636 Victor Moretti was seconds away from ordering his men to throw my sick baby and me out into the freezing snow when he noticed the silver locket around her neck—but when he saw the symbol engraved on its back and heard my mother’s name, the most feared man in New York suddenly looked terrified.

My heart dropped into an abyss.

I didn't think; I moved. I bolted out of the library, sprinting down the long corridor toward the medical wing, Victor right behind me, his gun drawn.

"LILY!" I screamed, slamming open the doors to the pediatric suite.

The room was in total chaos. Medical equipment was overturned, monitors beeped frantically with warning codes, and two nurses were collapsed on the floor, unconscious.

The crib was empty.

"NO! NO! LILY!" I shrieked, throwing myself over the white plastic mattress, clutching her pink fleece blanket to my face. "LILY!"

Victor rushed into the room, his eyes scanning the shattered space with terrifying speed. He knelt beside one of the collapsed nurses, checking her pulse.

"Sedative gas," Victor growled, standing up. "They pumped airborne narcotics through the ventilation system."

He kicked open the private bathroom door. The glass window leading out to the rear garden was smashed outward. Fresh boot prints led through the snow toward the rear gate.

"Nina!" Victor bellowed into his comms. "Lock down the perimeter! Nobody leaves the property! Search every vehicle!"

I fell to my knees on the cold tile floor, clutching Lily’s blanket, tears streaming down my face in a violent torrent.

"Sofia..." I sobbed, my voice choked with unbearable grief. "It was Sofia! She distracted us in the library while her men snuck through the medical wing!"

Victor walked over to me, kneeling down and grabbing my shoulders firmly.

"Listen to me, Hannah!" Victor commanded, forcing me to look at him. "They didn't kill her. If they wanted her dead, they would have left her in the crib. They took her alive because they need the locket—and they need you to unlock the ledger!"

I wiped my face frantically, grabbing Victor’s lapels. "Then take me to them! Take the locket! Take the money! Take everything! Just give me my baby back!"

"I will get her back," Victor promised, his voice so dark, so cold, it sounded like a promise from Death itself. "I swear to you on my soul, Hannah. I will bring Lily back to your arms before this night ends."

Marco sprinted into the room, holding a tablet. "Boss! We tracked the vehicle! It's a medical transport van heading toward the old iron foundry in Newark! Sofia's personal security detail is escorting it!"

Victor stood up, pulling a tactical vest over his black sweater and checking his ammunition clips with terrifying speed.

"Marco, mobilize the entire Brooklyn division," Victor ordered, his eyes glowing with an unholy fire. "Every soldier, every associate, every weapon we have. We aren't conducting a tactical strike."

He chambered a round into his rifle with a loud, metallic CLACK.

"We are going to burn that foundry to the ground."

"Victor!" I shouted, scrambling to my feet. "I'm coming with you!"

Victor stopped, turning to look at me. "Hannah, it's a war zone. It's too dangerous—"

"She is MY daughter!" I screamed, stepping right up to his chest, all fear leaving my body, replaced by the fierce, terrifying instinct of a mother fighting for her child. "My mother died protecting me! I will NOT sit in this safehouse while my baby is in the hands of those monsters! If you don't take me, I will drive there myself!"

Victor stared at me for a long, silent moment. In my eyes, he saw the same fire, the same stubborn courage that Elena Rossi had possessed twenty years ago.

A faint, deadly smile touched his lips.

"Nina," Victor said, throwing a lightweight bulletproof vest to me. "Fit her with body armor. Give her a sidearm and show her how to disengage the safety."