**THE MAFIA BOSS SAW HIS 78-YEAR-OLD MOTHER WALK INTO HIS ENGAGEMENT DINNER HOLDING A LITTLE GIRL'S MUDDY PINK RAIN BOOT—THEN HIS FIANCÉE SAID, “SHE FOUND IT IN THE GARDEN. SHE STILL CAN'T LET GO OF THAT CHILD,” BEFORE LUCA EVEN ASKED WHY HIS MOTHER WAS CRYING.**

“Vanessa,” I breathed, staring at the intercom speaker mounted in the corner of the steel ceiling.

“I saw you on the lobby security cameras,” Vanessa laughed. Her voice was distorted through the speaker, but the cruelty was crystal clear. “You really thought you could steal my father’s leverage?”

“Rachel!” Luca’s voice shouted in my earpiece. I could hear the sound of screeching tires and shattering glass on his end. He was crashing his car into the bank. “Stay away from the door! I’m coming!”

“The air vents are off, Vanessa,” I yelled into the intercom, trying to keep the rising panic out of my voice.

“I know,” Vanessa purred. “The vault is hermetically sealed. You have about twenty minutes of oxygen before you pass out. Enjoy the quiet, Rachel.”

The intercom clicked off with a hiss of static.

The silence that followed was absolute, terrifyingly heavy.

I sank to the floor, leaning my back against the cold steel of the deposit boxes. I hugged my knees to my chest, the designer tote bag with the ledger resting beside me.

“Luca,” I whispered into my collar, my breathing already feeling slightly shallow.

“I’m here, Rachel. I’m right here,” Luca’s voice came through, jagged with adrenaline. “I’m in the lobby. My men are securing the guards. I’m at the vault door.”

I could hear a faint, muffled thumping sound through the two feet of solid steel behind my head.

“I found a file, Luca,” I said, tears finally slipping down my cheeks. “She caused my mother’s botched surgery. She bankrupted us on purpose just to hire me.”

Luca swore viciously in Italian through the earpiece.

“She is a dead woman,” Luca vowed, his voice vibrating with a terrifying, primal rage. “I swear to you on my daughter’s soul, she will pay for every tear you’ve shed.”

“The air is getting thin,” I admitted, trying not to hyperventilate.

“Rachel, listen to me,” Luca’s voice softened, becoming incredibly tender and urgent. “I am setting a shaped C4 charge on the locking mechanism of the door. I need you to go to the far corner of the vault. Get under the viewing table and cover your ears.”

I scrambled to my feet. The lack of oxygen was already making me lightheaded.

I stumbled to the far corner and crawled under the heavy wooden viewing table, curling into a tight ball.

“I’m under the table,” I said softly.

“Good girl,” Luca murmured. “Rachel?”

“Yes?”

There was a pause on the line. I could hear his ragged breathing.

“When my daughter died, I thought my life was over,” Luca said, his voice stripped of all the mafia boss armor. It was just him. Just a man. “I let the house go dark. I let my mother suffer. I gave up.”

I closed my eyes in the dark.

“But then you walked in,” he continued. “You loved a little girl you never even met. You stood up to a monster to protect a pair of pink rain boots. You brought the light back into my home.”

“Luca,” I sobbed quietly, overwhelmed by his confession.

“I am not losing you in this vault, Rachel Morgan,” he promised fiercely. “I love you. Do you hear me? I love you.”

My heart hammered against my ribs, momentarily overriding the lack of air.

“I love you too,” I breathed.

“Cover your ears,” he ordered. “Firing in three… two… one.”

The explosion was deafening.

The shockwave reverberated through the steel room, rattling my teeth and shaking dust from the ceiling.

A massive, violent screech of tearing metal followed.

The heavy steel door groaned, buckled, and was violently kicked open from the outside.

Fresh, cool air rushed into the stagnant vault.

I scrambled out from under the table, coughing through the smoke.

Luca strode through the smoke, his gun raised, his eyes frantically scanning the room. When he saw me, he dropped his weapon completely.

He crossed the room in two massive strides, dropped to his knees, and pulled me into a desperate, crushing embrace.

I buried my face in his neck, inhaling the smell of cordite and his cologne, wrapping my arms tightly around him.

“I’ve got you,” he whispered fiercely, pressing kisses into my hair. “I’ve got you.”

“I have the ledger,” I coughed, pulling the tote bag toward me.

Luca pulled back, looking at my face. His dark eyes were blazing with relief and a dangerous, lethal resolve.

“Let’s go end this,” he said, pulling me to my feet.

We ran out of the vault.

The lobby of the bank was chaotic. Luca’s men had disarmed the security guards and secured the exits.

But as we reached the shattered glass doors of the main entrance, the screech of tires echoed from the street.

Four black SUVs slammed to a halt, completely blockading the bank.

Dozens of armed men poured out of the vehicles, raising assault rifles.

Standing behind the barricade of cars, wearing a pristine white trench coat, was Don Bellini. Vanessa’s father.

And standing right beside him, pointing a pistol directly at the front doors of the bank, was Vanessa.

“Hand over the ledger, Luca!” Don Bellini’s voice boomed over a megaphone. “You’re outgunned! Give me the book, and I’ll let you and the maid walk away!”

Luca pulled me behind a thick marble pillar inside the lobby.

He checked the magazine of his handgun.

“He’s lying,” Luca told me quietly. “The moment I hand over that book, they’ll gun us down.”

“What do we do?” I asked, gripping the strap of the tote bag until my knuckles turned white.