Chapter 21
ALESSANDRO
The next morning arrives gray and bitter, New York’s sky the color of old pewter with snow threatening in the heavy clouds.
I’ve been in countless dangerous situations over the years.
I’ve faced federal raids, rival family wars, assassination attempts that should have ended my life.
But nothing has ever felt like this—this crushing weight of knowing that the woman I love is walking into a trap designed specifically to destroy her.
Bianca moves around our hotel room with calm efficiency, checking her own equipment with the kind of methodical precision that would be reassuring if I didn’t know how much was riding on every decision we make today.
She’s wearing black tactical gear that transforms her from elegant heiress into lethal operative—fitted body armor, thigh holster, her dark hair pulled back in a severe bun that won’t interfere with her sight lines.
She looks ready for war.
“Transport leaves in fifteen minutes,” I tell her, though she already knows the timeline by heart.
“I know.” Her voice is steady, controlled. But I catch that subtle head tilt again, the slight pause as if she’s listening to something I can’t hear. “Are Matteo’s people in position?”
“All twenty-four, plus our own support team,” I respond. “We have eyes on every street between the safe house and the courthouse.” I move to the window, studying the street below for any sign of surveillance or unusual activity. “If this goes sideways, help will be thirty seconds away.”
“It’s going to go sideways,” she says with certainty that makes nerves flood my system. “The question is whether we can control how.”
At exactly 0900 hours, we take our positions in the armored convoy.
Dr. Schuyler sits between Bianca and me in the back seat of the central vehicle, her face pale with terror above the bulletproof vest the FBI insisted she wear.
She’s maybe forty, with a heart-shaped face, short brown hair and wire-rimmed glasses that keep slipping down her nose.
She’s trembling like a leaf, looking at Bianca and me with fear radiating from every pore.
“It’s going to be okay,” Bianca tells her, her voice surprisingly gentle. “We’re going to get you to the courthouse safely.”
Dr. Schuyler nods, but I can see she doesn’t believe it.
Neither do I, if I’m being honest.
The convoy consists of three black SUVs—lead vehicle with federal agents, our vehicle in the center, and a tail car with more agents and two of Matteo’s best men.
The route has been planned down to the second: seventeen minutes through downtown New York, past the old port, up through the financial district to the federal courthouse.
For the first eight minutes, everything goes according to plan.
Then the world explodes around us.
The lead vehicle disappears in a ball of flame as an IED tears through the intersection ahead of us.
Our driver—one of my most experienced men—yanks the wheel hard left, tires screaming as we fishtail around the burning wreckage, but I can already see the trap unfolding.
Dr. Schuyler shrieks.
Muzzle flashes erupt from rooftops, storefronts, parked cars.
The distinctive crack of high-powered rifles fills the air as bullets spider-web the armored glass inches from my face.
Our tail car takes a direct hit from what sounds like an RPG, spinning sideways and slamming into a concrete barrier.
“Contact left! Contact right! Contact everywhere!” I shout into my comm as I push Dr. Schuyler down below the window line. “This is a full-scale ambush!”
Through the chaos, I catch a glimpse of Bianca’s face, and what I see there chills my blood.
She’s not surprised.
She’s not even particularly concerned.
Her expression is neutral, like she’s been expecting this exact scenario.
“How many?” she asks, her voice cutting through the gunfire with unnatural calm.
“Too fucking many!” Our driver’s voice is strained as he tries to navigate through the kill zone while bullets spark off our armor. “I count at least twelve shooters, probably more!”
“Then we go through them.” Bianca’s hand moves to her weapon. “Alessandro, can you get us to the courthouse?”
“Not through this,” I grit out. “We need to break contact, find alternate routes—”
“No.” Her interruption is sharp, final. “We stick to the mission. Dr. Schuyler testifies today, or this was all for nothing.”
The commitment in her voice is absolute, but it’s also fucking insane.
We’re outnumbered at least four to one, caught in a prepared kill zone with a civilian in tow.
Any rational person would call for extraction.
But as I watch Bianca assess our situation with that unnaturally steady gaze, I realize she’s not thinking like any rational person I’ve ever known.
She’s thinking like Giuseppe DeLuca.
God help us.
