Chapter 10 - The Lion's Retaliation
The black convoy departed Dead Man’s Ridge under cover of an afternoon thunderstorm.
Four armored sedans flanked the heavy Mercedes van carrying Mia, Dante, and three of Mason’s elite personal guards.
Mia looked out the tinted ballistic window at the rain lashing against the glass.
In her lap rested a small silver medallion on a delicate chain.
Before they left, Lily had slipped it into her palm.
It was a medal of Saint Jude, the patron saint of lost causes, which had belonged to Lily’s mother.
"Keep it safe, Mia," the child had whispered.
"It protected Mommy until she went to heaven. It will protect you and the baby."
Mia clasped the medallion tightly, feeling the cool silver press against her skin.
Beside her, Dante checked the chamber of his sidearm.
"Queens is twenty minutes away, Mia. Evelyn Reed’s apartment is on the third floor of a walk-up near Astoria."
"Will she run when she sees armed men?" Mia asked.
"That is why you go to the door alone," Dante replied.
"My men will hold the perimeter, the stairwells, and the roof. But you have to knock."
Twenty minutes later, the convoy pulled into an alley behind a weathered brick apartment building in Astoria.
The rain poured down in relentless sheets, washing over the grime of the city.
Mia pulled a heavy wool hood over her head, tucking her bandaged right hand inside the pocket of her coat.
She climbed the narrow, squeaking wooden stairs of the building, her heart hammering against her ribs.
The smell of boiled cabbage and old damp carpet reminded her of her own ruined apartment.
She reached apartment 3B and knocked three times.
Silence answered from inside.
Mia leaned close to the chipped paint of the door frame.
"Evelyn," Mia whispered through the crack.
"It’s Mia. Mia Carter."
Inside, the floorboards creaked softly.
A peephole darkened.
Then came the sound of three heavy deadbolts turning one by one.
The door opened four inches, chained from the inside.
A woman with hollow, terrified eyes and dark circles stared out at her.
"Mia?" Evelyn gasped, her breath catching.
"Oh God... they told me you died in the mansion fire last night!"
"I survived, Evelyn," Mia said, tears welling in her eyes.
"Lily and Eleanor survived too. Mason Moretti didn't kill Thomas. It was Julian Vance."
Evelyn’s hands shook as she unhooked the chain and yanked Mia inside the dimly lit apartment.
The room was littered with packed cardboard boxes, burner phones, and stacks of shipping manifests.
"I know," Evelyn sobbed, collapsing against the kitchen counter.
"Thomas found the manifests for the shipment code-named Operation Cerberus. It was Julian’s private pipeline for weapons."
Evelyn reached into a metal lockbox beneath the sink and pulled out a thumb drive encased in black rubber.
"Everything is on this drive, Mia. The wire transfers, the security footage of the crane being tampered with, the names of the corrupt federal agents on Julian's payroll."
Mia took the drive with her uninjured hand, her heart soaring with triumph.
"We have him, Evelyn. We finally have him."
Suddenly, the small apartment window looking out onto the fire escape shattered inward in an explosion of glass.
A flashbang grenade bounced across the linoleum floor, hissing blinding white sparks.
"Cover!" Dante roared, kicking the front door off its hinges and diving into the apartment.
The grenade detonated with a deafening crack, blinding Mia and sending a wave of concussive heat across the room.
Automatic gunfire immediately ripped through the thin plaster walls from the fire escape outside.
Evelyn screamed, falling behind the counter.
Dante returned fire through the shattered window, his weapon barking three rapid rounds into the darkness of the alley.
"Ambush!" Dante yelled into his tactical radio.
"They followed us from the highway! Get the package out now!"
Mia scrambled across the floor, clutching the thumb drive against her chest with both hands.
Two masked gunmen in tactical gear leaped through the shattered window frame, their rifle muzzles sweeping the room.
Dante dropped one with a shot to the chest, but the second shooter swung his barrel directly toward Mia, who was cornered against the refrigerator.
"Drop the drive, girl!" the shooter snarled, his finger tightening on the trigger.
Mia pressed her back against the metal fridge, her body shielding her unborn child with every fiber of her being.
Before the assassin could fire, the wall behind him exploded in a shower of brick and drywall.
A massive, gloved hand reached through the gaping hole, grabbed the shooter by the back of his tactical vest, and hurled him outward through the window like a ragdoll.
The assassin plunged three stories down into the alleyway with a sickening thud.
Standing in the pulverized hole in the wall, rain dripping from his black leather trench coat, was Mason Moretti.
