Chapter 9 - CHOOSE
Victor Hale looked like a man arriving late for dinner.
Gray coat.
No tie.
Calm smile.
“Dante.”
Dante’s gun was already drawn.
Six rifles rose.
Victor lifted one finger.
“Don’t.”
Dante looked at Salvatore.
“You brought him here.”
Salvatore’s face was tight.
“I brought a solution.”
Victor smiled.
“Your father always did enjoy that word.”
Marco stepped beside Dante despite his injured shoulder.
Leo stood behind them.
Salvatore noticed.
“Why is the boy here?”
Dante almost laughed.
“Now you care?”
“Of course I care.”
“You waited eleven minutes.”
Salvatore’s face changed.
Javier had been telling the truth.
Dante saw it.
“Eleven minutes,” Dante repeated.
Salvatore looked at Victor.
Victor said nothing.
“You knew Elena was alive,” Dante said.
Salvatore’s voice lowered.
“I was trying to stop a disaster.”
“She was dying.”
“She had information that could destroy all of us.”
“My wife was dying!”
“And I made a terrible choice!”
The room shook with his voice.
Leo flinched.
Salvatore saw it.
His anger disappeared.
“Leo—”
“Don’t talk to him,” Dante said.
Victor sighed.
“This family drama is touching, but we do have business.”
He held out a hand.
“The ledger.”
“No.”
Victor looked almost disappointed.
“Dante, I could kill everyone in this room.”
“Then why haven’t you?”
Victor’s smile faded.
Because Dante was right.
If Victor simply needed the ledger, he would have taken it.
He needed something else.
Dante understood.
“You don’t know where the copies are.”
Victor said nothing.
Dante continued.
“Elena made copies.”
Salvatore turned sharply.
Victor’s eyes narrowed.
Dante smiled.
A bluff.
But Victor didn’t know that.
“You kill me, those files go public.”
“Where?”
“Try me.”
Victor lowered his hand.
“Take the boy.”
Two men moved toward Leo.
Dante raised his weapon.
Every rifle in the room pointed at him.
“Stop,” Salvatore said.
Victor ignored him.
“I said stop.”
Victor turned.
Salvatore stepped between his grandson and the armed men.
“He’s eight.”
“He’s leverage.”
“He’s family.”
Victor smiled coldly.
“That weakness is why your generation is finished.”
Salvatore hit him.
A seventy-one-year-old man punched Victor Hale in the mouth.
For one insane second, everybody froze.
Then guns came up.
Marco tackled Leo behind the piano.
Dante fired.
The room exploded.
Glass shattered.
Men shouted.
Salvatore grabbed Victor.
Luca’s men opened fire from outside.
Dante kicked over the piano bench and dragged the ledger toward cover.
Leo crawled beside Marco.
“Uncle Marco!”
“I’m okay!”
“You’re bleeding again!”
“Yeah, I do that a lot.”
Dante fired twice.
One of Victor’s men dropped.
Another gunman rushed the side door.
Luca shot him from the porch.
Victor broke free from Salvatore and pulled a pistol.
He aimed at Dante.
Salvatore saw it.
He stepped between them.
The shot cracked.
Salvatore staggered.
Dante caught him.
“Dad.”
Salvatore looked almost surprised.
Blood spread across his shirt.
Victor backed toward the door.
Dante raised his gun.
Victor smiled.
“You shoot me, you’ll never find Javier.”
Dante hesitated.
That was enough.
Victor escaped into the rain.
Salvatore collapsed against Dante.
“Listen to me.”
“Save your breath.”
“No.”
Dante pressed a hand against the wound.
“Dad—”
“Javier took Leo before because Victor told him to.”
“I know.”
“No.”
Salvatore grabbed his son’s wrist.
“You don’t understand.”
His eyes moved toward Leo.
“He wasn’t trying to trade the boy for the recorder.”
Dante stared.
“What?”
May you like
Salvatore coughed.
“He was supposed to kill him.”
