No caretaker had survived more than three days with me after the accident—not because the

Chiến dịch 29

The rain turned to sleet as the black Cadillac armored sedan cut through the narrow streets of South Philadelphia.

The interior of the car smelled of wet wool, gun oil, and leather. Luca sat in the front passenger seat with a pump-action shotgun resting between his knees, checking his watch every three minutes under the green glow of the dashboard lights.

I sat in the back, locked into the hydraulic floor clamps that secured my chair to the vehicle's reinforced chassis. Fay sat on the bench seat beside me. She had washed her hands with antiseptic from Luca's medical kit and wrapped her palms in white gauze, but she still wore the oversized sweater and the cheap sneakers.

"Mercer gave us the rest of the names before he lost consciousness," Luca said over his shoulder, not turning around. "Three port inspectors, two customs agents, and Valenti."

My jaw tightened. "Valenti?"

"He took two hundred thousand to look the other way when Sal's trucks backed into Pier 14 tonight," Luca said. "Sal is currently at the club celebrating. He thinks the docks are already his."

"Valenti was my father’s godson," I muttered, looking out the tinted window at the neon signs of the dive bars blurring past in the sleet.

"Your father’s been dead ten years, Dominic," Luca replied coldly. "Godsons have mortgages too."

Beside me, Fay spoke up, her voice quiet enough that Luca couldn't hear over the hum of the engine.

"What happens when you go in there?" she asked.

I looked at her. Her face was pale against the dark leather of the seat, but her hands were steady on her lap.

"Sal Leone will have twenty armed men in that club," I said. "He expects me to be dead. When I roll through those doors, half of those men will reach for their weapons. The other half will wait to see who has the upper hand."

"And if they shoot?"

"Then Luca and his men will kill everyone in the room," I said plainly. "That's how this works, Fay. You asked for five hundred dollars a week. If you want to get out at the next light, tell the driver. I’ll give you twenty thousand in cash from the glove box and a train ticket to Chicago."

Fay didn't look at the glove box. She looked straight at my face, her eyes fierce and uncompromising.

"You think I'm doing this for the money now?" she asked.

"Then why are you here?"

"Because thirty years ago, your father gave my mother five thousand dollars and told her to go away after my dad's spine was crushed on his pier," she said, each word landing like a hammer blow. "My family spent twenty years being treated like garbage by men who drove cars like this."

She reached out and tapped the steel frame of my wheelchair with a bandaged finger.

"You're the first one of you who actually understands what it feels like to be trapped in your own body," she said softly. "I'm not leaving until I see you take what belongs to you. Because if you can do it from this chair, then maybe my brother wasn't just a victim who died for nothing."

A strange, heavy silence settled over the backseat.

For six months, I had viewed my disability as an absolute defeat—a shameful, emasculating cage that stripped away my identity as a boss. But sitting beside this penniless woman whose whole life had been defined by hardship, I realized something that Sal Leone and Carmine had failed to understand:

A predator doesn't stop being a predator because its legs are broken. A wolf in a trap will still tear your throat out if you get close enough to gloat.

The Cadillac slowed down, turning into the alley behind the St. Jude Social Club on Eighth Street.

Two black Suburbans belonging to the Leone family were parked near the rear exit, steam rising from their exhaust pipes in the cold night air. A guard in a heavy leather trench coat stood under the yellow halogen light of the back entrance, smoking a cigarette with an umbrella tucked under his arm.

"We're here," the driver said, putting the car in park.

Luca racked the slide of his shotgun, the sound sharp and metallic in the confined cabin. "How do you want to handle the door, Dominic?"

"We don't sneak in," I said, reaching into my coat and pulling out the fresh magazine Luca had given me. I slid it into the Colt, chambered the round, and laid the gun flat across my lap, covering it with a folded woolen lap blanket. "Drop the ramp. Fay, you stay right behind my shoulder."

"I'm not hiding," she said.

"I didn't ask you to hide," I said, looking back at her with a razor-thin smile. "I asked you to watch."

The hydraulic ramp whirred as it lowered onto the cracked asphalt of the alley. The cold, wet sleet hit my face instantly, waking every nerve in my skin.

I rolled down the ramp, my wheels cutting through the slush, and stopped five feet from the Leone guard.

The man dropped his cigarette into a puddle, his mouth falling open as he recognized my face under the amber streetlight.

"Mr... Mr. Corso?" he stammered, his hand drifting instinctively toward his coat.

Before his fingers could touch leather, Luca stepped out from behind the Cadillac and pressed the cold double barrel of his shotgun against the man’s temple.

"Open the door, Frankie," Luca said softly. "Or we'll paint this brick wall with whatever's left of your ears."

Frankie swallowed hard, his face turning the color of skim milk. He turned with trembling fingers, pushed the security code into the electronic lock, and pulled the heavy steel door open.

Inside, the warm smell of garlic, expensive cigars, and anisette spilled into the alley, accompanied by the loud, celebratory roar of Sal Leone’s voice coming from the dining room.