Ambush

Ambush
Nico's POV

"Confess?" Sophia laughed bitterly. "You're here to confess?"

My father stood in the doorway with his hands still raised. His face showed no emotion. The same cold mask I'd seen my entire life.

"Everything Sophia told you is true," he said. "Twenty-five years ago, I killed five children to seal a pact between the families. I've carried that sin ever since."

The room went completely still. I felt like someone had punched all the air out of my lungs.

My father was a murderer. Not just a criminal who hurt bad people. A monster who killed innocent children.

"Why?" Dante's voice cracked. "Why would you do something like that?"

"Because I was weak," Father said. "Because I wanted power more than I wanted my soul. Because I convinced myself it was necessary."

Sophia's gun was shaking in her hand. Tears streamed down her face.

"My brother was seven years old," she said. "He trusted you. He called you Uncle Alessandro."

"I know." Father's voice finally showed something—pain. "I've seen his face in my nightmares every night for twenty-five years."

"That's not enough!" Sophia screamed. "Nightmares aren't enough! You should suffer like those children suffered!"

She raised her gun and pointed it directly at Father's heart.

"Sophia, wait!" Isabella stepped forward. "If you kill him now, the truth dies with him. The other families get away with everything."

Sophia hesitated.

"She's right," I said, finding my voice. "My father isn't the only guilty one. The Kozlovs, the Castellanos, all of them were part of this. If you want real justice, we need him alive to testify."

"Justice." Sophia spat the word like poison. "There's no justice for murdered children."

"Then let's make some," Isabella said. "The USB drive has evidence. Your father's journals prove what happened. We can expose everyone. We can burn down all five families and let the world know what they did."

Sophia stared at Isabella for a long moment. Something shifted in her eyes.

"You'd destroy your own father?" she asked again.

"He's already destroyed," Isabella said quietly. "He destroyed himself twenty-five years ago when he helped bury those children."

Sophia lowered her gun slowly.

"Fine," she said. "We do this together. We expose everyone. And then..." She looked at my father with pure hatred. "Then I decide what happens to him."

Relief flooded through me. The immediate crisis was over. Now we just had to get out of here and figure out our next move.

"Let's go," I said. "We need to get somewhere safe before the Kozlovs realize what's happening."

We moved toward the door as a group—my father in front, Sophia's remaining men around him, my brothers and Isabella behind. I stayed at the back, watching for any threat.

We were halfway down the stairs when I heard it.

The sound of breaking glass.

Then gunfire exploded from everywhere.

"Kozlovs!" I shouted, pulling my gun. "Everyone down!"

Bullets tore through the walls around us. Plaster and dust filled the air. Screams echoed through the stairwell.

I grabbed Isabella and threw her against the wall, covering her body with mine. A bullet whizzed past my ear, close enough to feel the heat.

"Stay behind me!" I yelled over the chaos.

Three men in black masks appeared at the bottom of the stairs. Kozlov soldiers. I didn't hesitate.

My first shot hit the leader in the chest. He went down hard. The second man raised his weapon, but I was faster. Two shots and he crumpled.

The third man got off a round before I could take him out. The bullet grazed my shoulder, burning like fire. I ignored the pain and put him down with a single shot to the head.

"Move!" Luca's voice came from somewhere ahead. "Get to the cars!"

I grabbed Isabella's hand and pulled her down the stairs. She was shaking so hard she could barely run, but she kept moving. Brave girl.

More gunfire behind us. I heard Dante shouting, Marco returning fire, my father's men engaging the attackers.

We burst through the front door into the night.

It was a war zone.

Black cars blocked the street. Men with automatic weapons fired from every direction. Bodies lay on the sidewalk—some Kozlov, some ours.

"The car!" I pointed to our vehicle twenty feet away. "Run!"

Isabella sprinted toward it. I covered her, firing at anyone who got too close. My shoulder screamed with every shot, blood soaking through my shirt.

A Kozlov soldier appeared right in front of Isabella. She screamed and froze.

I tackled him before he could fire. We hit the ground hard, rolling across the concrete. His gun flew from his hand. I slammed my fist into his face once, twice, three times until he stopped moving.

"Nico!" Isabella was at the car door, looking back at me with terrified eyes.

I ran to her and shoved her inside. Then I dove in after her, covering her with my body as more bullets hit the windows.

The glass held—bulletproof, thank God.

"Drive!" I shouted at our man behind the wheel.

The car lurched forward, tires screaming. We crashed through a barrier and shot down the street, leaving the chaos behind.

I stayed on top of Isabella until we were three blocks away. Then I finally rolled off and checked her for injuries.

"Are you hurt?" I asked.

She shook her head, her whole body trembling. "You're bleeding."

I looked at my shoulder. The bullet graze was worse than I thought. Blood covered my entire arm.

"I'll live," I said.

Isabella's eyes filled with tears. "You could have died. You threw yourself on top of me. You could have died."

"That's my job."

"No." She grabbed my face with both hands, forcing me to look at her. "That's not a job. That's... that's..."

She couldn't finish the sentence. But I understood what she meant.

My phone buzzed. A message from Luca.

Father captured by Kozlovs. They're taking him to the warehouse. They say they'll trade him for Isabella and the evidence.

My blood ran cold.

Another message came through.

They have something else. Something they found on Father's body when they grabbed him.

A photo loaded on my screen.

It showed a piece of paper covered in my father's handwriting. A list of names—all five children who were killed twenty-five years ago.

And at the bottom of the list, circled in red ink, was a sixth name.

A name that made my heart stop completely.

Isabella Cross.

Beneath it, in my father's handwriting: "The one who survived. Vincent hid her. She doesn't know the truth. She's one of them."

I looked up at Isabella with new horror in my eyes.

She wasn't just Vincent Cross's daughter.

She was one of the children who was supposed to die twenty-five years ago.

And my father had spent the last two decades trying to finish what he started.