Chapter 5 - Blood on the Snow
The explosion didn't destroy the estate.
It destroyed the road behind them.
Adrian pulled Maya away from the window as a shock wave rattled the nursery shelves. Nicholas hit the floor. Glass burst inward, and a porcelain horse shattered against the wall.
Grant's voice erupted through Adrian's earpiece.
“South entrance compromised! We have armed men at the perimeter!”
Adrian grabbed Maya's hand.
“Can you walk?”
“Yes.”
“Then stay beside me.”
They moved through the nursery's rear door into a narrow passage built into the original stonework. Nicholas followed, clutching his injured arm. Behind them, gunfire cracked through the corridor.
Maya stumbled on the uneven floor.
Adrian caught her.
“I'm fine,” she insisted.
“I'm not asking you to be fine. I'm asking you to tell me if you're hurt.”
The difference stopped her for half a second.
Then another contraction tightened across her abdomen.
She gripped his arm.
Adrian went pale.
“That's it. We're getting you out.”
“Don't you dare panic.”
“I'm not panicking.”
“You look like you're about to shoot the entire building.”
“Only the people shooting at us.”
Despite everything, a breathless laugh escaped her.
It was the first time she'd laughed with him in months.
The sound seemed to strike him harder than the gunfire.
They reached an underground storage room where Grant had assembled two guards. A service tunnel led toward the old carriage house, where an armored SUV waited.
Before they could leave, Nicholas seized Adrian's sleeve.
“We can't go to the hospital.”
“My wife is eight months pregnant.”
“And someone just bombed the estate after learning she had the key. They'll be waiting at every place they know you might take her.”
Adrian looked at Maya.
She was pale, sweating, and trying not to show how frightened she was.
“I'm not giving birth in a bunker,” she said.
“No one is asking you to.”
“Good. Because I refuse to have my daughter enter this world surrounded by armed men and your family secrets.”
Adrian's expression softened.
“Then we'll find a way to get you somewhere safe.”
Grant interrupted. “We have an alternative. A maternity clinic outside the city. Private staff, independent security, no connection to the Cole organization.”
“Who runs it?” Maya asked.
“Dr. Brooks has privileges there.”
She nodded. “Then that's where we're going.”
Adrian didn't argue.
They drove through the snow in a convoy of three vehicles. Halfway to the clinic, the lead vehicle swerved, its rear tire shredded by gunfire from an unseen shooter.
Grant ordered everyone to stop.
Adrian drew his weapon.
Maya heard a second burst of shots, then the crash of metal as the rear vehicle collided with a roadside barrier.
“Get down!” Adrian shouted.
He covered Maya with his body as bullets struck the SUV's armored doors.
For several terrifying seconds, she could hear nothing but the pounding of her own heart.
Then Grant shouted, “They're withdrawing!”
Adrian raised his head.
“Why?”
Grant looked toward the road.
“Because someone just hit their position.”
A black sedan emerged from the snowfall. It stopped twenty yards away.
The rear door opened.
An elderly woman stepped onto the road.
She wore a dark wool coat and leaned on a silver-handled cane. Her hair was white, her face lined, and her eyes fixed on Adrian.
He stood frozen.
“Mom?”
The woman looked at him with unbearable sadness.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
Adrian took one step forward.
Then another.
Maya had never seen him hesitate like that. He looked as though he wanted to run to Eleanor and strike her for abandoning him in the same breath.
“Where have you been?” he demanded.
“Alive.”
“That's not an answer.”
“No,” Eleanor said. “It's the one I was able to give you.”
Adrian's eyes shone.
“You let me bury an empty coffin.”
“I know.”
“You let me believe you were dead.”
“I know.”
“You let me spend twelve years thinking I failed to save you.”
Eleanor's face crumpled.
“I thought you would be safer hating the dead than searching for the living.”
Adrian laughed once, bitterly.
“You don't get to decide what grief I can survive.”
“No,” she whispered. “I don't.”
Maya stepped out of the SUV, one hand supporting her stomach.
Eleanor looked at her.
Then her expression changed.
“You're carrying the next generation of this family.”
“I'm carrying my daughter,” Maya replied. “And I need you to understand something. Whatever happened between you and your son, you don't get to use this baby to repair it.”
Eleanor lowered her head.
“You're right.”
The simple admission unsettled Maya more than a denial would have.
A distant siren rose through the snow.
Grant approached. “We have to move.”
Eleanor nodded toward her sedan.
“Come with me. I have the records, the recordings, and the proof of who ordered the attack.”
Adrian studied his mother.
“Why should I trust you?”
“Because I know who shot at your office. I know who poisoned your father. And I know why they waited until Maya was pregnant to make their move.”
Her gaze dropped to Maya's stomach.
“They aren't trying to destroy your marriage, Adrian.”
She paused.
“They're trying to make sure your daughter never learns what her mother inherited.”
Maya stared at her.
“I didn't inherit anything.”
Eleanor reached into her coat and produced a folded document.
The signature at the bottom belonged to Maya's late father.
A man she had believed died owing money to a collection of private lenders.
Across the top, in bold letters, were the words:
BENEFICIAL OWNER: BENNETT FAMILY TRUST.
Maya looked up.
“What is this?”
Eleanor's voice trembled.
May you like
“Your father didn't die in debt, darling.”
“He died trying to hide a fortune from the people who murdered him.”
