2025-04-24 21:21:28There was an echo of gunshots through the burning warehouse.
Dino’s heart slammed against his ribs. Elena gasped, clutching her side. But no blood. Instead, one of Alejandro’s men had a bullet hole bloomed in his chest, staggered, eyes wide in shock. Then he collapsed. Dino’s gaze snapped to the entrance. A dark silhouette stood there. Sergio. Gun still raised, smoke curling from the barrel. “Elena, run!” Dino shouted. Alejandro snarled, firing twice. Dino lunged, shoving Elena out of the way. He felt the heat of the bullets whip past his ear. Too close. No time to think. The building groaned, about to collapse. As the fire roared louder, licking the ceiling. Alejandro was still blocking the exit; a second was all Dino needed. The timely distraction of Sergio had bought them that. --- Dino didn’t hesitate. He launched forward, tackling Alejandro to the ground. Fists flying. Alejandro grunted, twisting beneath him, trying to bring the gun up. Dino slammed his elbow down hard. Alejandro hissed in pain, the gun slipping from his grasp. Their eyes met—pure hatred. “Still trying to play hero, Hermano?” Alejandro sneered, blood trickling from his nose. “You are no brother of mine.” Dino grabbed him by the collar. Alejandro smirked despite the pain. “Then kill me.” For a moment, he wanted to. Dino just tightened his grip. But no. Killing Alejandro now would be too easy. Too quick. Alejandro deserved worse. Instead, Dino delivered a brutal punch, knocking him unconscious. “Elena, now!” She was already moving, dodging falling debris as the warehouse collapsed around them. Sergio covered them, firing at the last of Alejandro’s men. Alejandro’s unconscious body was thrown aside by Dino before he ran. The flames surged. A final warning. When they were outside. Just behind them the warehouse crumbled into fire and ruin. The car screeched down the road, speeding away from the inferno. Dino could see Elena in the back, trembling, her hands clenched in her lap, knuckles white. “Are you hurt?” he asked. She shook her head. “No. But… he knows, Dino.” Dino’s jaw tightened. “About your mother.” She nodded, eyes dark. Sergio glanced at them from the driver’s seat. “We need to move carefully. Alejandro won’t stop.” No, he wouldn’t. Dino exhaled, staring at the city lights ahead. And neither would they. --- Dino’s phone buzzed. A blocked number. Frowning, he answered. “Who is this?” A familiar voice, low and husky. “Kid.” Dino stiffened. Capello. Elena’s father. “Where are you, Capello?” His next words sent an ice-cold shiver down Dino’s spine. “We need to talk. It’s about your mother.” Elena shifted beside him, her gaze heavy with worry. “Dino… what does he mean?” Dino’s grip tightened around his phone. Capello’s voice had been strained, urgent. Whatever he had to say wasn’t just a warning—it was a revelation. Sergio kept his eyes on the road, his tone steady. “Where is he?” “Didn’t say,” Dino muttered. He replayed Capello’s words in his mind, searching for hidden meaning. “But he wouldn’t call unless it was important.” Elena swallowed hard. “Then we find him.” Dino met her gaze, nodding. They had been running, fighting, surviving—but this? This was different. This was the truth they had been denied. And it was time to uncover it.
