Chapter 6 - The Council of Wolves
The central gallery beneath the Grand Central Terminal warehouse was built like an underground bunker for kings who operated outside the law.
Sixty feet below the street level, beneath three layers of reinforced concrete and old rail lines, the air was warm, filtered, and heavy with the scent of aged whiskey, hand-rolled tobacco, and expensive wool. A massive, U-shaped mahogany table dominated the center of the hall, illuminated by recessed spotlights that cast sharp, dramatic shadows across the faces of thirty men.
These were the seven families of the Chicago Commission.
Men who controlled the shipping docks on Lake Michigan, the construction unions in Cook County, the private waste management corridors, and the high-yield loan portfolios that kept half the politicians in Springfield in office.
At the center of the table sat Don Carlo Lucchese—seventy-five years old, his silver hair combed back like an eagle's crest, his liver-spotted hands resting on the gold handle of a walking stick that had belonged to his father.
To his right, breathing heavily and adjusting his disheveled silk tie with trembling fingers, sat Julian Vance.
Julian had cleaned the mud from his shoes, but his face was slick with sweat under the halogen lights. A glass of vintage scotch sat untouched before him, vibrating slightly in rhythm with the distant rumble of the subway cars passing overhead.
"The time is eleven-fifty-six," Don Carlo announced, his dry, papery voice carrying easily across the silent gallery. "We have gathered to settle the succession of the Moretti territory. For six months, this commission has watched the North Side slip into stagnation. Shipments are delayed. The docks are operating at half-capacity. And our Don... sits in his mansion on the Gold Coast, unable to hear the orders of his own captains."
A murmur of solemn, calculated agreement rippled through the capos seated along the wings of the table.
"It is a tragedy," Julian Vance spoke up, his voice trembling with a rehearsed, mournful gravitas that made my stomach turn from behind the concrete pillar where we stood in the upper shadows. "Vincent was like a brother to me. We all know the brilliance he brought to this city after his father's passing. But the trauma from that bombing fourteen years ago was permanent. The auditory nerve damage has reached his cerebral cortex. His private physicians confirmed this morning that he is no longer capable of independent executive governance."
Julian reached into his leather portfolio and laid a thick stack of certified legal documents in front of Don Carlo.
"Under Article Nine of the Commission Charter," Julian continued, standing to his full height, projecting his voice toward the dark corners of the hall, "I am presenting the unified proxy transfer. With the consent of the Moretti captains, I will assume the operational directorship of the North Side shipping lines and the distribution terminals in Gary."
Don Carlo picked up his reading glasses, scanning the signature page. "And Vincent? Where is he tonight, Julian? A transition of this magnitude requires the Don's personal seal."
"Vincent had... an episode this evening, Don Carlo," Julian said, lowering his eyes with theatrical sorrow. "A violent psychotic break triggered by his deteriorating condition. He attacked his own security detail at the estate. He had to be placed into protective medical confinement at an undisclosed facility in Wisconsin. For his own safety. And for ours."
"That's a lie," a voice said.
The sound did not come from the mahogany table.
It came from the elevated industrial catwalk forty feet above the gallery floor.
Thirty men reached for the holsters beneath their tailored jackets in a synchronized, violent reflex.
Don Carlo didn't flinch. He slowly raised his hand, halting his bodyguards, his cold gray eyes tracking upward into the darkness of the rafters.
Standing on the steel platform beneath the industrial ventilation shafts was a woman.
I was wearing a torn, oil-stained gray sweater and muddy work boots, my dark hair tangled with rain and soot, holding a heavy porcelain bowl in both hands.
Beside me stood Vincent Moretti.
He wore no suit. He wore no jewelry.
His white shirt was ripped open to the navel, his broad chest stained with streaks of dried blood and black grease, the white bandage across his right ear glowing starkly against the shadows. In his left hand, he held the heavy iron crowbar he had used to pry open the emergency ventilation hatch. In his right hand, resting casually against his thigh, was his customized Glock.
He didn't look down at the thirty drawn weapons.
He didn't look at the capos he had commanded for a decade.
He looked down at Julian Vance.
The silence that hit the underground gallery was absolute. It was the silence of men who had just seen a dead god step out of his tomb with an iron spike in his fist.
Julian stumbled backward, knocking his leather armchair into the concrete wall behind him, his glass of scotch shattering across the floor.
"Vincent..." Julian gasped, his voice cracking into a high-pitched, pathetic squeak that echoed off the high rafters. "You... you were at the house... Leo said—"
Vincent didn't answer.
He reached out with his left hand, took the porcelain bowl from my fingers, and held it out over the railing forty feet above the table.
He tilted the rim.
The black, segmented metallic spider fell through the air, tumbling end-over-end through the beam of the central spotlight, before landing with a sharp, sickening metallic clatter squarely in the center of Don Carlo’s open legal papers.
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The red diode was still blinking.
Blink. Blink. Blink.
