Chapter 9 - The Ghost's Ultimatum
The heavy thrum of twin turbine engines rattled the leaded glass windows of the grand entrance.
A sleek, unmarked black helicopter hovered fifty feet above the front courtyard, kicking up a hurricane of dead leaves and cold rain.
"That’s my extraction team, Sergeant!" Sterling laughed, taking another backward step toward the rain-swept terrace.
"Put a bullet in me, and those thirty-millimeter cannons will level this limestone mausoleum before you can blink!"
Elena stood anchored between the two men, the cold draft of the autumn storm whipping strands of hair across her eyes.
Her mind flashed to the burning sands of Erbil, the screams of Corporal Harris, and the smell of charred aluminum.
Was Carmine just another serpent in a bespoke suit?
Was her brother’s miraculous survival just a payoff from the men who had orchestrated her nightmare?
Carmine walked past the shattered crystal debris until he stood directly beside her, completely unprotected.
He reached out with his left hand, gently grasping the hot barrel of Elena’s Glock, and pulled the muzzle toward his own breast pocket.
"If you believe I had any hand in the slaughter of your men, pull the trigger right now, Elena," Carmine said, his voice entirely devoid of fear.
His dark eyes held hers with a terrifying, absolute sincerity.
"My father died three years ago because he refused to let Ironstone use our shipping lines for weapon transfers."
"Salvatore murdered him with an insulin overdose to seize the docks and sign that contract."
"The foundation equity Sterling is talking about was Salvatore’s private nest egg, hidden under my father’s forged signature."
Elena looked deep into Carmine’s eyes, searching for the telltale twitch of a manipulator.
She saw only the fierce, unyielding fury of a man who had lived his entire life surrounded by the same rot that had destroyed her own.
She pulled the gun from his chest with a sharp snap of her wrist.
"I don't shoot without verifying the target," Elena said flatly.
She pivoted smoothly on her heel, brought the Glock up in a two-handed grip, and fired a single round through the center of Vance Sterling’s right knee.
Sterling collapsed onto the marble steps with a high-pitched scream of agony, clutching his shattered joint.
"You're not getting extracted today, Colonel," Elena hissed, stepping forward and kicking his sidearm across the wet terrace into the fountain.
Through the open doorway, the helicopter angled its nose toward the house, the twin barrels of its forward chin-gun spinning into position.
"They're preparing to fire!" Carmine shouted, grabbing Elena by the waist to haul her back behind the limestone doorframe.
"Dante!" Carmine roared into his radio. "Activate the roof-mounted perimeter countermeasures!"
"Countermeasures are online, boss!" Dante’s voice crackled through the static from the basement bunker.
High above the manor's slate roof, two automated anti-aircraft missile tubes rose smoothly from the decorative stone chimneys.
Before the helicopter’s gunner could loose his thirty-millimeter payload, a surface-to-air Stinger missile ignited with an ear-shattering roar.
The white-hot rocket streaked across the fifty yards of open sky, striking the tail rotor of the unmarked gunship.
The helicopter spun violently out of control, its metal tail snapping like a dry twig in the autumn air.
It tumbled sideways into the thick forest canopy three hundred yards from the house, exploding in a massive fireball that lit the gray morning sky with brilliant orange light.
The shockwave rolled across the lawn, rattling the heavy oak doors on their hinges.
Elena stood on the terrace, watching the black smoke billow into the sky, the smell of burning jet fuel mixing with the autumn rain.
Beside her, Salvatore Duca was crawling on his elbows through the broken glass, sobbing like a terrified child.
"Carmine... Carmine, please," Salvatore begged, his bloodied face smearing across the wet marble.
"We're blood... you can't kill your own family... your father would have forgiven me..."
Carmine looked down at his uncle with eyes that were as cold and empty as an Arctic grave.
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"My father is dead because of you, Salvatore," Carmine whispered, drawing his nickel-plated pistol.
"And in this house, blood only protects those who honor it."