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Chapter 140
The rain had slowed by dawn, but the chill lingered. The warehouse in Milan was quieter now, but inside its steel walls, the tension had never been louder.Riva lay on a medical cot, her breathing shallow but stable. A white bandage wrapped tightly around her thigh, stained with faint pink. Tomiwa stood guard at the door, rifle slung casually over his shoulder, eyes alert for any sign of The Crows.Dino stood by the window, staring out at the grey morning light. His fists clenched as he replayed Riva’s warning over and over again in his mind. The Crows.Paula approached silently. "She’ll recover. She said they tracked her from Zurich. They're ghosts. She barely got out."Dino nodded. "Sanchez planned this in layers. Mirador, Navaro... and now a third unit completely off-grid. This wasn’t just legacy preservation. He wanted scorched earth if he ever went down."Paula looked over her shoulder, then lowered her voice. "Alejandro’s been... distant. Since yesterday. He hasn’t said a word t
Chapter 139
The warehouse in Milan reeked of oil, gunmetal, and burnt rubber. Rain drummed against the corrugated roof in a steady rhythm, each drop a drumbeat to the gathering storm.Dino paced in the shadows, his jaw tight, the weight of their victories doing little to ease the tension clawing at his nerves. Zurich had been a win—but it was only a scratch on the surface. Mirador was in custody, but his silence thus far was a louder scream than any confession.Sergio stood by the makeshift monitor wall, watching a live feed from the G-8 security compound where Mirador was being held. “Still nothing. Not a damn word.”“He knows his fate,” Paula muttered, crossing her arms. “If he speaks, he dies by the hands of Sanchez’s loyalists. If he stays quiet, he’ll rot.”Tomiwa walked in then, soaked to the bone but with fire in his eyes. “Intercepted chatter. A coded message was left outside the Zurich site. It’s from Sanchez. He’s trying to reach someone.”Dino’s gaze snapped to him. “Who?”Tomiwa tosse
Chapter 138
The storm hit Genoa that night. Rain lashed at the windows of Dino’s high-rise office, now serving as the nerve center of their alliance. Lightning split the sky in violent forks, illuminating the tension that never truly left the room.Dino stood before the massive glass pane, the city below flickering with half-dimmed lights and panic. News of the vault explosions had sent shockwaves across Europe, and while the world tried to make sense of the attacks, Dino was several steps ahead. He had to be. Especially now that Sanchez was no longer a shadowy cartel figure pulling strings—he was caged. But dangerous still."He won’t stay quiet," Tomiwa muttered, tossing a newly intercepted message on the table. It was written in code, but the threat was loud and clear. Capello and Elena. They were targets.Sergio, seated at the corner of the room with a pistol on the table before him, let out a low whistle. "Man’s in prison, and he's still swinging blades. This guy is relentless.""And smart,"
Chapter 137
The soft hum of fluorescent lights buzzed in the concrete bowels of the high-security prison outside Palermo. Inside a heavily guarded wing, Sanchez sat behind reinforced glass, his face older but no less venomous. His once-expensive suit was replaced with an orange jumpsuit, but his eyes burned with undiminished rage.Two guards flanked the security post while a prison psychologist observed him from the other side of the partition. He barely blinked."I want to send a message," Sanchez said coolly.The psychologist raised an eyebrow. "This isn’t a press room."Sanchez leaned forward, revealing a stitched scar on his temple, a reminder of his violent capture. "Then write this down. Tell Capello... and Elena. The walls of this cage won't last forever. And when I get out, I’ll bury them both."The guards stepped in, but Sanchez didn’t resist. As they dragged him back into his cell, he laughed—low and venomous."Time doesn’t heal debts. It just fattens them."---Milan – Rooftop Safehous
Chapter 136
The dawn was bleak over Milan, casting long shadows across the shattered skyline. The fallout from the strikes against Mirador had left a void — and in that silence, new threats were already clawing to the surface.Dino stood in the armory, his fingers brushing over the cold steel of a modified pistol. The vault explosions, the fall of Vexler, and the disruption of Mirador’s European backbone — it was everything they had fought for. But there was no triumph in his eyes. Not yet.Sergio approached, his face smeared with soot and cuts. “The final reports are in. Vexler’s entire chain collapsed. Offshore accounts frozen, the Lisbon office burnt out, and the rest — scattered. We should be celebrating.”Dino looked up slowly. “We took out the snake’s head. But the body is still thrashing.”Alejandro strode into the room, black gloves in one hand, the other holding a blood-stained dossier. He hadn’t said much since the strike in Madrid. Something had changed. The Alejandro who had stood bes
Chapter 135
The Swiss Alps stood like eternal sentinels under a gray sky, their peaks sheathed in white silence. Somewhere beneath them, the Genesis facility awaited.Sergio tightened his gloves and adjusted the scope on his rifle. He crouched behind a snow-covered ridge, eyes fixed on the distant structure nestled into the mountain face. The facility wasn’t marked on any map. No lights. No footprints. Just shadows.Beside him, Tomiwa checked the schematics again. “Thermal says two heat signatures inside. Small security. This is more a tomb than a lab.”Sergio nodded. “Still. Whatever Vexler left behind, it was worth hiding this deep.”Tomiwa shifted his gaze toward the other ridge, where Alejandro stood alone, silent, staring down at the complex below. The wind howled around him, but he didn’t flinch. He looked like a ghost—or worse, a man reborn.“He’s different,” Tomiwa muttered.Sergio glanced up. “Back to his old self.”“More like... what he was trying not to be.”---Back at the temporary b