He held a high-powered tactical shotgun in his right hand, his face covered in rain, blood, and murderous triumph.
He had not waited at the compound.
He had followed the convoy with his own strike team, shadowing them every step of the way.
"Nobody," Mason’s voice rumbled like thunder through the destroyed apartment, "touches what belongs to me."
He stepped over the debris, dropped his weapon, and pulled Mia up from the floor with infinite gentleness.
He cupped her face in his large, scarred hands, checking her eyes, her bandages, her breath.
"Are you hurt? Did the blast touch you?" Mason asked, his voice raw with terrifying urgency.
"I have the drive, Mason," Mia whispered, holding up the black thumb drive through her tears.
"I have the proof. Thomas is cleared. Julian Vance’s entire empire is on this chip."
Mason stared down at the tiny drive in her hand.
Then he looked into Mia’s tear-stained, soot-streaked face.
Without a word, in the middle of the smoking, ruined apartment, surrounded by shattered glass and spent brass casings, Mason pulled her flush against his chest.
He buried his face into the crook of her neck, his arms wrapping around her waist, holding her and the unborn child safe within his embrace.
"You did it, Mia," Mason murmured against her hair, his deep voice trembling with reverence.
"You just handed me the sword that will execute the traitors."
He pulled back, his dark eyes burning with the cold, absolute fire of an emperor ready for war.
He turned toward Dante and the arriving soldiers.
"Secure Evelyn Reed. Bring the vehicles to the front."
Mason took Mia’s hand in his, his fingers intertwining with hers, completely unbothered by the blood or the bandages.
"It is eleven o'clock," Mason declared, his voice echoing with absolute doom for his enemies.
"Julian Vance is waiting at St. Jude’s Cathedral for his crown."
"Let us go to church, Mr. Moretti," Mia said, her eyes flashing with lethal resolve.
"And deliver his funeral."CHAPTER 11 — The Gathering of the Wolves at St. Jude’s
The rain fell in deafening sheets over the stone spires of St. Jude’s Cathedral in Little Italy.
Lightning tore open the midnight sky, casting violent blue shadows across the towering stained-glass windows.
Down on Mulberry Street, dozens of armored black limousines lined the curb like hearses waiting for a mass funeral.
Every vehicle bore the discreet insignia of the Five Families of the Eastern Seaboard.
At the heavy wrought-iron gates of the church courtyard, armed security guards with handheld metal detectors searched every entrant down to their belt buckles.
Under the ancient laws of the Commission established eighty years ago, St. Jude’s was consecrated ground.
No firearm, no knife, and no weapon of war was permitted to cross the holy threshold under penalty of instant death.
Inside the vast, cavernous nave, the air was thick with the scent of burning frankincense, melted beeswax, and old mahogany.
Hundreds of votive candles flickered in red glass cups along the stone walls, painting the gilded statues of the saints in trembling blood-red light.
Seated in the front pews were the most powerful and ruthless men in the underworld.
Don Carmine Falcone sat in the center pew, his silver-headed cane resting between his knees, flanked by his four surviving sons.
Beside him sat the bosses of the Maroni, Lucchese, and Caccini syndicates, their faces grim and wary.
Only the front pew on the left stood completely vacant.
It was the Moretti family pew, carved with the proud crest of a roaring lion beneath a crown.
Standing before the high altar, directly beneath the giant marble crucifix, was Julian Vance.
The former consigliere wore an immaculate charcoal three-piece suit with a silk necktie the color of fresh ash.
His hair was slicked back with fragrant pomade, and a gold watch glinted beneath his starched French cuffs.
Julian rested both hands upon the marble lectern, looking down at the gathered mob bosses with eyes brimming with triumphant deceit.
"Honored brothers of the Commission," Julian began, his voice amplified by the cathedral's vaulted acoustics.
"We gather tonight under the darkest cloud that has ever hung over our collective brotherhood."
Don Carmine Falcone leaned forward, his raspy voice echoing through the nave.
"Get to the point, Julian."
"Where is Mason Moretti, and why are we meeting in a church at midnight?"
Julian bowed his head with theatrical sorrow, pressing his palm against his heart.
"Twenty-four hours ago, a catastrophic explosion and fire decimated the Moretti ancestral estate."
The assembled capos whispered among themselves, the tension rippling through the wooden pews like an electric current.
"Mason Moretti, his eighty-year-old grandmother Eleanor, and his young daughter Lily were inside," Julian announced with manufactured grief.
