginning to pierce the darkness.
The fortress had survived the night.
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The traitors had been excised like rot from an ancient oak.
Now, Lorenzo had a promise to keep to the girl who had risked everything to save him.
