Chapter 8 - The Shadow Protocol
The violent shockwave from the exploding car threw Chloe hard against the rusted concrete bridge pillar.
She gasped for air, her ears ringing completely from the deafening blast.
Miller was writhing in the deep mud, completely disoriented and bleeding heavily from his shattered eardrums.
A tall, dark figure slowly stepped out from behind a massive steel shipping container.
It was not Dominic, Paulie, or any of the heavily armed mafia enforcers she recognized.
It was an older woman with sharp, incredibly familiar eyes and a sleek, suppressed pistol in her hand.
The woman walked calmly up to the bleeding detective and fired a single, lethal shot directly into his chest.
Chloe stared in absolute, paralyzing disbelief as the woman turned her cold gaze toward the bridge.
The woman looked exactly like Chloe's mother, who had supposedly died in a tragic car accident fifteen years ago.
The older woman offered her hand to Chloe, pulling the completely shocked girl out of the freezing mud.
She quickly explained that she had faked her death to escape her husband's incredibly dangerous thievery.
She had spent the last fifteen years working as a highly trained shadow operative for Dominic's rival syndicate.
She warned Chloe that Dominic had deliberately set her up to be murdered tonight by pulling his snipers away.
She claimed Dominic wanted both Miller and Chloe dead to permanently erase his father's stolen secrets.
Chloe felt her heart shatter completely, realizing she was merely a disposable pawn in a massive, decades-old mafia war.
Her mother pulled her toward a heavily armored vehicle hidden in the dark tree line.
She promised to take Chloe and Sam far away from the city and the violent monsters who ruled it.
Chloe climbed into the passenger seat, finally feeling a profound sense of safety with her newly discovered mother.
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She buckled her seatbelt and reached for her phone to call Paulie and demand Sam's immediate release.
Before she could dial the number, she noticed a large, incredibly fresh bloodstain on the sleeve of her mother's dark coat.
