Chapter 7 - The Strike at Midnight
The study door was kicked open with violent force.
Frank Vance—Leonardo’s chief bodyguard, the man identified in the ballistic report—strode into the room holding a silenced automatic pistol. Behind him was Leonardo, wearing a dark wool coat, his hands casually tucked into his pockets, an icy, victorious smile on his face.
"Put the toy away, Massimo," Leonardo said smoothly, stepping over the threshold. "The house is secure. Your friend Marco is currently tied to a chair in the basement, and Isabella has been escorted to her quarters."
Margot shrank back against the heavy mahogany desk, her hand reaching blindly for a heavy bronze paperweight on the surface.
Massimo did not lower his gun. His finger rested lightly on the trigger, his arms extended with absolute, stone-cold stability.
"You're making a mistake, Leonardo," Massimo said quietly.
"Am I?" Leonardo chuckled, walking toward the center of the room. "I just finalized the transfer of the Swiss holding accounts. The council signed off on my total management of the estate ten minutes ago after I informed them that your medical condition had deteriorated beyond recovery."
Leonardo looked past Massimo, his cold eyes landing on Margot.
"A pity about the girl," Leonardo added smoothly. "She was quite effective. But she knows too much now, doesn't she?"
Frank Vance stepped forward, raising his silenced weapon directly toward Margot’s chest. "I'll handle her first, boss."
"No," Massimo said.
"You can't stop him from that chair, nephew," Leonardo sneered. "You're a cripple sitting on a pile of dead money."
Massimo looked Leonardo dead in the eye.
Then, without a word, Massimo stood up.
He didn't use a handrail. He didn't use his arms.
He stood upright on his own two feet, smooth, powerful, and erect, his tall frame towering over the room like a resurrected titan.
Leonardo’s mouth fell open in absolute, paralyzed horror. "What... what is this?!"
Before Frank Vance could react to the impossible sight of the mob boss standing on his feet, Massimo raised his weapon and fired two rapid shots.
THWACK. THWACK.
Frank Vance collapsed onto the Persian rug with two heavy rounds in his chest, his gun clattering uselessly across the floor.
Leonardo let out a terrified shriek and scrambled backward toward the open door, but Margot didn't freeze. She stepped forward, grabbed the heavy bronze paperweight off the desk, and hurled it with all her strength directly at Leonardo’s head.
The weight struck Leonardo sharp across the temple. He stumbled sideways with a groan, crashing heavily against the oak doorframe before sliding unconscious onto the floor.
The study fell into absolute, deafening silence, punctuated only by the smell of spent gunpowder and the crackle of the hearth fire.
Massimo stood tall near his chair, his breathing calm, his gun held steady toward the doorway as three of Marco’s loyal security guards rushed up the stairs, taking control of the hallway.
Massimo turned his head slowly, looking at Margot standing beside his desk, her chest heaving, her hair slightly disheveled, holding a heavy glass bookend in her left hand like a weapon.
"Nice throw," Massimo said, a small, genuine grin breaking across his face.
Margot looked at him—standing upright, six feet two inches of pure, solid power—and let out a shaky, breathless laugh before dropping the bookend onto the carpet.
"Your form was terrible when you stood up," she panted, wiping a strand of hair from her eyes. "You leaned too far to the left."
May you like
Massimo chuckled, lowering his weapon, and stepped forward—taking three firm, deliberate steps across the room under his own power—until he reached her side.
"Then come here," he murmured, reaching out to wrap his arm around her waist, "and hold me up."
