Chapter 7 - The Siege of Pier 4
The sun rose over Brooklyn behind a blanket of heavy grey clouds, casting a dull, metallic light over the waters of Upper New York Bay.
At 6:30 AM, three black SUVs pulled through the rusted chain-link gates of Pier 4, stopping in a semicircle around Container 402.
Eight men stepped out into the chilly morning air, led by Falcone himself—a short, stocky man in his late sixties wearing a custom camel-hair coat, his silver hair slicked back tightly against his skull. Beside him stood Jimmy "The Hook," his jaw wrapped in heavy white bandages, his eyes burning with pure hatred.
"Where is Viktor?" Falcone barked, looking around the empty, foggy dock. "He was supposed to have the transport trucks ready twenty minutes ago."
"Viktor isn't coming, Falcone," a voice called out from the high metal catwalk thirty feet above the ground.
Falcone snapped his head up.
I was standing on the narrow steel walkway, framed against the grey morning sky, holding a heavy manila folder in my left hand.
"Vance," Falcone spat, his face twisting into a scowl. "I thought Jimmy put a bullet in you last night."
"Jimmy couldn't hit a barn door from three feet away, Falcone," I called down, my voice echoing off the corrugated iron walls of the surrounding warehouses. "And your little framing scheme against Rosa Vargas is over."
Falcone let out a short, bark of laughter, reaching into his camel-hair coat for a cigar. "You think you're clever, Leo? You come here alone to play hero? Look around you! I have eight armed men on this dock! You're thirty feet up on a rusty ladder with nowhere to run!"
"I'm not alone, Falcone," I smiled down at him.
From the fog behind the shipping containers, the low, mechanical rumble of multiple heavy engines began to echo across the pier.
Four massive union tugboats pulled up along the dock wall, their bright floodlights suddenly snapping on, blinding Falcone and his men in a wall of intense white light!
At the same time, six dark blue sedans tore through the front gates, their sirens blaring as thirty armed officers from the Waterfront Commission and the Federal Bureau of Investigation spilled out across the asphalt, their weapons drawn and leveled!
"Federal agents! Drop your weapons! Hands on your heads now!" a loud bullhorn echoed from the lead vehicle.
Falcone’s men panicked, tossing their handguns onto the wet pavement as they raised their hands into the air. Jimmy "The Hook" tried to run toward the edge of the dock, but two federal officers tackled him onto the wooden planks, slamming him face-first into the salt-stained timber.
Falcone stood alone in the center of the piercing floodlights, his cigar dropping from his lips into a puddle at his feet. He looked up at the catwalk, his eyes filled with shock and rage.
"You called the feds?" Falcone screamed through the noise of the sirens. "You broke the code, Vance! You're a rat!"
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I walked down the iron stairs slowly, stopping three feet in front of him as two federal agents moved in to snap heavy steel handcuffs around his wrists.
"I didn't break any code, Falcone," I whispered, leaning down so only he could hear me. "I protected my family. That’s the only code that ever mattered."
