Chapter 8 - Blood on the Snow
The freezing alpine storm whipped through the shattered glass conservatory on the ground floor as the mercenary strike team breached the perimeter.
Sixteen tactical operators in white arctic camouflage swarmed across the flagstone terrace, their suppressed automatic weapons sweeping the darkness.
The lead mercenary commander, a notorious French syndicate enforcer named Lucian Moreau, gestured his men toward the grand marble staircase.
“Eliminate the security detail, secure the hard drives, and burn the pediatric wing to the foundation!” Moreau commanded through his throat mic.
Before his operatives could take three steps onto the grand staircase, I opened fire from the second-floor mezzanine with devastating, surgical precision.
The high-velocity rounds tore through the lead two mercenaries’ tactical armor, dropping them instantly onto the marble steps.
Matteo and our twelve elite private security soldiers flanked the ground floor, unleashing a devastating crossfire from behind the reinforced stone pillars.
Muzzle flashes illuminated the grand entrance hall in blinding strobes of orange and crimson fire.
Moreau dove behind an imported marble statue, firing a burst of armor-piercing rounds toward my position on the balcony.
The bullets chewed through the wooden balustrade, sending splinters of polished oak raining across the foyer.
I did not flinch; I adjusted my thermal optic, tracking Moreau’s heat signature through the stone pillar as he reloaded his weapon.
I leaned over the railing, firing three synchronized rounds through the unarmored base of the statue, shattering his left knee.
Moreau let out an agonizing roar of pain, tumbling onto the flagstones as his weapon clattered across the wet floor.
My tactical team swarmed the remaining mercenaries, neutralizing the hostile unit in less than ninety seconds of ferocious, overwhelming force.
The grand foyer fell into dead, ringing silence, broken only by the crackle of burning debris and the howling wind outside.
I descended the marble staircase with slow, rhythmic, terrifying strides, stopping directly over the bleeding mercenary commander.
I pressed the hot barrel of my rifle against the center of Moreau’s forehead, looking down into his terrified, bloodshot eyes.
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“Tell your board of directors in Geneva that their debt to the Vance family has just matured,” I whispered in a voice cold enough to freeze fire.
“And I am boarding a flight to Switzerland tomorrow morning to collect the principal in blood.”
