Chapter 9 - THE AMBUSH AT ENGINE 42
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The black Mercedes jumped the curb at forty miles per hour, smashing directly into the side of an idling Dodge Ram.
Metal shrieked, glass exploded into the street, and the heavy impact threw me violently against my seatbelt.
Before the smoke could even clear, Luca kicked his driver's side door open and stepped out into the pouring rain.
Gunfire erupted instantly, tearing through the evening air with deafening cracks that echoed off the brick buildings.
Pedestrians screamed in terror, scattering into nearby restaurants and storefronts as war erupted on the streets of Chicago.
Luca fired with terrifying precision, taking down two masked gunmen who were attempting to deploy heavy rifles from the truck bed.
Marco's Suburbans screeched to a halt behind us, and eight Moretti soldiers flooded the street, laying down heavy suppressing fire.
"Claire, stay down!" Luca yelled over his shoulder, his trench coat billowing in the wind as he advanced through the crossfire.
"No! He's inside!" I screamed, kicking my door open and scrambling out onto the wet pavement.
I crawled behind the cover of a concrete planter, staying low as bullets ricocheted off the brick exterior of the firehouse.
The large red bay doors of Engine 42 were closed, but the small pedestrian access door on the side had been kicked open.
I saw a third gunman in a tactical vest slipping inside, carrying a silenced automatic submachine gun.
"Luca! One got inside through the side door!" I shouted at the top of my lungs.
Luca turned, saw the open entryway, and sprinted through the rain like an enraged lion.
I followed right behind him, adrenaline completely drowning out any sense of self-preservation.
We burst into the cavernous garage of the firehouse, where the massive red fire engines gleamed under bright fluorescent lights.
A loud commotion echoed from the upstairs crew quarters—the sound of breaking wood and shouting men.
Luca bounded up the metal stairs three at a time, his gun raised, his face completely devoid of fear.
I reached the top landing just in time to see the masked gunman kick open the door to the captain's office.
"Captain Miller!" the gunman yelled, raising his weapon toward the man standing behind the desk.
Samuel Miller was standing there in his navy blue uniform trousers and a grey department t-shirt.
He didn't freeze, and he didn't cower.
With the lightning-fast reflexes of a trained athlete, Samuel grabbed a heavy brass fire extinguisher from the wall bracket.
He hurled the heavy metal cylinder with incredible force, striking the gunman squarely in the chest.
The impact knocked the shooter off balance, his bullets spraying wildly into the acoustic ceiling tiles.
Before the assassin could recover his aim, Luca stepped into the doorway and fired two clean shots into the man's chest.
The gunman collapsed onto the linoleum floor, motionless, his weapon clattering across the room.
The silence that followed was deafening, broken only by the hum of the overhead lights and the distant wail of police sirens.
Samuel stood behind his desk, his breathing heavy, his hazel eyes wide with shock as he stared at the armed intruder.
Then, Samuel's gaze slowly drifted upward, locking onto the face of the man who had just saved his life.
Luca lowered his smoking weapon, his entire body trembling as he stood in the doorway of his brother's office.
For ten agonizing seconds, neither man spoke a single word.
They stood five feet apart, two men from completely different worlds, staring at their own reflections in each other's faces.
The identical bone structure, the identical eyes, the identical scar running along their left jawlines from childhood chickenpox.
Samuel swallowed hard, his voice trembling with profound confusion.
"Who... who are you?" Samuel asked, his hands shaking slightly against his desk.
Luca dropped his gun to the floor, raised his empty hands, and took a single, hesitant step forward.
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"My name is Luca Moretti," he whispered, tears streaming freely down his rugged face.
"And thirty years ago, your name was Julian."
