For fourteen days, Chicago’s most feared mafia boss watched helplessly as his premature son screamed whenever anyone touched him. Doctors tried everything.

The radio hissed with static.

Marcus gripped the microphone so hard I thought the plastic would shatter. He didn’t reply. He just cut the channel.

“Drive,” Marcus barked to his man behind the wheel. “Get us to the dry dock.”

“We’re walking into a trap,” Michael rasped from the floor, clutching the thick gauze I had packed into his side. “She has high ground there. Snipers.”

“I know,” Marcus said grimly. He started loading a heavy rifle. “But she has Daniel.”

I finished taping Michael’s bandage. My hands were stained with my brother’s blood. I looked over at Leo. The baby was awake now, staring up at the metal ceiling with wide, dark eyes. He wasn’t crying. It was as if he knew the gravity of the moment.

“I’m going out there,” I said.

Marcus stopped loading his magazine. He looked at me like I was insane. “You are staying in this truck, Jenkins. My job is to protect the heir.”

“She wants the baby and the empire,” I said, my voice steadier than I felt. “If you go out there guns blazing, she’ll execute Daniel instantly. You need a distraction. I’m the distraction.”

“Rachel, no,” Michael gasped, trying to sit up. I pushed him gently back down.

“Michael, she killed Camille,” I said, looking my brother in the eyes. “She used you. She tried to kill Leo. If Daniel dies, there is no one left to protect us. She will hunt us for the rest of our lives.”

I turned to Marcus. “Do you have a bulletproof vest that fits me?”

Marcus stared at me for three long seconds. Then, a grim smile touched his scarred face. “Daniel picked a hell of a nurse.”

He tossed me a lightweight Kevlar vest. I strapped it over my scrubs.

“Here is the play,” Marcus said, outlining the layout on a digital screen. “The dry dock is a concrete basin. She’ll be standing at the edge, holding Daniel, so we can see him. Her snipers will be on the rusted cranes above. You walk out holding a bundle in the baby blanket. Make her think you brought the kid.”

“And Leo?” I asked.

“Stays in the truck with your brother and two of my men. The truck will be locked down. Impervious to small arms fire.”

I took a deep breath and grabbed the blue baby blanket. I bundled up a couple of heavy trauma kits inside it, shaping it to look exactly like a sleeping infant.

The truck rumbled to a halt. We had arrived.

Marcus tapped his earpiece. “Snipers in position?”

“Copy. We have eyes on the cranes. Waiting for your signal.”

“Let’s go,” Marcus said.

The heavy back doors swung open. The cold Chicago wind hit me instantly, smelling of river water and rust.

I stepped out onto the cracked concrete, holding the bundle tight to my chest. Marcus walked three paces behind me, his rifle lowered but ready.

The dry dock was massive, a hollowed-out concrete canyon meant for repairing freighters.

Standing at the edge of the drop-off, illuminated by harsh work lights, was Elena.

Kneeling on the concrete beside her, bleeding heavily from his shoulder and leg, was Daniel. His hands were zip-tied behind his back. He looked battered, exhausted, but his eyes locked onto me the second I stepped out of the shadows.

When he saw the blue blanket in my arms, true terror flashed across his face.

“Rachel, no!” Daniel yelled, struggling against his ties. “Take him back!”

Elena kicked Daniel hard in the ribs. He groaned, collapsing onto his side.

“Shut up,” Elena snapped. She smiled at me. “I knew you were smart, Rachel. You brought the prize.”

“I want Daniel released first,” I shouted over the wind.

Elena laughed. “That’s not how negotiations work, sweetheart. Bring the child to me. Then Marcus can carry his boss home.”

I took a step forward.

“Stop right there,” Elena warned, raising her pistol. She pointed it directly at Daniel’s head. “Set the baby on the ground and walk away.”

I stopped. I looked at Daniel. Despite the blood and the pain, he was shaking his head frantically.

“I said set him down!” Elena screamed, her composure finally cracking.

I slowly bent my knees. I placed the blue bundle carefully on the wet concrete.

“Now back away,” Elena ordered.

I took three steps back.

Elena’s eyes gleamed with victory. She stepped away from Daniel, lowering her gun slightly as she walked toward the bundle. She reached down to pull back the fabric.

“Take the shot,” Marcus whispered into his radio.

Two suppressed cracks echoed through the shipyard.

Up on the cranes, Elena’s two snipers dropped instantly.

Elena froze, realizing she had been flanked. She ripped the blanket back.

Seeing the trauma kits instead of the baby, her face contorted in absolute fury.

“You bitch!” she screamed, raising her gun toward me.

But Daniel wasn’t waiting.

Using the distraction, Daniel had pushed himself up. Despite his tied hands and bleeding leg, he lunged forward, throwing his entire body weight against Elena’s knees.

Elena lost her balance, firing a wild shot into the air, and stumbled backward.

Backward, right over the edge of the concrete basin.

She screamed, a terrifying sound that was cut short by a sickening crunch thirty feet below in the empty dry dock.

Silence rushed back into the shipyard.

I ran to Daniel, dropping to my knees beside him. I pulled bandage scissors from my pocket and cut the heavy plastic zip-ties off his wrists.

He didn’t check his wounds. He grabbed my shoulders, his eyes searching mine frantically.

“Where is he? Where is Leo?”

“He’s safe,” I promised, tears finally spilling hot down my face. “He’s in the truck with Michael. He’s safe.”

Daniel let out a broken sob, pulling me against his chest. We knelt there in the rain, surrounded by blood and the echoes of violence, holding onto each other like a lifeline.

Then, Marcus stepped up beside us. His face was pale.

“Daniel,” Marcus said, his voice tight.

Daniel looked up. “Is it over?”

Marcus shook his head slowly. He pointed toward the heavy tactical truck parked fifty yards away.

The back doors were wide open.

And standing in the doorway, holding a gun to my brother’s head, was the head of Daniel’s hospital security detail.