Chapter 4 - The Printing Press at 5th Street
Rain began to fall over Queens at 11:00 AM—a freezing, grey New England drizzle that turned the pavement slick and black.
The old printing press on 5th Street was a sprawling, derelict brick monster from the 1920s. Its high arched windows were dark, shattered, and covered with rusted iron bars. Pigeons roosted in the rotting wooden roof beams, their coos swallowed by the dull rumble of distant highway traffic.
In the alley behind the building, a sleek black GMC Van sat idling, exhaust curling up into the damp air like white smoke.
Inside a darkened second-floor office overlooking the alley, Marco Santini stood by a dusty window, holding a military-grade tracking monitor. On the screen, three blinking blue dots were moving rhythmically along 8th Avenue toward Kennedy Airport.
"He's running," Marco laughed—a wet, raspy sound that shook his narrow chest. He touched the deep, jagged scar running from his left ear to his collarbone—the mark I had given him fifteen years ago when he tried to sell our distribution routes to the Moretti family. "Look at him, Miller. The great Vincent Torino is bolting for his private jet like a whipped dog."
Standing beside him was Special Agent Sarah Miller. She was thirty-five, sharp-featured, wearing an expensive tailored trench coat over her federal tactical uniform. Her eyes were fixed on her secure satellite comms link.
"It’s too easy, Marco," Miller said, her brow furrowing with sudden suspicion. "Vincent doesn't run. He didn't run during the '08 turf war, and he didn't run when the grand jury subpoenaed his bank accounts last year. Why would he take three armored vehicles straight down 8th Avenue during peak delivery hours?"
"Because he’s old!" Marco spat, turning around to face her, his eyes wild with a blend of paranoia and avarice. "He’s soft! He spent the last ten years building hospital wings and buying art! He lost his edge the moment he started acting like a businessman!"
Down in the alley, inside the black GMC Van, Daniel Vance’s wife, Sarah, was sitting tied to a steel support pillar, holding her weeping four-year-old son, Leo, against her chest. Standing near the rear doors were two heavy-set mercenaries wearing tactical black parkas, their weapons held casually at their sides.
"Hey," one of the mercenaries grunted, looking out the tinted rear window. "You hear that?"
"Hear what?" the second guard asked, chewing on a toothpick.
"Sounds like... water running."
Before the guard could finish his sentence, the heavy iron storm drain cover directly beneath the rear bumper of the van exploded upward with violent force!
A heavy flashbang grenade clattered against the floor of the alley.
BANG-FLASH!
A blinding white light and a 160-decibel shockwave shattered the alley air!
The two mercenaries screamed, clutching their eyes and ears as they stumbled backward against the van's side doors.
Before they could recover, the rear doors of the van were violently ripped off their hinges from the outside! Mateo’s massive, black-gloved hands reached into the cabin, grabbed the first guard by his tactical vest, and hurled him six feet through the air into the brick wall. The second guard tried to raise his sidearm, but a single suppressed shot from my weapon took him cleanly through the shoulder, knocking him unconscious onto the asphalt.
"Clear!" Mateo roared.
I stepped over the fallen guards, stepping into the back of the van.
Sarah Vance shrank back against the pillar, screaming, clutching her little boy to her chest.
"Mrs. Vance," I said, keeping my weapon pointed toward the floor, my voice calm and low. "Your husband sent me. My name is Vincent Torino."
She stopped screaming, her tear-streaked face pale with shock. "Vincent...? But... Daniel said you were going to kill us!"
"Daniel was mistaken," I said, reaching down with a small pocket knife to slice the zip-ties binding her wrists. "Your husband is currently drinking coffee in my kitchen. And your son... Sophia asked me to make sure he got home safe."
At the mention of Sophia’s name, Sarah let out a long, sobbing breath of relief. "The little girl from 3A? She... she went down to the garage?"
"She saved all of us," I said, gently helping her to her feet and handing her over to two of my bodyguards. "Take them to the safehouse in Brooklyn. Secure the perimeter."
"What about you, Boss?" Mateo asked, adjusting his night-vision goggles as he looked toward the fire escape stairs leading up to the second floor of the printing press.
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I looked up at the frosted, shattered windows of the second floor, where Marco Santini was still waiting for his wiretap to deliver a victory that was never coming.
"Marco and I have an appointment fifteen years in the making," I said. "And Agent Miller needs to learn how we do business in Queens."
