Chapter 6 - The Siege of Pier 4
The rain began to pour just as our three black SUVs pulled up behind the rusted corrugated metal containers of Pier 4. The salty wind whipped off Boston Harbor, carrying the bitter taste of brine and diesel fuel.
Victor sat beside me in the back of the lead vehicle, double-checking the magazine of a heavy Sig Sauer pistol. He looked up, catching me watching him.
“You should have stayed at the estate, Dora,” he said quietly.
“I’m not hiding anymore, Victor,” I replied, my voice steady despite the adrenaline roaring in my ears. “High school taught me what happens when you hide. You get stepped on. I’m done hiding.”
Victor stared at me for a long moment, then let out a sharp breath that sounded almost like a laugh. “God help anyone who ever crosses you twice.”
The doors opened, and the tactical team fanned out into the rain like ghosts.
Pier 4 was a labyrinth of stacked shipping crates and towering crane gantries. At the far end, near a docked cargo freighter, half a dozen men stood under the harsh glare of a halogen work light. Among them stood Anthony Moretti, a short, sweating man in an expensive cashmere coat, pacing nervously while a briefcase sat open on a oil drum between them.
“Anthony!” Victor’s voice cut through the sound of the crashing waves like thunder.
The Moretti guards whipped around, reaching for their weapons, but Dante and Marcus were already positioned on the elevated catwalks above them, laser sights painting their chests in glowing red dots.
“Romano!” Anthony shrieked, stumbling backward against an oil drum. “You’re dead! You’re all dead!”
“You put a half-million-dollar bounty on a civilian, Anthony,” Victor said, walking slowly into the halo of the light, his pistol held loosely at his side. I walked a half-step behind him, my presence an unmistakable statement to everyone on that pier.
“That nobody?” Anthony screamed, pointing a trembling finger at me. “That waitress is a liability! She’s the reason you made a fool of us at the Aster!”
“She saved my life in an alley eight months ago while bleeding men like you watched from your high-rise towers,” Victor snarled, closing the distance. “She is worth ten thousand of you.”
“Kill them!” Anthony roared to his guards.
The shooting started instantly.
The world dissolved into deafening noise, flashes of orange muzzle fire, and the ping of bullets striking metal containers. Victor spun me behind the heavy steel frame of a shipping crate, returning fire with lethal, terrifying precision. Two Moretti guards dropped before they could clear their holsters.
From above, Dante and Marcus laid down suppressing fire, neutralizing the rest of the crew in seconds.
Silence fell over Pier 4 just as quickly as the violence had erupted, broken only by the hiss of rain on hot metal and the groans of the wounded.
Anthony Moretti fell to his knees in the mud, his expensive cashmere coat ruined, staring up at Victor as he walked slowly toward him.
May you like
Victor stopped inches from Anthony, pressing the barrel of his pistol gently against the man’s forehead.
“You wanted a war, Anthony?” Victor whispered, his voice carrying across the empty pier. “War is over.”
