Chapter 6 - SIEGE OF TOPANGA
The estate turned into a battleground in seconds.
The deafening sound of automatic gunfire cut through the roaring wind and rain. RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT! Glass shattered across the lower levels as Marco’s security team engaged the invaders in the grand marble foyer.
Elena sprinted up the stairs three at a time, her heart pounding in her throat. She burst into the children's wing.
The quadruplets were already out of their beds. Leo was holding a heavy brass lamp like a club; Sofia was holding her iPad, her face pale as she watched the internal security camera feeds; Mateo was shivering; and Valentina was sitting on her bed, clutching her violin case to her chest, her eyes wide with catatonic terror.
"Elena!" Leo cried out, dropping the lamp slightly. "They're inside!"
"I know, baby, I know!" Elena rushed forward, gathering all four of them into her arms. "Listen to me! Your father built a safe room on the third floor! We need to go right now!"
"Is Dad going to die like Mommy?!" Valentina sobbed, her small body shaking uncontrollably.
Elena grabbed Valentina by the shoulders, forcing the girl to look directly into her eyes. "No! Your father is fighting for you! But he needs us to be brave! Hold my hand! Don't let go!"
Elena grabbed the heavy master keycard Ricardo had given her for emergency access, leading the four children down the narrow, dimly lit service corridor that led to the hidden steel door behind the library bookshelf.
Below them, the house shuddered from an explosion. A grenade had detonated on the lower terrace, blowing out the soundproof windows.
As they reached the entrance of the library, a shadow stepped out from the darkness of the hallway.
It wasn't one of Ricardo’s guards.
It was a tall, skeletal man with a scarred face, wearing a tactical vest, holding a suppressed submachine gun. Mateo Cruz—Gabriel Vance’s former lieutenant.
"Well, well, well," Cruz sneered, his yellowed teeth flashing in the emergency lights as he raised the weapon. "The little Flores cubs. And their pretty new mother."
"Get behind me!" Elena yelled, stepping directly in front of the four children, shielding them with her body.
"Move, girl," Cruz spat, stepping closer. "Beatrice said there was a teacher here, but I didn't think you'd be stupid enough to stand in the way of a execution. Ricardo destroyed my family. Today, I finish his."
"Beatrice...?" Elena whispered, the terrifying truth dawning on her. "Beatrice gave you the security codes?"
"She opened the gate, sweetheart," Cruz chuckled darkly. "She wanted the estate. I wanted the blood. Now step aside, or you die first."
Behind Elena, Leo suddenly reached into his pocket. With a sharp, practiced motion, he pulled out a heavy steel marble he used for his slingshot tricks and hurled it with all his strength directly into Cruz’s right eye.
"ARGH!" Cruz shrieked, stumbling back, clutching his face as blood welled between his fingers.
"RUN!" Elena screamed.
She shoved the four kids into the library, slammed the heavy oak doors, and dragged a heavy mahogany desk across the floor, jamming it beneath the doorknob just as Cruz began firing through the wood.
THUD! THUD! THUD! Bullets splintered the thick oak, passing inches over Elena’s head as she hit the floor.
"THE SAFE ROOM! GO!" Elena ordered, crawling across the carpet toward the hidden bookshelf panel.
Sofia frantically swiped the keycard against the reader hidden behind a row of leather-bound encyclopedias. The heavy steel door hissed open, revealing a reinforced, brightly lit bunker equipped with food, water, and security monitors.
Elena shoved Leo, Mateo, Sofia, and Valentina inside.
"Elena, come in!" Valentina begged, reaching her small hand out from inside the bunker.
"I have to lock it from the outside to seal the magnetic deadbolts, sweetie," Elena said, her eyes brimming with tears as she looked at the four little faces that had become her whole world. "Stay inside. You are safe now."
"NO! ELENA!" Leo yelled.
Elena hit the internal lock button. The heavy steel blast door slid shut with a deafening CLANG, sealing the quadruplets safely inside the impenetrable vault.
Elena turned around, picking up a heavy bronze statue of a horse from the library table.
The oak library doors exploded inward, shattered to splinters. Mateo Cruz stepped through the smoke, his eye bleeding, his face twisted into an expression of demonic rage.
"You brave little bitch," Cruz growled, raising his gun directly at her chest. "Say goodbye."
Elena raised the bronze statue, her jaw set, her eyes unblinking, preparing to take the bullet.
BANG!
A single, loud gunshot echoed through the library.
Cruz’s eyes went wide. A small red hole appeared in the center of his forehead. He dropped to his knees, collapsing onto the Persian rug like a sack of stones.
Standing in the shattered doorway, covered in soot, rain, and blood, was Ricardo.
He dropped his empty gun, stepped over Cruz’s body, and sprinted across the room, pulling Elena fiercely into his arms. He held her so tight she could barely breathe, his heart hammering violently against her chest.
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"Elena... oh God, Elena," Ricardo sobbed into her hair, his massive body shaking with pure, unadulterated relief. "Are they safe? Are you safe?"
"They're in the bunker," Elena sobbed, holding onto his blood-stained shirt, burying her face in his neck. "They're safe, Ricardo. We made it."
