Chapter 13 - The phantom in the glass
The revelation hung between them like an unexploded shell. Damian’s world, built entirely on control and ruthless logic, fractured into pieces. The deaf little girl who had just saved his empire from an internal coup carried the very blood he believed had been wiped out.
"He didn't die in that crash, did he?" Damian asked, standing up straight. The cold, calculating mafia Don took over once again, burying the shock beneath lethal focus.
"I don't know," Mara whispered, trembling. "All I knew was that after the fire in Sicily, his men stopped hunting me. I thought he was truly gone. I moved across three states, changed my name, and lived like a ghost. I took the job here because I thought the safest place on earth was inside the fortress of his greatest enemy—his own brother."
Suddenly, Lila tugged hard at Damian’s pant leg.
Damian looked down. The little girl wasn't looking at him or her mother. Her sharp eyes were fixed on the panoramic floor-to-ceiling glass wall that overlooked the manicured gardens and the private airstrip beyond.
She pointed a tiny finger toward the tree line five hundred yards away. Her small hands began to move in sharp, frantic shapes: *The red eye. It is blinking at us.*
"Down!" Damian roared.
He threw his massive body over Mara and Lila, slamming them onto the hardwood floor behind the reinforced steel desk.
A fraction of a second later, the bullet struck.
The heavy glass didn't shatter into shards—it was military-grade ballistic glass—but a spiderweb of white fractures bloomed instantly at the exact level of Damian's head. The deafening crack of a high-caliber anti-materiel rifle echoed across the estate, followed immediately by the blaring sirens of the fortress defense system.
"Red alert! All units converge on Sector Four!" Marco’s voice screamed over the compound speakers.
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Underneath Damian’s protective frame, Lila didn't make a sound. She buried her face in his neck, her tiny arms wrapping around his collar. Even in the chaos, she did not scream or panic; she simply held on to the one person who refused to let her fall.
Damian felt her tiny heartbeat racing against his chest, and an ancient, primal rage ignited in his veins.
