CHAPTER 3: The Crimson Sunrise
CHAPTER 3: The Crimson Sunrise
The trap sprung the very next night.
Vincent had purposefully leaked information through his security detail that I was being moved to a safe house in the North Shore. It was a lie, a calculated bait to force Raymond and Elena into the open.
At midnight, the power to the estate was suddenly cut. The grand chandeliers flickered out, plunging the mansion into pitch blackness.
"Stay behind me," Vincent whispered. We were in the main ballroom—the very place where our story had begun. He pulled a suppressed pistol from his waistband, his body shifting into a lethal, defensive stance.
The heavy ballroom doors creaked open. Flashlights sliced through the darkness, illuminating the silhouettes of four armed men. Behind them stepped Uncle Raymond, a cruel smile twisting his face, flanked by a nervous-looking Elena.
"Vincent!" Raymond called out into the dark. "Give up the girl, and we can negotiate your retirement. You don't have to die tonight. Just step aside. Let the Moretti family prosper under proper leadership."
"Proper leadership?" Vincent’s voice echoed from the shadows, calm and terrifying. "You mean selling out to the cartel? Poisoning your own blood because you couldn't handle being second best?"
"He’s over there! Shoot!" Elena screamed, losing her composure.
Gunfire erupted, the deafening cracks shattering the glass windows. Vincent pulled me behind a marble column, shielding my body with his own. He spun around, firing three precise shots. Three of Raymond’s mercenaries dropped to the floor, their weapons clattering against the marble.
Raymond panicked, grabbing Elena by the arm and turning to flee.
"Not this time," Vincent growled. He lunged out from behind the column, his movements lightning-fast. He tackled Raymond to the ground, knocking the older man’s gun away.
Elena pulled a small derringer from her purse, aiming it directly at Vincent’s back.
"Vincent, watch out!" I screamed.
Without thinking, I grabbed a heavy silver champagne bucket from a nearby table and flung it with all my might. It struck Elena squarely in the wrist. Her gun fired harmlessly into the ceiling, and she collapsed to her knees, clutching her broken hand and weeping in agony.
Vincent pinned Raymond to the floor, the barrel of his gun pressed firmly against his uncle's forehead. Raymond’s silver hair was disheveled, his eyes wide with the realization that he had lost completely.
"Please, Vincent," Raymond begged, his voice trembling. "We’re family."
"Family doesn't build a casket for a living man," Vincent said coldly.
He didn't pull the trigger. Instead, the lights suddenly flooded back on. The doors burst open, and dozens of heavily armed men—Vincent’s true loyalists, led by a stern-looking security chief—poured into the room, instantly detaining Raymond and Elena.
"Take them away," Vincent commanded, not even looking at his family as they were dragged out in handcuffs, their cries of protest fading down the hall. The Moretti civil war was over before it could even begin.
The ballroom fell silent again, save for the sound of our ragged breathing. The white lilies from the funeral were withered, scattered across the floor amidst broken glass and spent shell casings.
Vincent turned to me. He tucked his gun away, his gray eyes softening into something beautiful, something full of a warmth I had never seen before. He walked over to me, looking down at the cheap waitress shoes I was still wearing, then up at my face.
"You threw a champagne bucket at a mafia assassin," he said, a rare, genuine smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
"She was going to shoot you," I said, my heart still pounding, though not from fear anymore.
Vincent reached out, taking both of my hands in his. He lifted them, kissing my knuckles gently. "I told you before. You are the trouble now, Grace Holloway. You ruined my funeral, you ruined my enemies, and you completely ruined my plans to never care about anyone again."
"Is that a complaint, Mr. Moretti?" I asked, a small smile finally breaking through my exhaustion.
"It’s a confession," he murmured, pulling me close until there was no space left between us. "Chicago is mine. But I am yours. Stay with me. Not as a captive, and not as a waitress. As my queen."
Looking into his gray eyes, the same eyes that had opened from the dead to change my destiny, I knew there was only one answer.
May you like
"Try and stop me," I whispered.
He smiled, a bright, triumphant sound that echoed through the ballroom, shattering the last ghosts of the past. As the sun began to rise over Lake Michigan, casting a brilliant golden light through the broken windows, Vincent leaned down and kissed me—a promise of a new beginning, a clean slate, and a love that had literally conquered death.
