Chapter 5 - The Unmasking Of The Snake
“Nobody move!” Serena shrieked, her voice manic and cracked with hysteria.
Her perfect posture and aristocratic elegance had completely collapsed, revealing the feral monster underneath.
The two hundred wealthy hostages screamed and scattered toward the far edges of the hall, cowering beneath dining tables and overturned chairs.
“Serena, put the gun down,” Gabriel said, his voice terrifyingly calm as he stepped directly into her line of fire, shielding me and our three boys with his massive body.
“You don’t understand, Gabriel!” she screamed, her hands shaking violently as the pistol barrel wavered between Gabriel’s forehead and my shoulder.
“I saved you from her!”
“Claire was weak! She cried every time you came home covered in blood!”
“She didn’t understand the empire your father built, she wanted you to give up the council seat and become an ordinary civilian!”
“I was the one who belonged by your side!”
“I spent five years orchestrating every alliance, securing every harbor shipment, and cleaning up your messes!”
“And you threw me away the second these little bastards walked through the door!”
“Do not call my sons bastards,” Gabriel growled, taking a slow, calculated step toward her.
“You set Claire up with Rossi five years ago, didn’t you?”
Serena laughed, a chilling, unhinged sound that echoed against the reinforced glass windows.
“Of course I did!” she spat proudly, tears of spite running down her foundation-caked face.
“Rossi was desperate for an inside informant, so I had Dominic drug Claire’s wine at the charity luncheon.”
“Dominic carried her unconscious into Rossi’s suite, snapped twenty photographs, and carried her right back out before she even woke up!”
“Rossi didn’t even touch her, Gabriel!”
“It was all theater! Beautiful, simple theater!”
“And you bought every single piece of it because your pathetic, arrogant mafia pride couldn’t handle the thought of another man touching your wife!”
The revelation shattered the remaining pieces of Gabriel’s soul.
The realization that he had banished the only woman he had ever truly loved based on a grotesque illusion crafted by his closest confidante nearly brought him to his knees again.
Gabriel did not look at Serena; his dark, murderous gaze shifted slowly toward Dominic, who stood ten feet away.
“Dominic,” Gabriel spoke, his tone chillingly smooth.
“You served my father for twenty years.”
“You served me for ten.”
Dominic didn’t flinch.
Slowly, the veteran bodyguard raised his hands away from his weapon, his expression carved from old leather and regret.
“Her father had markers on my family’s estate in Sicily, Boss,” Dominic confessed in a flat, dead voice.
“If I didn’t help her frame Miss Claire, my sister and her children would have been burned alive inside their farmhouse.”
“I chose my blood over yours.”
“You chose wrong,” Gabriel said softly.
Serena noticed the distraction and cocked the hammer of her pistol, aiming squarely at Julian, who was trembling in my arms.
“If I cannot have the Cross empire, Gabriel, you will not have an heir to inherit it!” she screamed.
She pulled the trigger.
The gunshot exploded inside the enclosed ballroom like a cannon blast, the muzzle flash illuminating the terrified faces of New York’s elite.
In that split second, Gabriel didn’t draw his weapon.
He threw himself over my body and our three children, absorbing the impact with his own flesh.
A dull, wet thud echoed as the bullet tore through Gabriel’s left shoulder, spattering dark crimson blood across my cheek and Julian’s navy blazer.
Gabriel let out a low grunt, his massive weight collapsing forward over us, shielding all four of us beneath his muscular back.
Before Serena could chamber another round, two deafening shots rang out from behind the bar.
Dominic had drawn his service weapon with lightning speed, firing twice into Serena’s chest.
Serena gasped, her eyes widening in disbelief as she looked down at the blossoms of blood blooming across her emerald gown.
Her pistol clattered against the marble floor, and she collapsed backward into the decorative fountain, her blood turning the crystal water into a sickening shade of pink.
The ballroom fell into dead, terrifying silence once more.
Gabriel remained draped over me and our sons, his heavy breathing ragged and hot against my neck.
“Gabriel!” I cried, my old instincts overriding five years of bitterness as I pressed my trembling hands against the gaping wound in his shoulder.
His blood was warm and slick between my fingers.
He slowly lifted his head, his face pale from blood loss, but his gray-green eyes burned with a fierce, protective light that nothing could ever extinguish.
He looked down at Leo, Mateo, and Julian, who were staring at his wound with wide, frightened eyes.
“Are... are they hurt?” Gabriel gasped, coughing up a fleck of blood.
“No,” I wept, tears streaming down my face as the scent of his blood brought back all the terror of our past life.
“They are safe, Gabriel. They are safe.”
A weak, bloody smile touched his lips for the first time in five years.
“Dominic,” Gabriel wheezed, his voice fading rapidly as unconsciousness crept around the edges of his vision.
“Get Dr. Bennett... unlock the doors... prep the surgical theater for Julian...”
“And Dominic...”
“Yes, Boss?” Dominic answered, kneeling beside his bleeding master with tear-filled eyes.
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“If my sons or their mother shed another tear tonight... you die next.”
With those final words, the tyrant who ruled New York’s underworld slumped completely against my chest, his blood mingling with the fabric of my dress as the heavy steel doors finally began to unseal.
