Chapter 6 - THE ASSAULT ON THE NORTH WING
The heavy velvet curtains caught fire from the tracer rounds.
Crack-crack-crack.
Automatic rifle fire shredded the mahogany bookshelves, raining paper and wood chips over the sofa.
Gabriel reacted with the speed of an apex predator.
He swept Clare off the leather cushions with his left arm, rolling off the sofa onto the hardwood floor.
He used his broad back as a human shield, pressing her body flat against the reinforced wainscoting beneath the window sill.
A storm of lead chewed through the room twelve inches above their heads.
The antique grandfather clock imploded into splinters.
“Marcus!” Gabriel roared into his collar radio.
“They breached the perimeter fence at Sector Four!” Marcus’s voice crackled through static and deafening gunfire.
“It's not just Leo’s crew, boss!”
“Carlo Moretti brought sixty men across the river!”
“They have thermite launchers!”
“Fallback protocol Delta,” Gabriel ordered, his voice dead calm amidst the chaos.
“Seal the subterranean bunker.”
“Bring the heavy iron from the armory.”
Gabriel turned to Clare.
Her face was pale in the flickering firelight, but her eyes were wide, clear, and locked onto his.
“Can you crawl?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said without hesitation.
“Behind the desk,” Gabriel instructed.
“There is an iron floor ring beneath the Persian rug.”
“Pull it.”
He drew his Sig Sauer from his shoulder holster.
He leaned around the shattered window frame and fired four double-taps into the darkness of the garden.
Two muzzle flashes in the snowy shrubbery died instantly.
Two bodies tumbled into the frozen rose bushes.
Clare scrambled across the floor on her knees, keeping her broken arm tucked securely against her ribs.
She reached the massive mahogany desk.
She gripped the edge of the antique silk rug with her right hand and yanked it back.
A circular cast-iron hatch was set into the oak floorboards.
A heavy brass ring gleamed in the center.
Clare hooked her fingers into the ring and hauled upward with all her strength.
The rusted hinges shrieked, opening into a dark, brick-lined shaft with concrete steps descending into blackness.
“I got it!” she called out through the din of shattering glass.
A grenade arced through the broken window, bouncing off the leather sofa.
A military-grade fragmentation canister.
Its spoon popped with a sharp clack.
“DOWN!” Gabriel lunged across the four feet separating them.
He tackled Clare into the open hatchway just as the grenade detonated.
BOOM.
The shockwave tore the heavy oak door off its frame, blowing a hurricane of fire, shrapnel, and burning horsehair cushions through the study.
Gabriel and Clare tumbled down the six concrete steps, crashing onto the damp stone floor of the subterranean wine cellar.
Gabriel slammed the heavy iron hatch shut from below.
He threw the two-inch steel deadbolts into place.
The iron clanged shut like a bank vault.
Above their heads, shrapnel peppered the iron plate with dull, vibrating thuds.
Silence returned.
Damp, cold, subterranean silence.
The air smelled of aged oak casks, sulfur, and centuries-old limestone.
Emergency battery-operated LED strips clicked on along the vaulted ceiling, bathing the tunnel in low, amber light.
Clare pushed herself up against a stack of vintage Bordeaux crates.
Her cast was covered in gray plaster dust, but her arm remained stable.
Gabriel stood up, brushing burning debris from his dark wool trousers.
A thin line of blood ran down his left temple, dripping onto his white collar.
He didn't wipe it away.
He walked to the far wall where an iron gun safe was bolted to the bedrock.
He spun the mechanical dial with rapid, practiced turns.
Left thirty-two.
Right eighteen.
Left four.
The heavy steel door swung open.
Inside rested six tactical assault carbines, twelve drum magazines, and three tactical vests loaded with ceramic ballistic plates.
Gabriel pulled a lightweight Kevlar vest from the rack.
He knelt in front of Clare.
He slipped the vest over her head, carefully maneuvering the straps around her splinted arm.
He cinched the velcro tight against her ribs.
“Gabriel,” she whispered, her hand resting against his chest.
“They’re going to burn the house down.”
“Let them burn it,” Gabriel said softly.
He checked the action on a custom Daniel Defense MK18 carbine.
The bolt slammed forward with a clean, lethal metallic snap.
CLACK.
“This house is just brick and mortar, Clare.”
“You are my empire.”
He looked toward the northern tunnel that led beneath the river to the boat house.
“Carlo Moretti thinks he is walking into a trap for an injured lion.”
“He forgot that this estate was designed by my grandfather in 1948.”
Gabriel’s lips curved into a cold, wolfish grin that made the blood sing in Clare’s veins.
“The wine cellar doesn't just have an exit, Clare.”
“It has valves.”
He reached for a heavy brass wheel mounted beside the vintage port racks.
A pipeline connected directly to the estate’s private underground fuel reserves.
Three thousand gallons of industrial diesel oil stored for the winter heating generators.
“Marcus,” Gabriel spoke into his radio.
“We’re in the cellar tunnel, boss,” Marcus’s voice returned.
“The northern garden is crawling with Moretti’s vanguard.”
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“Clear the perimeter, Marcus,” Gabriel commanded.
“I’m flooding the irrigation lines.”
