Chapter 6 - The Red Velvet Box
The piece of parchment trembled in my hands.
I have the detonator.
Vanessa Bellini hadn't just planted a bomb in the mansion. She had wired Pier 42. And Luca was heading there right now, thinking he was walking into a standard mafia standoff, completely unaware that his former fiancée was waiting to blow the entire dock into the lake.
I dropped the note and ran back into the living room.
"Daniel!" I shouted, panic raising my voice an octave.
Daniel was standing by the window, checking the perimeter security feeds on a tablet. He looked up, startled. "What is it?"
I shoved the note into his hands. "Vanessa left this in the kitchen. She knew we would come to the safe house. She set a trap for Luca at the harbor!"
Daniel scanned the note, his face draining of color. "How did she get this in here?"
He looked at the red velvet box I was still clutching. "That's the engagement gift Luca gave her last week. She must have slipped it into the safe house supplies when she visited."
"We have to warn him!" Teresa cried, standing up from the sofa, her hands shaking.
Daniel pulled his radio from his belt. "Boss, do you copy? Abort the harbor assault. It's a trap. Do you copy?"
Static hissed through the speaker.
Daniel tried again. "Alpha team, this is actual. Abort Pier 42. Do you copy?"
More static.
Daniel cursed, slamming the radio against his palm. "They're jamming the signal. Dominic Bellini has military-grade scramblers surrounding the harbor. Luca can't hear us."
"Then we have to go get him," I said, my voice surprisingly steady despite the terror gripping my chest.
Daniel looked at me like I was insane. "Hannah, you are a housemaid. You are not walking into a combat zone. I am staying here to protect Mrs. Moretti, as ordered."
"If you stay here, your boss dies!" I argued, pointing at the note. "Vanessa is waiting for him! You know the layout of Pier 42, right?"
"I designed the security for it," Daniel admitted grimly.
"Then you know how to get in without triggering the main gates," I pressed. "Daniel, we don't have time! If Luca dies, the Bellinis will come for Teresa next. We have to stop Vanessa."
Teresa stepped forward, placing a gentle but firm hand on Daniel's arm. "Go with her, Daniel. Bring my son home."
Daniel looked at Teresa, then at me. He sighed heavily, drawing his sidearm and checking the magazine.
"If we die," Daniel grunted, "Luca is going to kill me."
Ten minutes later, Daniel and I were speeding toward the South Side docks in an unmarked sedan.
The rain had stopped, leaving a heavy, suffocating fog rolling off Lake Michigan. The harbor was eerily quiet, the massive shipping containers looming like steel ghosts in the mist.
Daniel parked the car three blocks away in a dark alley. We moved on foot, slipping through a rusted chain-link fence that Daniel had discreetly cut months ago for an emergency exit route.
We crept through the shadows of the towering containers, the smell of salt and diesel heavy in the air.
"Pier 42 is at the end of this row," Daniel whispered, holding his gun at the ready. "Stay behind me."
As we rounded the final corner, the fog parted just enough to reveal the loading dock.
My heart dropped into my stomach.
Luca’s tactical teams were pinned down behind a row of concrete barriers. Dominic Bellini’s men had them surrounded, raining heavy suppressing fire down from the catwalks of a massive warehouse.
But Luca wasn't with his men.
He was standing in the open, completely exposed in the center of the pier.
Thirty feet away, standing near the edge of the dock, was Vanessa Bellini.
She wasn't wearing her ruined red gown anymore. She wore a sleek black trench coat. In one hand, she held the leather-bound ledger Antonio Moretti had hidden twenty years ago.
In the other hand, she held a small, black detonator with a glowing red light.
"Call off your men, Luca!" Vanessa screamed over the gunfire, her voice echoing across the water. "Or I press the button and the C4 under this pier takes us all to the bottom of the lake!"
Luca didn't flinch. He stood perfectly still, his dark eyes locked on the woman he had almost married.
"You won't do it, Vanessa," Luca said, his voice carrying an eerie, lethal calm. "If you blow the pier, the ledger burns with us. And Dominic will kill you himself for destroying his leverage."
"My father is a coward!" Vanessa shrieked, her composed facade completely shattered. "He was going to let me take the fall for Julian’s bomb! I’m taking the ledger, and I’m taking control of the family!"
"She's lost her mind," Daniel whispered to me from the shadows. "If she presses that button, Luca is dead. I don't have a clear shot. She's standing too close to the edge."
"I do," I breathed, my eyes locked on a massive, heavy-duty forklift parked just ten feet behind Vanessa.
"Hannah, no!" Daniel hissed, grabbing my arm.
But I didn't listen.
I ripped my arm away and sprinted out from behind the container, using the deafening roar of the gunfire to mask my footsteps.
I didn't run toward Luca. I ran straight for the forklift.
I scrambled up into the driver’s seat. The keys were still in the ignition—standard harbor protocol during late-night shifts.
I didn't know how to drive a forklift, but my father had been a mechanic. I knew enough.
I slammed my hand down on the ignition and jammed the gearshift forward.
The massive engine roared to life with a deafening, mechanical scream.
Vanessa jumped, spinning around in terror.
She saw me sitting in the cab, illuminated by the halogen headlights.
"You!" Vanessa shrieked, raising the detonator.
I didn't hit the brakes. I slammed my foot on the gas and aimed the heavy steel forks directly at the wooden crates stacked precariously right next to where Vanessa was standing.
The forklift slammed into the crates with a thunderous crash. The heavy wooden boxes toppled over, cascading violently toward her.
Vanessa screamed, diving out of the way to avoid being crushed.
The detonator flew from her hand, clattering harmlessly across the concrete pier.
Luca didn't waste a millisecond.
He lunged forward, closing the distance between them, and kicked the detonator off the edge of the pier. It splashed into the dark, freezing water below.
The threat was gone.
I slammed the brakes on the forklift, my hands shaking so badly I could barely turn the key to shut the engine off.
Vanessa scrambled to her feet, desperate to retrieve the ledger she had dropped.
But Luca was already there.
He didn't draw his gun. He didn't hit her.
He simply reached down, picked up his father's ledger, and looked at the woman who had tried to destroy his family.
"Your engagement is over, Vanessa," Luca said coldly.
And then, from the shadows of the warehouse, a slow, mocking clap echoed across the pier.
We all froze.
Stepping out of the fog, holding a massive, silenced assault rifle, was Dominic Bellini.
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And standing right beside him, looking completely unharmed and holding a gun aimed directly at Luca's head, was the man we had left locked in the trunk of the SUV.
Julian Moretti.