“Left side building, third floor!” I call out as I spot a sniper position. “Bianca, can you—”
“I got it!” she calls, rolling down her window and returning fire with controlled bursts that force the shooter to duck for cover.
But even as she engages the enemy, I can see her lips moving slightly.
Is she praying?
Our vehicle lurches as the driver takes a hit, blood spreading across his shoulder as he struggles to maintain control.
I grab the wheel from the back seat, trying to keep us stable while Bianca continues her counter-fire, her body jerking in time with the gun.
“H–how many more blocks?” Dr. Schuyler’s voice is barely audible over the gunfire.
“Eight,” I tell her, though I have no idea how we’re going to make it that far.
That’s when I see the real scope of Dominic’s plan.
This isn’t just an ambush to kill a federal witness.
The positioning of the shooters, the timing of the attack, the presence of news cameras in strategic locations—this entire operation has been designed to create a very specific narrative.
DeLuca protection fails catastrophically.
Bianca DeLuca proves unworthy of leadership.
The witness dies in a hail of bullets while under the protection of Giuseppe’s granddaughter.
Except she’s not Giuseppe’s granddaughter. She’s Giuseppe’s daughter.
And that’s going to make all the difference.
“Change of plans,” Bianca announces, ejecting her spent magazine and slamming in a fresh one. “We’re not running from this fight.”
I stare at her, open mouthed. Has she lost her fucking mind? “Bianca, we need to—”
“We’re gonna end it.” She turns to look at me, and for a moment I see something in her eyes that makes every survival instinct I have start screaming warnings. “Trust me.”
I do, and that’s what scares me.
She flashes me a Cheshire cat grin and kicks open her door.
Horror rolls through me and I lean forward to try and snatch her.
There’s no fucking way she’s about to do what I think she’s going to do.
She can’t be that idiotic…
“Don’t you fucking dare, Bianca!” I shout.
She waggles her fingers at me. “Bye.”
And with that, she rolls out into the street, using our vehicle as cover while she advances toward the heaviest concentration of enemy fire.
“Bianca!” I scream, terror coursing through my body. I’m going to fucking kill her. If she survives this, I’m going to fucking kill her.
Instead of seeking cover and calling for backup, Bianca moves through the kill zone like she owns it.
Her shooting is precise and goddamn is it hot to see her like this.
“What a woman,” I breathe, and even Dr. Schuyler’s mouth is agape as she watches Bianca fearlessly eliminate targets.
She’s demonstrating absolute fearlessness in the face of overwhelming odds, showing every shooter in the area that she’s not just unafraid of their ambush—she’s superior to it.
I scramble out after her, trying to provide covering fire while keeping Dr. Schuyler safe, but I can barely keep up with Bianca’s advance.
She moves from position to position with perfect timing, never where the enemy expects her to be, always exactly where she needs to be to inflict maximum damage.
“Six down, six to go,” she calls back to me, her voice carrying clearly over the gunfire. “Can you get Dr. Schuyler to that doorway?”
I look where she’s pointing—a reinforced entrance to an office building that would provide good cover while we wait for backup.
It’s maybe thirty yards away through open ground covered by at least three different sniper positions.
“Have you lost your mind?” I yell. “That’s suicide!”
“Just fucking do it!” she orders as she reloads her gun.
She breaks cover again, drawing fire from all remaining positions.
I weigh my options and I really hate what I’m about to do.
“I’m going to fucking kill her,” I mutter to a startled Dr. Schuyler. “Unless Matteo kills me first.”
I seize the woman, ignoring her yelp. “Let’s go, Jane.”
I sprint across the open ground with Dr. Schuyler clutched against my side.
Bullets spark off the pavement around us, close enough that I can feel the heat, but somehow none of them find their mark.
We make it to the doorway just as Bianca’s return fire eliminates two more shooters. But as I turn to check her position, I see something that makes my heart stop.
Blood spreading across her left shoulder where a bullet has found its mark.
She’s hit.
No.
But instead of going down, she just shifts her weapon to her right hand and keeps advancing.
“Bianca!” I shout, but she doesn’t acknowledge me. She’s completely focused on the remaining targets, moving through the ambush zone like some unstoppable force of nature.
