Chapter 6 - Blood on the Iron Floor
Before Falcone could scream an order, the skylights above us shattered in a deafening cascade of safety glass and steel cables.
Marcus and my elite breach team rappelled down from the rafters, their assault rifles barking in controlled, deadly three-round bursts. The four snipers on the catwalks plummeted to the concrete floor like broken mannequins, eliminated before their fingers could squeeze their triggers.
Chaos erupted inside the foundry.
Muzzle flashes strobed against the rusted iron walls, illuminating the slaughter in violent pulses of yellow and orange. Falcone’s mercenaries, completely disoriented by the surprise aerial assault, scrambled for cover behind heavy machinery, spraying wild gunfire into the dark.
Sterling shrieked like a wounded animal, dropping his umbrella and diving behind an overturned steel hopper.
A bullet ripped through the meat of my left shoulder, spinning me around. The sheer concussive force tore through Clara’s delicate sutures along my ribs, and I felt the warm, sickening flood of fresh blood immediately soaking through my vest. The agony was blinding, white-hot and suffocating, but the ghost of my father's scream fifteen years ago kept my feet anchored to the ground.
I leveled my right pistol and fired three consecutive rounds through the chest of a charging hitman, dropping him instantly. I advanced through the gunfire like a specter, ignoring the lead tearing into the brickwork around me.
Falcone was hobbling frantically toward the rear loading dock, his ivory cane clattering across the wet floor as he abandoned his men to save his own skin.
""Carmine!"" I roared over the deafening cacophony of gunfire.
The old man turned, terror finally cracking his arrogant facade. He reached into his coat for a snub-nosed revolver, but I crossed the distance between us in three long strides.
I caught his wrist, twisting it until the bones cracked with a sickening snap. The gun clattered harmlessly into a pool of muddy water. I shoved him backward, slamming his spine hard against the rusted metal hull of an inactive blast furnace.
Falcone groaned, sliding down into the dirt, clutching his broken wrist to his chest. His chest heaved with shallow, rattling breaths.
""Please... Bucky..."" he begged, the proud Don reduced to a groveling dog in the dirt. ""It was business. Your father understood business. I have millions in Swiss accounts... bearer bonds... take it all!""
""My name is not Bucky,"" I snarled, pressing the smoking barrel of my pistol directly between his terrified, watery eyes. ""My name is Dante Moretti. And this isn't business. It's retribution.""
A scuffling sound scraped behind me.
I pivoted instantly, my weapon tracking the sound. Richard Sterling was crawling out from behind the steel hopper, clutching a dropped Beretta in both trembling hands, aiming directly at my exposed back.
""Die, you monster!"" Sterling screamed.
Before his finger could contract, the heavy double doors of the foundry courtyard blew inward. A black SUV skidded sideways through the mud, spraying gravel across the entrance.
Through the shattered driver-side window, a single rifle shot cracked with the sharp whip of a high-caliber round.
Sterling’s forehead blossomed with a neat red hole. His eyes rolled back into his head, and he collapsed face-first into the filthy water, his gun splashing harmlessly beside him.
I lowered my pistol, my chest heaving, blood pouring down my side, soaking my tailored trousers. The SUV door swung open.
Vincent stepped out of the driver's seat, lowering a customized sniper rifle. And from the passenger seat, completely ignoring Vincent's frantic protests, tumbled Clara.
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She had defied every single order I gave her. Her scrub top was soaked in mud, her hair was wild and tangled from the storm, but in her hand, she wasn't holding a weapon. She was holding a green canvas trauma kit.
And behind her, sitting upright and safe in the reinforced back seat, was Arthur Vance, wrapped in a thick wool blanket, sipping tea from a thermos.
