Chapter 8 - The Ghost of the Past
Two days later, the war for the Moretti syndicate shifted from the boardrooms to the shadows.
Deep inside an abandoned shipping warehouse near the Calumet River, Marcus Reed sat before a bank of glowing computer monitors, his fingers flying across a mechanical keyboard as he tried to reroute a final multi-million-dollar wire transfer from the Moretti offshore accounts.
He had lost Clara. He had lost the nursery element. But he still had the master override codes.
"Just five more minutes," Marcus muttered to himself, sweat beading on his forehead as a security firewall beeped angrily at him.
Clack.
The sound of a heavy metal door unlatching echoed across the cavernous, empty warehouse.
Marcus froze. He reached slowly toward his holster, drawing a compact Glock, and turned his chair around to face the shadows of the loading dock.
"Who's there?" Marcus barked.
From the darkness beneath the rusted crane, a tall, broad-shouldered figure stepped into the weak circle of overhead light.
Dante Moretti walked slowly, his hands empty, his dark overcoat unbuttoned. Behind him, two armed enforcers stood blocking the only exit, flanked by Sal Mercer.
Marcus forced a thin, crooked smile. "Dante. I thought you'd be busy mourning your little maid."
"You made a mistake, Marcus," Dante said, his voice terrifyingly calm as he stopped ten feet away.
"Did I? The car bomb was clean. The girl was close. If it wasn't for that interfering surgeon you brought home, Leo would be buried beside his parents."
"That's where you're wrong," Dante said. He tilted his head slightly toward the darkness behind Marcus.
A second figure stepped out from the shadows—a tall man with silver hair and cold, calculating eyes. Everett Cross, head of the Northern Corridor Alliance, flanked by two of his own elite guards.
Marcus’s face drained of color. He gripped his pistol tighter. "Cross? What is this?"
"You stole from my freight lines six months ago to fund your little independence project, Marcus," Everett Cross said smoothly, stepping into the light. "You thought you could pit the Morettis and the Crosses against each other and pick the bones clean." Everett glanced sideways at Dante. "I told you my daughter had good instincts."
Marcus raised his Glock, aiming directly at Dante’s chest. "I'll take you both with me—"
Bang.
The gunshot didn't come from Dante.
From a catwalk twenty feet above the loading dock, a single red laser dot flickered across Marcus’s wrist.
A silenced round struck the frame of Marcus’s pistol, shattering the weapon into jagged shards of polymer and steel. Marcus screamed, dropping his bleeding hand.
On the catwalk, lowering a specialized sniper rifle, stood Vivienne Cross. She wore a dark tactical jacket, her auburn hair pulled back into a tight braid, looking down at the traitor with the cold detachment of an executioner.
Dante didn't flinch. He walked slowly forward, closing the distance until he stood inches away from the disarmed, trembling traitor.
"You broke my family, Marcus," Dante whispered.
May you like
"Dante—wait, let's talk—"
Dante didn't talk. He struck with brutal, unyielding efficiency, driving his fist into Marcus’s jaw before grabbing him by the collar and slamming him down onto the concrete floor.
