Chapter 6 - The Safehouse Ambush
The safehouse was a nondescript brick warehouse situated in the industrial shadows of Goose Island, surrounded by rusty razor-wire fences and abandoned shipping containers. When Luca’s sedan drifted through the reinforced iron gates, Dino’s battered SUV was already idling inside the garage bay, steam hissing from its bullet-riddled radiator grille.
The moment Nina stepped out of the car, the sharp metallic stench of fresh blood hit her senses.
On a metal workbench under a single dangling work light lay Silvio Marchetti. His expensive suit was shredded and drenched in dark crimson. His lips were turning a mottled blue, his chest heaving irregularly with shallow, agonizing gasps.
“He has an open sucking chest wound on the left side,” Nina announced, instantly slipping into professional command mode. She tore open a trauma pack supplied from Luca’s emergency stash, slipping on sterile nitrile gloves. “Dino, hold his shoulders down! Luca, shine that halogen work lamp directly over his sternum!”
Silvio’s bloodshot eyes rolled in their sockets, locking onto Nina’s face. “You... the nurse...” he wheezed, pink foam bubbling at the corners of his mouth.
“Save your breath, Silvio,” Nina snapped coldly, cleaning the wound with betadine before picking up a surgical scalpel. “You have a collapsed lung. Air is trapped inside your pleural cavity, crushing your heart. I’m going to make an incision between your fourth and fifth ribs and insert a chest tube to relieve the pressure. It’s going to hurt like hell because we don’t have time for local anesthetic. If you want to live long enough to say your prayers, you start talking to your nephew right now.”
Nina made a precise, decisive incision. Silvio let out a muffled shriek of sheer agony, his fingernails clawing into the metal workbench as Nina skillfully pushed the plastic chest tube through the intercostal muscle into the pleural space. A hiss of trapped air and dark blood rushed out into the collection chamber.
Silvio gasped, his lungs expanding as fresh oxygen surged back into his system. His color shifted back from blue to ashen grey.
Luca stepped directly into his uncle’s field of vision, holding Julian’s binder in front of the dying man’s face.
“Who authorized the Detroit hit, Silvio?” Luca demanded, his voice colder than the winter outside. “How did Marco Valenti get the access codes to our railyard depot?”
Silvio coughed, spattering blood onto the concrete floor. Realizing that his allies had abandoned him to be slaughtered, the old man’s loyalty shattered. “Marco... Marco promised me fifty percent of the logistics pipeline. The meeting... they’re raiding the railyard at sunrise to plant the military-grade explosives and frame you for the explosion... they’re going to burn your entire shipping fleet, Luca!”
“What are the override codes for the security gates?” Luca pressed, leaning in close. “Tell me, Silvio. Or Nina pulls that chest tube out right now and lets you drown in your own blood.”
Silvio looked at Nina with terrified desperation. But Nina’s eyes were cold and uncompromising; she held the tube firmly, waiting.
“Seven... seven-four-nine-two-Delta,” Silvio gasped, his body trembling with shock. “The detonators are wired to the main terminal server in warehouse four. Marco is there himself... overseeing the staging.”
Silvio’s head fell back against the table, his pulse fluttering erratically. Nina checked his carotid artery, then looked at Luca. “He’s in hypovolemic shock. He won’t survive the ride to another clinic, but he’s told you what you need to know.”
Before Luca could reply, a deafening crack shattered the warehouse’s high clerestory windows. Glass rained down like daggers.
“Sniper!” Dino bellowed, throwing his massive body over Nina and tackling her behind an armored forklift just as a volley of high-caliber rounds tore through the workbench where Silvio lay.
Silvio’s body jerked violently as three heavy rounds punched through his torso, ending his life instantly.
“They tracked Dino’s convoy!” Luca shouted, drawing a matte-black customized 1911 pistol from his shoulder holster. “They’re surrounding the perimeter!”
Automatic gunfire erupted from all sides of the warehouse, tearing through the corrugated metal walls. Nina curled into a ball behind the steel wheel of the forklift, dust and fragments of brick biting into her face.
Luca dropped into a crouch beside her, his firearm barking with controlled, deadly double-taps toward the shattered window frames. “Stay low, Nina! Dino, pop the smoke canisters! We’re taking the subterranean maintenance tunnel to the railyard!”
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“You’re going to the railyard now?” Nina shouted over the deafening din of ricocheting bullets. “Luca, there’s an entire army out there!”
Luca turned to her, his dark eyes ablaze with cold fury. “They tried to murder my nephew, they butchered my brother, and they dragged you into this slaughterhouse. I am ending this tonight. And you are staying by my side until I know you are safe.”
