Chapter 9 - HUNTING THE VIPER
Rain poured from the heavens in violent, torrential sheets, drenching the industrial shipping port of the Hudson River. Fog rolled off the black water, wrapping around rusted shipping containers like a shroud.
Marco’s private helicopter had been forced down by the storm, grounding him at Terminal 4—a smuggling hub he had secretly operated behind my back.
I arrived alone, stepping out of my armored SUV clad in black tactical gear, armed with a combat shotgun and dual .45s. Behind me, three blacked-out SUVs carrying twenty of Petrov’s elite Bratva soldiers pulled up silently into the staging area.
Petrov stepped out, racking the slide of an AK-47, his eyes gleaming in the rainy gloom. "A favor for a favor, Moretti. When this is over, we split the Brooklyn ports fifty-fifty."
"Take the whole damn port," I rasped, my eyes fixed on the illuminated cargo warehouse at the end of the pier. "Just make sure nobody leaves that building alive except me."
"Deal," Petrov grinned.
We moved through the perimeter like ghosts. Marco’s remaining loyalists were stationed along the catwalks and behind shipping crates. The assault was sudden, violent, and absolute.
Petrov’s men opened fire, creating a deafening symphony of gunfire that echoed across the river. Explosions ripped through fuel barrels, illuminating the rain in towering plumes of orange flame.
I pushed directly through the center of the slaughter, a phantom of pure vengeance. Every mercenary that crossed my path fell to my blades and bullets. I wasn't fighting like a syndicate boss protecting territory; I was fighting like a father running out of time.
I kicked open the heavy iron doors of the central crane control tower.
There, perched on an open metal platform fifty feet above the churning, freezing waters of the Hudson River, stood Marco. He was soaked to the bone, limping heavily, clutching a silver cryogenic container against his chest with one hand and holding a detonator in the other.
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"It’s over, Dominic!" Marco screamed above the roar of the wind and rain. "You take one step closer, and I drop the antidote into the river! Sophia dies, and your precious little daughter grows up an orphan!"
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