He Came Home Early and Found a Pet Collar Around His 6-Year-Old Son’s Neck. His New Wife Called It “Discipline”—Until Her Own Mother’s Phone Revealed What They Had Planned Before the Party Even Began. / Chapter 47 / 80

Chapter 47 - Glass Shards and Broken Vows

Ravenswood Manor rose from the dense pine forest like an iron-and-stone fortress. Constructed in the late nineteenth century by the Vance mining barons, it was surrounded by razor-wire fences, motion-sensing floodlights, and a reinforced gate.

Daniel didn't bother looking for an open door.

He drove the armored SUV straight through the wrought-iron gates at eighty miles per hour. The heavy steel crumpled under the vehicle's reinforced bull-bar with a deafening screech of rending metal. The SUV plowed across the gravel courtyard, smashing through the front entryway’s grand oak doors, shower of splintered timber and shattered stained glass exploding into the grand foyer.

Alarms blared, red emergency strobes bathing the marble hall in blood-colored light.

Daniel killed the engine. He reached into the backseat, unclipping Mason. "Stay low on the floorboard of the truck. If anyone comes near this door who isn't me, pull this pin." He placed a smoke grenade into the boy’s hands. "Understood?"

Mason nodded, clutching the grenade with both hands. "I’m not afraid, Daddy."

Daniel racked the slide of his combat shotgun. "I know you're not."

Daniel kicked open the driver's side door and stepped into the foyer. Two security guards appeared on the mezzanine above, firing automatic rifles. Marble chips flew from the pillars as Daniel rolled behind a heavy stone fountain. He returned fire—three thunderous blasts from the twelve-gauge—shredding the wooden balustrade and sending both guards tumbling down to the marble floor below.

A heavy boot slammed into Daniel’s ribs from the side, knocking the breath from his lungs.

Marcus.

The mercenary leader tackled Daniel into the grand staircase, his combat knife flashing in the strobe light. The blade carved a deep trench across Daniel’s shoulder before Daniel caught Marcus's wrist in a vise-like grip.

"You should have stayed in the river, Vance!" Marcus snarled, spitting blood onto Daniel’s face as they rolled down the stairs, crashing through a mahogany display cabinet. Glass rained around them in razor-sharp cascades.

"I’m not a Vance," Daniel growled through gritted teeth, driving his knee into Marcus’s groin with devastating force.

Marcus gasped, his grip loosening. Daniel seized the mercenary’s head, smashing it violently against the edge of the stone hearth once, twice, three times, until Marcus slumped limp against the fireplace, blood pooling on the cold hearth.

Daniel stood, his chest heaving, his body battered and bleeding from a dozen cuts.

Then, from the floor beneath him, through the brass ventilation grates, the mechanical voice drifted up once more.