That’s when the second wave hits.
More shooters emerge from concealed positions, fresh fighters who’ve been waiting for exactly this moment.
The volume of fire doubles, then triples, turning the street into a war zone.
Pop!
A high-powered rifle round catches me in the ribs, spinning me sideways as the ceramic plate in my vest cracks but holds.
I grunt and stagger backward. “Fuck.”
Pain explodes through my chest, stealing my breath, but I force myself to keep moving.
Dr. Schuyler screams as I stumble, clutching at my side where blood is already soaking through my jacket.
I deposit Dr. Schuyler at the doorway. “Stay there,” I order before whirling around to find Bianca.
“Alessandro!” Bianca’s voice cuts through the chaos, but she’s pinned down behind an overturned car, blood streaming from her shoulder and a fresh wound along her scalp where another bullet skimmed her skull.
“Goddammit Bianca!” I yell, starting to move toward her—pain be damned—but then I pause.
I see a sniper.
Muzzle flash from a fourth-floor window, the distinctive bark of a .308 that’s been targeting our position.
The shooter adjusts his aim, the rifle swinging toward where Dr. Schuyler huddles in the doorway.
I throw myself sideways, tackling the terrified witness to the ground just as the bullet punches through the space where her head had been a split second before.
The impact drives us both into the concrete, my ribs screaming in agony as we hit.
“Stay down!” I shout, but more bullets are already incoming.
Bianca breaks from cover in a desperate sprint toward our position, her left arm hanging useless but her right hand still firing with deadly accuracy.
She drops two more shooters, but the crossfire is too intense.
A round catches her in the thigh, sending her stumbling. Another grazes her neck, painting her throat with blood.
“No!” I shout, every instinct in me screaming to go get her.
She goes down hard, grunting as she does so, but rolls behind a concrete planter that’s already being chewed apart by sustained automatic fire.
“We need to move!” she calls out, her voice weaker now but still full of fire. “The courthouse is only three blocks—”
The explosion cuts off her words.
A grenade lands ten feet away, close enough that the blast picks me up and slams me into the building wall.
My ears ring with a sound like church bells, and everything goes fuzzy around the edges.
Through the smoke and debris, I can see Bianca trying to push herself up, blood covering half her face, her tactical gear torn and smoking.
Through blurry vision, I hear Bianca scream, the not bloodied part of her face white as she stares at something just to my right.
Why is she screaming? What even happened?
I turn my head and what I see makes my heart nearly stop.
Dr. Schuyler isn’t moving.
Her body is slumped against the wall, her glasses broken and knocked away as her head hangs forward.
“No!” Bianca screams.
More figures emerge from the smoke—at least six more shooters.
They’re wearing gear that matches ours, and for a moment I wonder if they’re backup. Then I see their faces.
Calabrese soldiers. All of them.
“Targets are down!” one of them shouts. “Move in for confirmation!”
I try to reach for my weapon, but my arm won’t respond properly.
Everything hurts, and I can taste blood in my mouth.
Nearby, Bianca is attempting to reload with hands that shake from blood loss and shock.
We’re finished. We’ve lost.
And there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t protect the woman I love.
The lead shooter raises his rifle, aiming directly at Bianca’s head.
She looks up at him, her steel-blue eyes defiant even as death approaches.
“Go ahead,” she says, her voice steady even though she’s looking down the barrel of a gun. “Do it.”
“Bianca!” I try again weakly, trying to get the shooter to get me instead. I’ll do anything to ensure she stays alive, even if it means my death.
Then the world explodes again, but this time it’s coming from our side.
Matteo’s men hit the ambush from three different angles, their assault catching the Calabrese soldiers completely off guard.
The street erupts in fresh gunfire as two dozen DeLuca soldiers engage the enemy with overwhelming force.
But even as backup arrives and the battle shifts in our favor, I can see that we’re badly hurt.
Blood pools beneath Bianca’s body, and my vision keeps sliding in and out of focus as I lurch forward to press my fingers against Dr. Schuyler’s wrist.
Her pulse is weak but it’s there.
The last thing I remember before consciousness fades is Bianca’s voice, barely audible over the gunfire:
“Did we…did we get her to safety?”
Then everything goes black.