“He was already on the property for Vincent,” Dante interrupted sharply, cutting off my logic. “He was wrapping up an exam in the west wing. But getting him here, past that animal, is another story.”
Heavy, hurried footsteps echoed up the corridor from the grand staircase.
Dr. Ethan Reynolds appeared at the far end of the hall, carrying his heavy black leather medical bag with both hands. He was in his late fifties, silver-haired, with the calm, unflappable demeanor of a man who had pulled bullets out of mobsters on kitchen tables at three in the morning without ever blinking.
He had treated the Moretti family for over a decade. Even the most sadistic enforcers in the syndicate treated him with a grudging, respectful awe.
Today, however, Dr. Reynolds stopped twelve feet short of the study door.
He took one look at Titan’s towering, vibrating form, heard the low, tectonic rumble vibrating in the dog’s chest, and instantly set his medical bag down on the floor, raising both hands palms-outward in a universal gesture of surrender.
“I am not a dog tamer, Dante,” Dr. Reynolds said, his voice entirely steady, though sweat beaded on his forehead. “That animal is hopped up on pure adrenaline and protective instinct. If I walk through that doorway, he will tear my jugular out before I can pull a syringe of sedative from my bag. Somebody needs to tranquilize him.”
“We can’t,” Dante said grimly. “If we hit Titan with a dart gun while he’s in this state of hyper-agitation, the sudden spike in his heart rate could cause cardiac arrest. Mr. Moretti would kill every last one of us if his dog died because we panicked.”
“Then he’s going to die on his own floor,” the doctor replied coldly, crossing his arms, “because I’m not playing Russian roulette with a hundred-thirty-pound war dog.”
A heavy, suffocating silence fell over the hallway. The armed guards shifted uncomfortably, their hands hovering near their holsters but none of them brave enough to draw a weapon on Adrian Moretti’s most prized possession.
That was when I felt a small, warm tug at the hem of my gray cotton housekeeping skirt.
I looked down.
My blood ran completely cold.
Sophia.
She had slipped out of the linen closet, drawn by the commotion, her tiny fingers clutching a pink crayon in one hand and her spiral notebook in the other. Her big, innocent eyes peered around my skirt, looking past Dante’s bulky legs, past the terrified guards, and straight into the dark, blood-spattered study.
“Mommy,” Sophia whispered loudly, her sweet, high-pitched voice cutting through the heavy air like a silver bell. “Why is the big dog angry?”
“Sophia,” I gasped, my heart stopping as I swooped down, grabbing her under the arms and yanking her backward against my chest. “Sophia, sweetheart, don't look. Back up right now—”
It was too late.
The moment Sophia’s voice rang out down the corridor, the mechanical growl inside the study abruptly ceased.
The silence that replaced it was infinitely more terrifying.
Titan stopped trembling. His massive, blocky head snapped around, his dark, intelligent eyes locking onto the small doorway where my daughter stood half-hidden behind my apron.
Dante let out a sharp intake of breath, drawing his pistol halfway from its holster with a terrifying metallic slide. “Elena... get the child away. Now.”
Before I could drag backward, before I could scream or throw myself in front of my little girl, Sophia did something that made every single hardened criminal in the Moretti mansion stop breathing.
She let go of my skirt.
She took two steps forward, slipping right past Dante’s paralyzed arm, and walked out into the open space of the corridor.
She didn't run. She didn't cry.
She looked up at the terrifying, scarred, blood-flecked beast standing over a dying mafia boss—and she raised her small hand, waving shyly.
“Hello, puppy,” Sophia said.