Chapter 5 - The Price of Survival
The silence that followed was more deafening than the gunshots that had shattered the lobby.
Vincent didn't move. He didn't speak. He stared at Lily, his gaze dropping to her small, pale neck, the faint blue veins visible beneath her translucent skin, the slight lethargy that I had learned to recognize as the creeping exhaustion of her failing system.
Everything clicked into place in his mind.
Why I had risked coming back to the city I fled. Why I had accepted the risk of running into him. Why a proud, independent woman who had severed all ties had walked straight back into the lion’s territory.
I hadn't returned for nostalgia. I hadn't returned for money.
I had returned to beg for my daughter’s life.
“How long?” Vincent whispered. The absolute authority that usually surrounded him had vanished, replaced by an agonizing, hollow terror. “How long does she have?”
“Without a full bone marrow transplant?” I wiped a tear from my jaw, my voice shaking. “Four months. Maybe five. Her white blood cell count dropped another eight percent last week. The specialists at Northwestern Children’s Hospital agreed to review her case, but they need an exact, high-match familial donor to even schedule the prep chemotherapy.”
Vincent stepped forward. He didn't ask for permission this time. He reached out with both hands and gently, reverently took Lily from my arms.
To my shock, Lily didn't scream. She didn't pull away. She leaned her small, tired head against his broad shoulder, her little fingers tangling in the lapel of his tailored suit, finding some primal, instinctive comfort in the steady beat of his heart.
Vincent held her against his chest as if she were made of spun glass, his large hand supporting her back with an effortless, protective strength.
“Take whatever they need,” Vincent said, looking at me with a fierce, absolute determination that brooked no argument. “Take my marrow. Take my blood. Take my organs if she needs them. Call the hospital right now. We go under tonight.”
“It’s not that simple, Vincent!” I cried out, my hands trembling. “The protocol requires two weeks of genetic sequencing and screening! And look what just happened out there! We can’t just walk into a civilian hospital on Michigan Avenue! The Tarasovs shot up the Drake Hotel in broad daylight! If they find out Lily is admitted to Northwestern, they’ll bomb the pediatric wing just to spite you!”
The harsh, brutal reality of his world slammed down on us once again.
Vincent looked down at the child sleeping against his chest, his expression hardening into an icy resolve that terrified me.
“Then we don't go to Northwestern,” Vincent said coldly.
“What do you mean?”
“My family owns a private surgical facility outside Geneva, Illinois,” Vincent said, turning toward the heavy steel fire door that led down to the freight dock. “It was built for our capos during the faction wars. It has clean rooms, state-of-the-art hematology labs, and armed guards on every floor. The best hematologists in the Midwest are already on my payroll. They will perform the sequencing there. In total isolation.”
I shook my head violently. “No. No! That’s an illegal mob clinic, Vincent! I am not handing my daughter over to your underground butchers!”
“They are board-certified surgeons who owe their lives to me, Claire!” he snarled, stepping close, his eyes blazing with a terrifying intensity. “Out here, she is a target. In that facility, she is behind three inches of reinforced steel and fifty loyal men. You wanted my marrow? You have it. But you take it on my terms, in a place where I can keep her breathing long enough for the transplant to work!”
My heart hammered against my ribs. I was trapped.
To save my daughter, I had to place her directly into the jaws of the mafia empire I had spent five years running from. I had to trust the man who had lied to me, broken my heart, and whose very presence had just brought an assassination squad through a hotel lobby.
Before I could answer, the fire door at the bottom of the stairwell burst open.
Vincent had his gun unholstered and raised in half a second, his body angling to shield Lily completely behind his back.
“Hold your fire, Boss! It’s me!”
It was Sal—Vincent’s underboss, an older, scarred man with silver hair who had served the Moretti family since Vincent’s father ran the streets. He paused at the bottom of the stairs, breathing heavily, his suit spattered with rain.
“The Suburban is waiting at the bay,” Sal said quickly, his eyes widening in shock as he noticed Lily in Vincent’s arms, then darting to me. “Jesus, Claire… it’s really you.”
“Save the pleasantries, Sal,” Vincent snapped. “Is the route clear?”
Sal hesitated.
That single second of hesitation made the hair on my arms stand up. In the underworld, hesitation was always a prelude to betrayal.
“Sal,” Vincent growled, his voice laced with a lethal threat. “What aren't you telling me?”
Sal wiped rain from his brow, his jaw tight.
“The Tarasov hit squad in the lobby,” Sal said, his voice dropping into a tense, uneasy murmur. “One of the shooters survived the sweep. We put him in a service van and broke two of his fingers before he talked.”
“And?” Vincent demanded.
“He didn't get the tip from Portland, Boss,” Sal said, looking directly at me with eyes full of suspicion. “The Tarasovs didn't track Claire from Oregon. They didn't know she had a kid until two hours ago.”
My breath caught in my throat. “What are you saying?”
“The shooter said they got an anonymous call this morning,” Sal said, each word landing like a detonation in the narrow stairwell. “A high-priority leak from inside our own inner circle. Someone called Nikolai Tarasov directly and told him that Claire Bennett had landed at O’Hare with Vincent Moretti’s secret heir—and gave them our exact convoy coordinates for the Drake.”
Vincent froze.
The cold, calculating rage that settled over his face was more terrifying than anything I had ever seen from him.
A mole.
Someone in Vincent’s highest council had known about Lily before Vincent even did. Someone had tracked my return, watched me land, and deliberately called in a rival mafia hit squad to execute my four-year-old daughter before she could ever reach safety.
Vincent looked down at Lily, who was breathing softly against his neck, completely unaware that a death sentence had been signed on her head from inside her own father’s house.
May you like
Then, he looked up at me.
“Get in the car, Claire,” Vincent said, his voice terrifyingly calm, carrying a deadly promise of retribution. “Because before I give our daughter my marrow, I’m going to find out who in my family wants her dead.”
