Chapter 7 - THE MEDICAL SHIP
The red light on Kane’s remote blinked ominously in the smoky darkness.
He was insane. He was willing to die to get his empire back.
“Five seconds, Santiago!” Kane yelled, his calm facade finally cracking into desperate mania.
I lowered my gun. I couldn’t risk the building collapsing on Leo.
“It’s on a ship!” I shouted, throwing my weapon onto the floor. It clattered loudly against the marble.
Kane paused, his thumb hovering over the detonator button. “What ship?”
“My mother kept it hidden on a decommissioned medical freighter,” I lied, my mind racing to construct a plausible scenario. “It’s docked at Pier 39 on Lake Michigan. It’s in a biometric safe. I am the only one who can open it.”
Kane’s eyes narrowed, evaluating the truth of my words.
“You’re lying,” he sneered.
“Check my pockets!” I yelled, kicking my gun further away. “I have the docking access card. If you kill me, the safe permanently locks down. You lose it forever.”
Kane stared at me. His greed was his only weakness. He wanted the ledger more than he wanted revenge.
“Slide the card over,” Kane ordered.
I reached into my pocket. I didn’t have a docking card. But I had the heavy, silver money clip I always carried, engraved with the Moretti family crest. I slid it across the wet floor. In the dim, smoky light, it looked official enough.
Kane stepped forward to pick it up.
In that split second of distraction, Elena moved.
She didn’t cower. She didn’t wait to be rescued.
She threw her body weight backward, sweeping her legs out and kicking Kane squarely in the knee.
There was a sickening crunch. Kane howled in pain, his leg buckling beneath him. He dropped the detonator, stumbling backward.
“Run!” Elena screamed at me.
I didn’t run away. I leaped over the marble bar, sprinting the ten feet between us, and tackled Kane to the floor before he could recover his weapon.
We crashed into the shattered glass. Kane was older, but he fought with a feral, desperate strength. He punched me in the throat, gasping for air as he scrambled toward the detonator lying a few feet away.
I grabbed his ankle, dragging him back, and delivered a brutal strike to his jaw. Kane’s head snapped back against the floor, and he went limp.
I didn’t stop. I pulled a zip-tie from his tactical belt and bound his hands tightly behind his back.
I rushed over to Elena, pulling my knife to cut her bonds.
“Are you okay?” I asked, helping her to her feet.
She looked at me, breathing heavily. “I’ve been better. Where is Leo?”
“Mommy!”
Leo scrambled out from behind the bar, crying, and threw himself into Elena’s arms. She collapsed onto her knees, burying her face in his hair, sobbing with pure, unadulterated relief.
“I’ve got you, baby,” Elena wept, kissing his dirty cheeks. “I’ve got you.”
I watched them, a profound sense of peace washing over me despite the fire raging in the kitchen behind us. For the first time in my life, my family wasn’t a source of betrayal or violence. It was something worth protecting.
Suddenly, the red emergency lights flickered, and the fire alarms abruptly stopped.
The silence that followed was terrifying.
I looked toward the front doors.
A dozen heavily armed men stepped into the restaurant, their laser sights cutting through the smoke, all aiming directly at my chest.
They weren’t Kane’s men.
They were wearing black tactical gear with the insignia of the Chicago Syndicate—the rival mob faction my father had warred with decades ago.
A tall man in a tailored overcoat stepped through the ranks of the gunmen.
It was Viktor, the head of the Russian syndicate.
“Well, well,” Viktor said, a thick accent layering his deep voice. He looked down at the unconscious Kane, then at me. “It seems we arrived just in time to clean up a mess, Santiago.”
“This doesn’t concern you, Viktor,” I said, stepping in front of Elena and Leo, shielding them with my body.
“On the contrary,” Viktor smiled coldly. “Kane promised me the ledger in exchange for my men’s assistance tonight. He told me you had it. But seeing as Kane is currently indisposed… I will take it directly from you.”
He raised a hand, signaling his men to advance.
“If you want the ledger, Viktor,” a voice echoed from the shattered entrance.
Everyone froze.
Standing in the doorway, holding a massive, suppressed shotgun, was my mother.
She looked like an absolute phantom of death, her trench coat billowing in the wind off the lake.
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And standing right beside her, pale but very much awake, was Marco, leaning heavily on a crutch, holding a submachine gun.
“You have to go through me,” my mother declared.
