Chapter 5 - The Snake Sheds Its Skin
The convoy of eight blacked-out, bulletproof SUVs rolled silently onto the Interstate 88 heading west toward Geneva, Illinois.
The rain was falling in thick, heavy sheets, bouncing violently off the armored windshields while lightning flashed across the dark skies.
I sat in the captain’s seat of the lead vehicle, an automatic assault rifle resting across my knees, checking the tactical magazines mounted on my tactical vest. Beside me, Antonio was reviewing the digital blueprints of the Apex Logistics compound on a military-grade tablet.
“The Geneva compound is built like a bunker, Marco,” Antonio reported, pointing his scarred finger at the screen. “Ten-foot concrete walls reinforced with steel rebar. Thermal sensors along the tree line. Automated security gates. Dominic Moretti isn't stupid. He knows if you ever found out his family was holding your wife on Illinois soil, you’d burn the entire county down.”
“Dominic Moretti is an arrogant child playing with his father’s gun,” I said, racking the bolt of my rifle with a heavy metallic click. “He thinks because he’s three hundred miles from New York, he’s safe. He doesn't realize that in Illinois, I am the law.”
Suddenly, the encrypted tactical radio mounted on the dashboard crackled to life with loud static.
“Boss! This is Team Three at the Lake Forest estate! We have a breach! I repeat, we have a breach!”
My blood turned to liquid nitrogen. I grabbed the radio receiver instantly.
“Report!” I barked into the mic.
“It’s Matteo’s loyalists, Boss! A rogue squad of ten mercenaries just rammed a garbage truck through the west perimeter fence! They’re pushing toward the main house—they’re going after the little girl!”
“SOPHIA!” I screamed, my hand gripping the radio receiver so hard the plastic cracked.
“We’re engaging them in the courtyard, Boss!” the guard shouted over the sound of intense automatic gunfire blasting through the speaker. “Captain Frank is holding the second-floor stairwell! But they brought heavy explosives!”
Matteo had a backup plan.
Even from inside my sub-basement cell, his personal guards had triggered a timed contingency hit. If Matteo didn't check in by midnight, his men were ordered to breach my house, execute my daughter, and create enough chaos for Matteo’s sympathizers to break him out of the foundry cell.
“Turn two SUVs around!” Antonio ordered the driver frantically. “Marco, we have to go back—!”
“NO!” I roared, my voice cutting through the panic like an iron blade.
Antonio froze, staring at me in shock.
“We do not turn around,” I commanded, my eyes glowing with a terrifying, apocalyptic rage. “Frank and twenty of my best men are at that house. If they can’t protect my daughter, then none of us deserve to breathe. We hit Geneva NOW. We get Alina before Dominic realizes the strike failed!”
I grabbed the radio mic again. “Frank! Do you hear me?!”
Static cleared, and Captain Frank’s heavy, wheezing voice came through the speaker. “I hear you, Don Marco! I’m standing at the top of the stairs! Nobody touches your daughter tonight unless they step over my dead body!”
“Hold the line, Frank,” I whispered. “I’m bringing you their heads by morning.”
I slammed the radio back onto its cradle and looked at the driver.
May you like
“Step on the gas,” I ordered. “Break every red light between here and the river.”
The heavy V8 engines roared as eight armored SUVs accelerated through the blinding rainstorm, tearing down the highway toward the compound at one hundred miles per hour.
