Chapter 13 - The First Strike
The concussive force of the explosion threw me violently against the heavy bookshelves.
Ricardo moved with blinding speed, pulling his weapon and standing fiercely in front of me.
Dante and my grandfather's enforcers immediately formed a protective circle around us.
The emergency backup lights flickered on, casting an eerie red glow over the ruined study.
"They breached the eastern gate!" Dante yelled into his radio, but only harsh static replied.
The communication jammers had been heavily activated.
We were completely cut off from the outside world.
"We need to get to the panic room," Ricardo ordered, grabbing my hand tightly.
"Where is Leo?" I screamed, my maternal instincts overriding my sheer terror.
"He is already in the bunker with his primary nanny," Ricardo assured me rapidly.
We pushed through the smoke and shattered glass, moving aggressively down the main hallway.
Suddenly, a dozen heavily armed mercenaries wearing black tactical gear blocked our path.
They did not wear the expensive suits of the Italian mafia.
They wore the brutal, militaristic armor of the Vargas cartel.
"Take the girl alive," the lead mercenary commanded in heavily accented English.
"Kill everyone else."
A chaotic, incredibly violent firefight instantly erupted in the narrow hallway.
Dante and the Commission enforcers returned fire with lethal precision, dropping three mercenaries immediately.
Ricardo pulled me behind a massive marble pillar as bullets shredded the expensive artwork on the walls.
I covered my ears, completely terrified by the deafening roar of automatic gunfire.
"Stay exactly here," Ricardo ordered, his eyes burning with a protective fury.
He leaned around the pillar, firing calculated shots that perfectly hit their marks.
But the cartel mercenaries were highly trained, and there were far too many of them.
One of the mercenaries managed to flank our position, raising his assault rifle directly at Ricardo's blind spot.
I did not think or hesitate for a single second.
I grabbed a heavy bronze statue from a shattered display table and threw it directly at the mercenary's head.
The heavy metal struck him squarely in the face, knocking him entirely off balance.
Ricardo spun around and instantly eliminated the threat.
He looked at me with a mixture of shock and deep, profound pride.
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"Move!" Dante shouted, having successfully cleared a brief path through the smoke.
We sprinted desperately toward the heavily reinforced steel doors of the underground bunker.
