CHAPTER 6 – THE PRICE OF ESCAPE
CHAPTER 6 – THE PRICE OF ESCAPE
The hidden elevator descended nearly one hundred feet beneath Manhattan.
Steel doors sealed shut above them.
For the first time since the shooting began...
There was silence.
Only the distant sound of machinery.
Maya leaned against the wall.
Her breathing became uneven.
Marcus immediately noticed.
"What's wrong?"
She winced.
"My stomach..."
A sharp pain shot through her body.
Charlotte hurried over.
"I'm calling an ambulance."
Marcus shook his head.
"No hospitals."
"They'll be waiting."
Charlotte looked furious.
"She's eight months pregnant!"
"And every emergency room in Manhattan has someone on Moretti payroll."
Maya suddenly grabbed Marcus's arm.
Another contraction.
Longer.
Stronger.
Her face turned white.
Marcus felt panic unlike anything he'd ever experienced.
He had faced assassins.
Federal raids.
Bombings.
None of it compared to watching Maya struggle to breathe.
Charlotte knelt beside her.
"I'm not an obstetrician, but something isn't right."
Luca looked toward Marcus.
"We have a medical facility at Safehouse Seven."
"How long?"
"Twenty minutes."
Marcus glanced at Maya.
She wouldn't last twenty minutes.
Another contraction hit.
She cried out despite trying to stay quiet.
Marcus dropped to one knee beside her.
His blood-stained hands trembled.
"Look at me."
She did.
"You promised you'd never come back."
"I know."
"You lied."
"I know."
Tears filled her eyes.
"I wasn't protecting myself..."
Marcus frowned.
"I was protecting our baby."
She took a shaky breath.
"The day I left..."
"...I found your father's men discussing how every Valentino heir eventually becomes a weapon."
Marcus froze.
"I couldn't let that happen."
"I wanted our child to grow up knowing birthdays instead of bodyguards."
"Holidays instead of hiding."
"School instead of safe houses."
Her voice cracked.
"I wanted one normal life."
Marcus closed his eyes.
Everything she'd feared...
Was happening.
Because of him.
He gently placed his hand against her stomach.
For the first time...
He felt the baby move.
A tiny kick pressed against his palm.
His entire body went still.
His child.
Real.
Alive.
Depending on him.
A tear rolled silently down his face.
Charlotte watched from across the room.
She had known Marcus Valentino for six years.
She had never seen him cry.
Not once.
Not even at his mother's funeral.
Maya whispered,
"He already knows your voice."
Marcus smiled through the tears.
"I'm sorry."
She looked at him.
"For everything."
"I should have chosen you."
"Instead of the empire."
Before Maya could answer—
Every light inside the underground tunnel suddenly went dark.
Emergency sirens screamed.
Luca grabbed his rifle.
"No..."
Marcus stood immediately.
"What happened?"
Luca looked at the security monitor.
His face lost all color.
"They found us."
"Impossible."
"They're inside the tunnels."
Marcus stared at the surveillance feed.
A group of heavily armed soldiers walked calmly toward the safehouse.
Leading them...
Was someone Marcus trusted more than his own shadow.
His lifelong head of security.
The man who had saved his life dozens of times.
Gabriel Rossi.
The monitor's speaker crackled.
Gabriel smiled directly into the camera.
"Good evening, Boss."
He slowly raised a small remote control.
"You always told us there was one tunnel nobody knew about."
He pressed the button.
"So..."
"...I spent five years building explosives inside it."
Marcus's eyes widened.
"No..."
A computerized voice echoed through the tunnel.
"Self-destruct sequence initiated."
"Detonation in... sixty seconds."
Maya looked at Marcus.
Marcus looked at his unborn child.
For the first time in his life...
May you like
The most feared Mafia boss in New York had only one question left.
Who could he save... when there wasn't enough time to save them all?
