Chapter 5 - The Silent Alarms
The air in the Russo mansion was thick and silent. The grandfather clock in the hallway ticked rhythmically. Damian sat in the dark of his study, perfectly still in his charcoal suit, staring at the encrypted message on his phone. The photo of Lily sleeping.
He didn't panic. Panic was for prey. Damian was the apex predator of the city.
He pressed a single button under his desk. No alarms blared. No sirens wailed. Instead, every door on the second floor silently locked with heavy magnetic bolts, and the exterior floodlights completely shut off, plunging the sprawling estate into total darkness.
Upstairs, a man dressed in black tactical gear crept down the hallway toward Lily’s room. He held a syringe filled with a heavy sedative. The plan was simple: take the girl, put her in the trunk of a car, and drive her to a safe house. Use her as leverage to force Damian to sign over the empire to Julian.
The intruder reached out, turning the brass handle of Lily’s bedroom door. It was locked.
He pulled a set of lock picks from his belt. As he leaned down to insert the tension wrench, a heavy hand clamped down onto the back of his neck like a vice of solid steel.
The intruder gasped, trying to spin around and swing his weapon, but he was lifted entirely off the ground. Damian stood behind him, swallowed by the darkness of the hallway.
With effortless, brutal strength, Damian threw the man backward. The intruder crashed into a heavy oak bookshelf, the breath leaving his lungs in a violent rush. Before he could recover, Damian was on him. Damian grabbed the man by the lapels of his tactical vest and hoisted him to his feet, pinning him against the wall.
"Who sent you?" Damian whispered, his voice a terrifying, gravelly rasp in the darkness.
The intruder choked, struggling against the iron grip. "Go to hell, Russo."
Damian didn't flinch. He reached down, snatched the syringe from the floor where it had fallen, and jammed it straight into the meat of the intruder's thigh. The man’s eyes went wide with pure terror as Damian pushed the plunger down halfway.
"I'll ask once more," Damian said coldly. "And if I don't like the answer, you get the rest of this dose, and you stop breathing in two minutes."
The man’s legs immediately went weak. "Vivienne!" he choked out, gasping for air. "It was Vivienne! She paid me to take the girl so you wouldn't go to the gala tomorrow!"
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Damian dropped the man to the floor. He pulled out his phone and dialed Leo.
"Get a cleanup crew to the second floor," Damian ordered, stepping over the unconscious body. "And prepare my tuxedo. We are going to a party."
