Chapter 1: The Tomb of the Crippled King
Two years after a sniper’s hollow-point bullet shattered my lower spine and stole the use of my legs, my multimillion-dollar fortress had devolved into a suffocating tomb. I was Danny Russo, a man whose mere whispered name used to freeze the blood of half the city’s underworld. Now, I was a ghost haunting my own estate, anchored to a titanium wheelchair that felt more like a cage than a mobility device. The sprawling mansion, with its vaulted ceilings and imported marble, was entirely devoid of life. My men lowered their eyes when I entered a room, terrified that acknowledging my presence meant acknowledging my weakness. Nurses quit in tears on a weekly basis; physical therapists lasted merely days. I had become a venomous, bitter creature, violently driving away anyone who dared to look at me with an ounce of pity.
