Chapter 14 - Shattered Threshold
The front door exploded inward in a hail of splintered mahogany and shattering safety glass.
I didn't think; my combat reflexes took over before my conscious mind could even process the concussive roar. I dropped flat against the hardwood floor of the foyer, rolling behind the thick, load-bearing pillar that anchored the grand staircase. High-velocity rounds tore through the air where my chest had been a fraction of a second prior, chewing deep grooves into the antique banister and sending plumes of dry white plaster raining down from the ceiling.
"Hannah! Stay down! Under the bed, now!" I roared over the deafening cracks of suppressed automatic fire.
There was no verbal response, only another terrified sob from the master bedroom directly above me. The red laser dots that had painted the bay window were now sweeping inside, slicing through the smoke and floating dust like surgical scalpels.
Three hostiles. Professional entry team. Tight spacing, suppressed weapons, matte-black tactical gear with no insignia. These weren't local hired thugs or my mother’s terrified socialite cronies; these were black-ops contractors sent to sanitize a crime scene and leave no witnesses breathing.
I drew my standard-issue Sig Sauer P320 from its concealed holster, flicking off the safety with a practiced click. I counted the cadence of their footsteps across the shattered glass on the porch. *One, two, three.*
The first point man cleared the doorframe, weapon raised, scanning low-to-high.
I didn't give him the chance to level his muzzle. Leaning out from the base of the pillar, I fired two rounds into his center mass and a third into the pelvic triangle. The heavy Kevlar caught the chest hits, but the kinetic energy coupled with the shattered pelvis threw him violently backward onto the porch.
"Contact left!" a voice barked in guttural, filtered radio static.
Before the remaining two could adjust their firing angles, I scrambled up the first four stairs on all fours, staying beneath the sightlines of the front windows. Muzzle flashes lit up the hallway below, shredding the runner rug beneath my boots.
I reached the second-floor landing just as the master bedroom door swung open.
Hannah stood there, clutching an iron fireplace poker in shaking hands, tears carving tracks through the dust on her cheeks. Behind her, the french doors leading to the second-story balcony were wide open, curtains billowing in the frigid night wind.
"Becca!" she cried, rushing toward me.
"Get down!" I lunged forward, wrapping my body around hers and driving us both into the corner of the hallway just as a burst of 5.56 rounds tore through the balcony windows, showering us in glittering shards of glass. A fourth shooter had scaled the trellis outside.
"They're all around the house," Hannah gasped against my collar, her entire frame trembling violently. "Becca, who are they? What did Dad do?"
"They're here for the secret under the ridge," I whispered, pressing my hand against the back of her head to keep her shielded. I popped up, sighted through the bedroom doorway, and put three rounds through the silhouette climbing through the shattered balcony frame. The shooter collapsed backward over the railing with a dull, sickening thud onto the stone patio below.
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"Listen to me, Hannah," I said, locking my eyes with hers. "Our parents spent five years erasing my name and telling the world I was a rotting convict so I wouldn't inherit this ground. They knew the truth would kill them. Now we take that truth and we burn their empire to ashes. But first, we survive tonight."
Downstairs, the heavy crunch of boots over broken glass signaled reinforcements. We couldn't hold the upper floor. There was only one way out.