Chapter 5 - The Blood of the Father
Inside the locked room, Harper crouched beside Noah’s bed, covering her ears as the rhythmic, terrifying thunder of gunfire echoed through the heavy door.
Noah stirred, his small eyelids fluttering open. He looked around the dimly lit, red-tinted room with confused, frightened eyes.
“Mama?” he whimpered, his voice raspy. “Why is it loud?”
Harper immediately smoothed his dark hair back, forcing a smile onto her face while her heart broke into a thousand pieces. “It’s okay, sweetheart. The doctors are just... fixing the air conditioner upstairs. How are you feeling?”
“My head doesn’t hurt as much,” Noah whispered. He looked toward the door as another heavy thud vibrated through the frame. “Is the dark man out there?”
Harper froze. She remembered Noah’s hallucination from the ER triage room.
“No, baby,” Harper said softly, kissing his cheek. “That wasn’t a dark man. That... that was your dad.”
Noah’s brown eyes widened slightly. “My dad? The prince from your storybooks?”
Harper swallowed down a wave of guilt. For five years, whenever Noah asked about his father, she had spun gentle fairy tales about a powerful king who lived far away, protecting a vast kingdom, unable to visit because his job was too important. She had built a heroic myth to cover up the bloody reality of Dante Valente.
“Yes,” Harper whispered. “He’s out there right now, protecting us.”
Outside, the battle had reached a bloody climax.
Dante and Matteo were pinned down near the secondary elevator bank. Moretti’s men had brought heavy firepower, shredding the drywall and glass partitions of the pediatric wing.
Dante felt a sudden, sharp heat slice across his left shoulder as a bullet grazed him, tearing through his coat and shirt. He didn't even flinch. He returned fire, taking out the shooter with a single round to the throat.
“Dante! Clear!” Matteo yelled, tossing a flashbang grenade down the narrow hall.
An blinding white flash and deafening boom detonated among the remaining attackers. Dante stepped out from cover like a shadow, finishing off the disoriented mercenaries with cold, methodical precision until the hallway was completely clear.
At the end of the corridor, the heavy doors of the central service elevator slowly slid open.
Marco Moretti stepped out.
Marco was fifty years old, thick-set, with a scar running from his left ear to his lip. He wore a heavy leather coat and carried a golden-engraved pistol. He looked around at the bodies of his hitmen littering the floor and let out a dark, raspy laugh.
“Dante,” Marco sneered, raising his pistol. “You always did fight like a dog when you were backed into a corner.”
“Marco,” Dante said calmly, stepping over a fallen body, his own weapon leveled directly at Marco’s head. “You made a fatal mistake tonight.”
“Did I?” Marco chuckled. “I came here to cut off your bloodline, Valente. You’ve been soft for five years. Thinking about your missing wife, slacking on your territories. I knew the moment you had a son, you’d become weak.”
“My son doesn’t make me weak, Marco,” Dante said, his voice dropping so low it sounded like a growl from the depths of hell itself. “He gives me a reason to ensure there is nothing left of you to bury.”
Before Marco could pull his trigger, Dante fired two rounds.
The first shot shattered Marco’s right wrist, sending his golden gun spinning onto the floor. The second shot caught him squarely in the chest.
Marco collapsed onto his knees, gasping for air, clutching his bleeding chest.
Dante walked up to him, stopping right in front of the dying mob boss. He looked down at him without a shred of pity, emotion, or regret.
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“Tell your brothers in hell,” Dante whispered, leaning down close, “that Noah Valente sends his regards.”
Dante pulled the trigger one last time.
