Chapter 5 - Blind Tasting
The roar of escaping gas was deafening, a localized blizzard of freezing white vapor filling the center of the cellar. The tactical team, reliant on their thermal and night-vision optics, were suddenly rendered totally blind. Worse, the dense argon gas displaced the oxygen at head height.
The first man dropped his weapon, clawing at his throat as he suffocated, his knees hitting the stone floor.
Michael didn't hesitate. He emerged from behind the rack of vintage Bordeaux and fired three precise shots. The suppressed pfft-pfft-pfft barely registered over the roaring gas. Two of the assassins dropped instantly.
The remaining two blindly returned fire. Bullets chewed through the mahogany racks. Bottles exploded in rapid succession. Expensive glass rained down, and the heavy, intoxicating smell of aged Cabernet and Pinot Noir instantly flooded the room, mixing with the metallic scent of blood and gas. Thousands of dollars of dark red liquid poured across the floor like a gruesome tide.
Claire stayed flat on her stomach, crawling beneath the freezing fog of the argon gas. Her hands slipped on the wine-soaked stones. She could hear the boots of one of the surviving attackers crunching over the broken glass, moving erratically as he tried to escape the suffocating cloud.
He was moving right toward Victoria’s hiding spot.
Claire didn't think; she reacted. Her hand brushed against an unbroken bottle that had rolled off a shattered rack. A heavy, thick-glassed magnum of Champagne.
She gripped it by the neck, pushed herself up from the floor, and swung it like a baseball bat into the back of the mercenary’s knee.
The man buckled with a sharp cry, dropping his weapon. Before he could recover, a shadow materialized from the fog. Adrian.
The mafia boss moved with terrifying efficiency. He wrapped one arm around the man's neck, locking it in a vise grip, and with his other hand, drove a shattered piece of a wine bottle straight up under the man's tactical vest. The man went limp.
The roar of the gas began to subside as the cylinder emptied. The white fog settled lower, revealing the devastation. Four dead men. Wine dripping from the ceiling and running in rivers down the aisles.
Michael kicked the weapons away from the bodies. He checked the hallway outside the vault.
“Clear for now,” Michael said, breathing heavily. “But Reynolds will send more when these guys don't check in.”
Adrian wiped his bloody hand on a linen napkin taken from a nearby tasting table. He walked over to the man he had just killed and reached into his tactical vest, pulling out a two-way radio.
He pressed the transmission button.
“Reynolds,” Adrian’s voice echoed in the cellar, smooth and unbothered.
Static hissed for a moment. Then, Reynolds' voice crackled through. “Adrian. I’m surprised you lasted this long.”
“I’m disappointed, Marcus,” Adrian replied. “After twenty years, you sell me out to the Morettis? For what? A bigger piece of a smaller pie?”
“The Morettis offered me a seat at the table,” Reynolds shot back, his voice tight. “Your father respected me. You just use me as a shield. It’s over, Adrian. I have fifty men locking down the hotel. The police have been diverted. You can't stay in that cellar forever.”
“I don't intend to,” Adrian said. “I’m coming for you.”
He crushed the radio under his heel.
Victoria rushed forward, grabbing Adrian’s arm. “Are you insane? We have to stay here! The police will figure it out eventually. If we go out there, we die!”
“If we stay here, he pumps poison gas through the vents,” Adrian said coldly, pulling his arm away. He looked at Claire. She was shivering, covered in wine and dust, still holding the neck of the broken champagne bottle.
“You said you know this hotel better than anyone,” Adrian said, staring into her eyes. “Is there a way out of this basement that isn't on the official blueprints?”
Claire swallowed hard. Her mind raced through the history of the building. The hotel was built in 1922. During Prohibition, it was a hub for bootleggers.
“Yes,” Claire said softly. “Behind the oldest racks in the north corner. There’s a bricked-up archway that leads to the old speakeasy tunnels. They connect to the city's subway maintenance shafts. The hotel sealed them in the eighties, but the mortar is old.”
May you like
Michael grabbed a heavy steel crowbar from the maintenance corner. “Show me.”
As Claire led them to the back of the cellar, she realized her life as a sommelier was over. She was no longer just a servant of the house. She was surviving the house.
