Chapter 7 - PIER 44
The docks at Pier 44 were desolate, shrouded in a thick, freezing fog rolling off Lake Michigan. Towering stacks of rusted shipping containers created a metal labyrinth.
Luca parked the SUV two blocks away. He turned to me and Ben in the backseat.
“You stay here,” Luca commanded, checking the magazine of his gun. “Lock the doors. Keep your head down.”
“Luca, no,” I argued. “If Vanessa sees you alone, she’ll kill Marco instantly. She thinks I have the ticket. She thinks my father told me where the extraction boat is. You need me as a distraction.”
Luca hesitated. He looked at Ben.
Ben signed rapidly. I stay. You go. Save Uncle Marco.
“He’s brave,” Luca said softly. He handed me his spare radio. “If anything goes wrong, you run back to the car and you drive away. Understood?”
I nodded.
We slipped out into the fog, moving silently between the massive steel containers. The smell of salt and diesel was overpowering.
As we rounded a stack of blue crates, we saw it.
A single black sedan was parked near the edge of the pier, its headlights illuminating a small, rusted tugboat tied to the dock.
Standing near the edge of the water was Vanessa. She held a silver pistol in her hand.
Kneeling on the wet concrete in front of her, his hands bound with zip-ties, was a man in a tattered gray coat. Even bruised and emaciated, the resemblance to Luca was undeniable. It was Marco.
“Where is the boat, Marco?” Vanessa screamed, kicking him in the ribs. “Arthur Hayes was supposed to book a smuggler’s boat for tonight! Where is it?!”
Marco coughed, blood running down his chin. He gave a weak, defiant laugh. “Arthur was a better man than you’ll ever be, Vanessa. He took my secret to his grave. You’re trapped.”
“I’m going to put a bullet in your head,” Vanessa shrieked, raising the gun.
“Looking for this?” I shouted, stepping out from the shadows into the headlight beams.
Vanessa spun around, aiming the gun at me.
I held up the Greyhound bus ticket. “There is no boat, Vanessa. My dad didn’t book a boat. He booked a bus out of state, under a fake name.”
Vanessa narrowed her eyes, trying to see me through the fog. “The maid. You stupid girl. Give me that ticket.”
“Let Marco go,” I said, forcing my voice to stay steady, “and I’ll tell you the fake name.”
Vanessa laughed. “I don’t need the name. I’ll just kill you both.”
She aimed squarely at my chest.
“Drop it, Vanessa.”
Luca stepped out from behind a container, ten feet to her left, his gun leveled at her head.
Vanessa froze. Her eyes darted between me, Luca, and Marco.
Reversal: Vanessa didn’t look scared. She smiled.
“You always were predictable, Luca,” she purred. “Always playing the hero for your family.”
From the shadows behind us, three men in heavy tactical gear stepped out, assault rifles raised. Rival family muscle. Vanessa hadn’t come alone; she had brought the people she was selling Marco to.
“Put the gun down, Luca,” Vanessa commanded. “Or they tear Emily apart.”
Luca’s jaw clenched. Slowly, agonizingly, he lowered his weapon and dropped it onto the concrete.
“Good,” Vanessa smiled. “Now, bring me the ticket, Emily.”
I took a step forward. My heart was hammering a frantic rhythm against my ribs.
But as I moved, a small, high-pitched ringing sound pierced the fog.
It was a piercing, mechanical squeal, coming from one of the empty shipping containers directly above Vanessa’s head.
Vanessa frowned, looking up.
It was feedback from a hearing aid.
Ben had sneaked out of the car. He had climbed the ladder of the shipping container.
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And as Vanessa looked up, Ben kicked a massive, rusted iron cargo hook off the top of the container.
The heavy iron swung down on its chain, smashing directly into the spotlight of the black sedan, shattering the glass and plunging the pier into chaotic darkness.
