Chapter 13 - The First Currency
The black sedan didn't try the gate. It sat there for three agonizing minutes, its twin halogen beams cutting through the salt mist, illuminating the hand-painted wooden sign: THE SEA BREEZE — FRESH SEAFOOD & COFFEE.
Then, with a low rumble of its dual exhaust, the car reversed smoothly into the turnaround, swung around, and accelerated back toward Route 1.
Alessandro lowered the carbine from his shoulder, but his posture didn't soften.
"A probe," he said, stepping away from the shed window. "They're verifying occupancy. Checking if we put up commercial security guards or called the county sheriff."
"If they see cops, they wait us out," I reasoned.
"If they see cops, they pay the county commissioners to reassign the patrol zones," Alessandro countered. "We handle this ourselves. But we need Victor."
Two hours later, an unmarked silver Ford F-250 pulled into the gravel drive, moving with its running lights extinguished. The driver killed the engine before the truck even stopped rolling.
Victor Russo stepped out.
He wore heavy work boots, a faded canvas jacket, and a baseball cap pulled low over his silvering temples. He didn't look like an enforcer from the South End; he looked like a long-haul contractor who hadn't slept in forty-eight hours.
He walked into the back kitchen of the diner where I had coffee brewing on the burner. He looked at Alessandro, then at the Glock resting on the prep table between the salt shakers.
"You got the letter," Victor said without preamble, pulling a stool out and dropping his heavy frame onto it.
"Dominic wants a seat at the table and my scalp on a pike," Alessandro said, pouring a mug of black coffee and sliding it across the counter.
Victor took a long, burning swallow. "It’s worse than that, boss. Dominic isn't acting alone. He brought in the Moretti remnants. Sal Moretti’s younger brother, Silvio, is backing him with private capital out of Montreal. They’re running synthetic narcotics through the lumber trucks."
My stomach tightened. "Fentanyl?"
"Fentanyl, counterfeit pharmaceuticals, unregistered munitions," Victor said, his voice grim. "Dominic doesn't care about maritime logistics. He’s turning the South End docks into a high-speed distribution turnpike. And the Commission gave him the green light because he promised them forty percent higher returns than you ever delivered."
"Because I kept the harbor clean of poison," Alessandro spat, his voice laced with venom.
"Morals don't pay dividends to seventy-year-old capos sitting in Miami condominiums," Victor said. He turned his eyes toward me, softening slightly. "Clara. You shouldn't be here. You should take Eleanor to the Adirondacks. I have a cabin near Lake Placid—"
"Stop offering me cabins, Victor," I interrupted, setting a plate of toasted rye bread in front of him. "If we run, we spend the rest of our lives looking at the rear-view mirror every time a black sedan stops at a red light. What is Dominic’s vulnerability right now?"
Victor blinked, momentarily caught off guard by the absence of fear in my voice. He looked at Alessandro, who simply gave a slight, affirming nod.
"His vulnerability is cash flow," Victor admitted, tapping his calloused fingers on the counter. "Dominic mortgaged two container yards to pay Silvio Moretti’s upfront distribution fee. He has a five-million-dollar balloon payment due to the Montreal cartel on the fifteenth. The money is being moved physically through an armored transport masquerading as a regional seafood distributor out of Rockland."
"The Rockland line," Alessandro muttered, his eyes narrowing into cold calculation. "They use the refrigerated trailers because highway weigh stations rarely inspect live seafood shipments due to spoilage risks."
"Exactly," Victor said. "Five million in non-sequential bearer bonds and cash. It moves on Thursday."
"If that payment doesn't reach Montreal," I said slowly, "Silvio Moretti cuts Dominic off."
"Silvio doesn't just cut him off," Victor said with a humorless grin. "Silvio sends three breach squads from Quebec to tear Dominic’s townhouse apart with crowbars."
Alessandro looked at the white ceramic coffee mug in his hand. He turned it slowly, watching the dark surface ripple.
"We don't steal the money," Alessandro said.
May you like
I looked at him, confused. "We don't?"
"No," Alessandro answered, his slate eyes locking onto mine with ruthless brilliance. "We seize it. And then we give it to someone who has the legal authority to destroy Dominic without firing a single shot."
