"So very brave." That wasn't the answer she'd expected.
"Brave?" Lark asked.
Maria nodded. "Your father wasn't always this powerful."
Lark leaned forward. "What do you mean?"
"He was dangerous." Maria's expression darkened. "But not untouchable."
Hope fluttered inside Lark's chest. "My mother fought him?"
"Every day,” Maria said. The housekeeper's eyes became distant. "She believed no one should live in fear."
"What happened?" Lark asked.
Maria was quiet for several long seconds. "She tried to leave."
Lark stopped breathing. "She tried to leave?”
"She packed your clothes." Maria smiled sadly. "You were only three."
Lark couldn't process the words. "She—she tried to take me?"
"Yes,” Maria said.
"What happened?” Lark asked.
"Someone betrayed her,” Maria whispered.
Ice settled in Lark's veins. "My father found out."
Maria nodded once. "He made sure no one ever tried to leave him again."
Lark's throat tightened painfully. "Did he—" She couldn't finish what she wanted to ask, but Maria understood anyway.
"I don't know exactly what happened,” Maria admitted as her voice broke. "But Isabella never came home." Silence swallowed the room. Lark had spent years believing her mother had abandoned her and that she had chosen freedom over her daughter. But now, she knew that everything she believed was a lie.
"Why are you telling me this?" Lark asked.
Maria looked toward the closed bedroom door. "Because your mother would never forgive me if I stayed silent."
Tears filled Lark's eyes. "I don't know what to do."
Maria reached across the small table and squeezed her hand. "Survive." The simple word carried decades of grief. "Then,” she lowered her voice to a whisper, “when the opportunity comes,run." A loud crash echoed somewhere downstairs, causing both women to jump. Voices erupted through the mansion, followed by the sound of men running through the marble hallways. Three rapid gunshots caused Lark to shoot to her feet.
"What was that?" she asked.
Maria's face drained of color. "Oh, dear God." Another gunshot thundered through the house, and another. Someone screamed, and the mansion exploded into chaos. Lark rushed toward the bedroom door, and Maria grabbed her arm.
"No!” Maria shouted.
"I have to know what's happening,” Lark insisted.
"You have to stay alive,” Maria countered. Outside the hallway, men shouted orders as furniture crashed around the mansion. Automatic gunfire erupted somewhere below, and Lark's heart pounded. This wasn't an argument. This wasn't one of her father's punishments. Someone had attacked the Santos compound, and for the first time in her life, the fortress around her prison was falling apart.
Dante
The first burst of automatic gunfire sent every instinct Dante possessed roaring to life. He was already moving before the second volley echoed through the mansion. The radio clipped to his shoulder exploded with overlapping voices.