"The municipal fire department has recovered no living souls from the master quarters."
Don Carmine frowned deeply, his bushy gray eyebrows knitting together in suspicion.
"Mason’s personal telephone is offline, but I received word this afternoon that his security detail was spotted moving through Queens."
Julian shook his head, offering a sorrowful, patronizing sigh.
"Scattered stragglers, Don Carmine, trying to salvage remnants of their dead master's empire."
"The Moretti bloodline has been extinguished by their own tragic carelessness."
"The gas lines beneath the west wing were neglected for years."
"With Don Bernardo's direct lineage erased, the northern docks and the union contracts cannot remain leaderless."
"Anarchy in the streets would invite federal investigations that could destroy us all."
Julian raised his right hand, pointing toward the empty Moretti pew.
"Therefore, as the chief legal counsel and executor of the Moretti assets, I formally claim the vacant seat."
"I propose an immediate treaty dividing thirty percent of the shipping terminals to the Falcone family."
"The remaining territory will fall under my direct stewardship as the newly appointed head of the Moretti coalition."
Don Carmine looked at the other bosses, weighing the offer of lucrative shipping lanes against the foul stench of Julian's ambition.
"And who validates your claim as heir, Vance?"
"You carry no Moretti blood in your veins."
"Your father was a clerk who handled tax write-offs for old Bernardo."
Julian’s jaw tightened, but his smile remained razor-sharp.
"The law validates me, Carmine."
"I hold the deeds, the bank accounts, and the loyalty of the city's port authority."
"Unless someone in this sacred room has an objection, the Commission shall cast its vote."
Before Don Carmine could speak, the massive, three-ton oak doors at the back of the cathedral burst open.
The sound hit the cavernous room like a thunderclap, echoing violently off the limestone arches.
A blast of icy wind and torrential rain swept down the center aisle, instantly extinguishing dozens of votive candles.
Every capo, soldier, and underboss leaped to their feet, spinning toward the darkness of the narthex.
Standing framed in the doorway, silhouetted against the flashing lightning, stood Mason Moretti.
He wore a long black wool overcoat, his shoulders broad as a fortress, his white dress shirt open at the collar.
His dark eyes were ablaze with lethal, calculating dominance.
Beside him walked Mia Carter.
She wore a simple, tailored black coat that concealed the bandages on her shoulder and right hand.
In her uninjured left hand, she carried the heavy, leather-bound Iron Ledger of Don Bernardo Moretti.
Behind them, supported on Dante's uninjured arm, stepped Eleanor Moretti, holding her silver-tipped cane with majestic poise.
And walking behind the matriarch was Evelyn Reed, carrying a sealed steel case containing the digital evidence of murder.
The entire cathedral went suffocatingly, horrifyingly still.
Men who had ordered hundreds of executions dropped their jaws in disbelief.
"Holy Mother of God," whispered Don Lucchese, crossing himself rapidly.
"He is not dead."
Mason stepped forward onto the polished Italian marble of the center aisle.
The wet leather of his boots struck the stone with the rhythmic, terrifying cadence of an approaching executioner.
"You are too eager to distribute a dead man's coat, Julian," Mason’s voice boomed through the sacred rafters.
Julian Vance backed away from the marble altar, the blood draining from his face until his skin looked like chalk.
"Mason..." Julian stammered, his polished facade shattering into pieces.
"You... you survived."
"Did you think cheap kerosene and severed alarm wires could burn out the blood of Bernardo Moretti?" Eleanor’s voice rang out, cold as tombstone granite.
The eighty-year-old matriarch walked down the aisle with her head held impossibly high.
Don Carmine Falcone stepped out of his pew, bowing his head in immediate, instinctive reverence to Eleanor.
"Donna Eleanor," Carmine murmured, his respect for the old woman genuine.
"You live."
"I live, Carmine," Eleanor replied without stopping.
"Because a twenty-four-year-old maid dragged my granddaughter and me through the flames while my own consigliere watched through binoculars."
Mason reached the foot of the altar stairs, stopping ten feet beneath where Julian stood shaking.
Mia walked up beside Mason, her chin lifted, her eyes locked directly onto the man who had murdered her husband.
Julian looked from Mason's murderous glare to the heavy leather book in Mia's hand.
When Julian's eyes landed on the embossed gold lettering of the Iron Ledger, a sound of strangled panic escaped his throat.
May you like
The wolves had gathered to divide the kingdom.
Instead, the rightful king had arrived with the list of their sins.
