Every afternoon at exactly 2:45, I left the private offices of Chicago’s most feared Mafia leader without explanation. For seven months, Victor Moretti allowed me to disappear every day—until the afternoon he followed me and discovered the secret I had protected from him: six children living in the shadows of his empire.

"No!" I shouted, throwing my body in front of the stairwell door. "You can't take them! They don't know you! You're a stranger to them!"

Victor walked toward me, his long strides effortless, stopping mere inches from my face. The scent of expensive cedarwood, leather, and faint gunsmoke enveloped me.

"I am his father, Olivia," Victor said softly, looking down into my eyes with an intensity that made my knees tremble. "And as of five minutes ago, you are no longer my secretary."

"Then what am I?" I rasped, my throat dry.

"You are the woman who raised my son when I was blind," he said, his hand reaching out to gently catch a stray tear on my cheek with his thumb. His touch was unexpectedly warm, firm, and startlingly gentle. "And that makes you the most important person in this city."

Before I could protest further, a loud explosion rocked the street above us.

BOOM!

Plaster rained down from the basement ceiling. The single light bulb shattered, plunging the room into chaotic, shadow-draped darkness. The children screamed in terror.

"DOWN!" Dante roared, drawing two heavy silenced pistols.

Victor reacted instantly. He lunged forward, wrapping his broad arms around me and pulling me against his heavy chest while simultaneously covering Noah with his body. He slammed us down behind a heavy oak workbench as automatic gunfire shredded the upper door frame.

RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!

Glass, wood splinters, and brick dust filled the air.

"Falcone’s hitmen!" Dante shouted over the deafening chatter of weapons, firing four precise shots back up the dark stairwell. "They followed us from the financial district, Boss! They knew you came here alone!"

"They didn't follow me," Victor growled, his arm tightening around my waist, his broad back shielding both me and Noah from flying debris. "Someone leaked my location."

My heart stopped. "What?"

"Only three people knew I followed you today, Olivia," Victor whispered into my hair, his voice laced with a terrifying, dark promise. "And one of them just signed their own death warrant."

Upstairs, heavy footsteps kicked open the remaining metal doors.

"Search the basement!" a rough voice with a heavy foreign accent barked. "Falcone wants the Moretti bastard dead! Leave no witnesses! Kill the kids!"

At the mention of the children, Victor’s eyes turned into liquid fire.

He looked down at me. "Keep Noah quiet. Can you do that?"

I nodded frantically, pulling Noah tight against my ribs, covering his ears with my hands while Daniel gathered the other five children behind the heavy stone laundry sink in the far corner.

Victor reached into his shoulder holster, pulling a matte-black heavy-caliber firearm. He didn't look afraid. He looked like a predator that had finally been given permission to hunt.

"Dante," Victor said smoothly. "Flashbang."

"Covering!" Dante pulled a silver canister from his tactical belt, pulled the pin with his teeth, and pitched it up the narrow stairwell.

BANG-FLASH!

A blinding white light and a concussive shockwave blew through the basement. Shouts of agony echoed from the top of the stairs as the attackers were temporarily blinded and disoriented.

Victor didn't wait. He rose from behind the workbench like a shadow unleashed from hell.

He moved with terrifying speed and lethal grace. Three shots echoed through the narrow space.

THUD. THUD. THUD.

Three armored men collapsed down the stone steps, their weapons clattering uselessly against the concrete.

Victor stepped over the bodies, standing at the foot of the stairs, his gun raised, his silhouette framed by the smoke pouring in from the alleyway outside.

"Dante, get the children into the primary SUV," Victor ordered without looking back. "Olivia, stay beside me. If anyone so much as looks at you wrong, shoot them."

He shoved a small, lightweight silver revolver into my trembling hands.

I looked at the heavy metal weapon, then at Victor’s broad back, and finally at the six terrified children looking at me for guidance.

My quiet, secret life as a tired waitress and underpaid secretary was dead.