Chapter 8 - THE SHOTGUN AND THE SILVER CYLINDER
Marcus didn’t dare move.
I stared at Mrs. Keene in absolute shock. The elderly catering worker, the woman who had been humiliated at the dinner table and held hostage in the mansion, was standing on the freezing pier with a twelve-gauge shotgun.
“Drop the weapon, Marcus,” Mrs. Keene said. Her voice didn’t shake. It was the voice of a woman who had survived decades in a world built by ruthless men.
Marcus slowly lowered his gun, but he sneered over his shoulder. “You’re an old woman, Margaret. You don’t have the stomach to pull that trigger.”
“I washed blood out of my husband’s shirts for twenty years,” Mrs. Keene replied coldly. “Don’t test my stomach.”
Before Marcus could react, a gunshot rang out from across the pier.
It wasn't Mrs. Keene.
Adrian Bellucci stepped into the light of the floodlamps, his pistol smoking. He had shot Marcus squarely in the kneecap.
Marcus screamed, collapsing onto the wet concrete.
Adrian walked forward, his presence commanding the entire harbor. He didn’t look at the bleeding traitor. He looked at me, and then at the little boy in my arms.
“Uncle Adrian?” Leo whispered, peeking over my shoulder.
Adrian’s face softened completely. He reached out and gently touched the boy’s hair. “I’m here, Leo. You’re safe.”
Francesca sprinted from the crates, dropping her rifle. “Leo!”
I handed the boy to her. Francesca fell to her knees, burying her face in her son’s neck, sobbing uncontrollably. The long, terrifying exile was over.
Adrian turned to Mrs. Keene. “I thought I told you to stay in the car.”
The elderly woman lowered the shotgun, finally letting out a shaky breath. “I’ve spent my whole life waiting in cars, Mr. Bellucci. I’m done waiting.”
“Where is Dominic?” Adrian asked.
“He’s dead,” Mrs. Keene said bluntly.
I gasped.
Adrian nodded slowly. “When Dominic tried to force me to sign the deeds in the mansion, he didn't realize Mrs. Keene had already unbarred the service doors for my extraction team. Dominic didn’t make it out of the study.”
The main threat was gone. Dominic Rossi was dead.
But then I remembered the horrifying reality waiting back at my neighborhood.
“Mr. Bellucci!” I yelled. “Sloane! The poison!”
Adrian’s eyes widened. He knelt beside the groaning Marcus and grabbed him by the collar.
“Where is the antidote?” Adrian roared. “Dominic had a silver cylinder on a necklace!”
Marcus laughed, spitting blood onto the concrete. “Dominic didn’t have the antidote, you fool. He gave it to me to hold. In case Sloane betrayed us.”
Marcus reached into his pocket with a trembling hand and pulled out a small, silver cylinder.
He held it over the edge of the pier, right above the churning black water of the harbor.
“You shot my knee, Adrian,” Marcus sneered. “So the fiancée dies.”
He opened his hand to drop the cylinder into the ocean.
But Mrs. Keene didn’t hesitate. She swung the heavy wooden stock of the shotgun directly into Marcus’s jaw.
There was a sickening crack. Marcus was knocked out cold, collapsing onto his back.
The silver cylinder flew from his hand, bouncing across the concrete toward the edge of the pier.
I dove for it, sliding across the wet pavement, scraping my knees, and slamming my hand down over the metal tube just an inch before it rolled into the dark water.
I held it up, my chest heaving. “I have it!”
Adrian grabbed the cylinder. “Let’s go. We have twenty minutes to save her.”
We raced back to the SUVs. The drive to my neighborhood was a blur of sirens and rain. We pulled up to the lawn where my father was standing over Carlo, with police cruisers finally arriving to secure the perimeter.
Sloane was lying on the grass, barely breathing. Her skin was terribly pale, the black veins stark against her neck.
Adrian popped the cylinder open. Inside was an auto-injector. He pressed it into Sloane’s thigh and clicked the button.
For ten agonizing seconds, nothing happened.
Then, Sloane gasped loudly, her chest arching as the antidote flooded her system. The black veins slowly began to recede. She opened her eyes, tears spilling down her cheeks as she saw her mother kneeling beside her.
“Mom,” Sloane wept, reaching out a weak hand. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Mrs. Keene took her daughter’s hand, crying quietly. “I know, Susie. I know.”
Adrian stood up, watching the reunion. He had lost a fiancée, but he had saved a life. And more importantly, he had his real family back.
He turned to Francesca, who was holding Leo tight. Brother and sister looked at each other, the years of misunderstanding washed away by the rain.
The main conflict was over. The Bellucci empire was safe.
But as I walked back to my father to check on him, my foot kicked something hard in the grass where Carlo had been sitting.
I looked down.
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It was a heavy, silver pocket watch. My father’s pocket watch. The one he claimed he had lost three years ago on a construction site.
I picked it up, my heart freezing. Because engraved on the back was the snarling wolf of the Rossi syndicate.
