Chapter 7 - The Final Reckoning at the Warehouse
The abandoned logging warehouse on the outskirts of Portland smelled of rotting pine, damp earth, and old iron.
Ethan, Mark, and a four-man Vanguard squad moved through the shadows like phantoms. Inside, surrounded by stacks of rotting crates, sat David Miller—scruffy, terrified, and tied to a wooden chair with thick plastic bindings.
Standing over him was Vincenzo Moretti himself—an old, silver-haired mafia boss with cold, calculating eyes and an expensive wool coat draped over his shoulders, flanked by half a dozen armed bodyguards.
"David, David, David," Vincenzo sneered, tapping the barrel of a polished silver revolver against David’s trembling cheek. "You thought you could steal forty million from my family and hide out in the woods? You're a coward. And now, your wife and your precious little daughter are going to pay the ultimate price for your greed."
"I don't have the key anymore!" David sobbed, his face bruised and bloody. "I gave it to—"
"You gave it to nobody," a cold, commanding voice echoed through the cavernous warehouse.
Vincenzo spun around, raising his revolver.
Step by measured step, Ethan Cole walked out from the shadows into the sickly yellow pool of overhead light, his hands casually tucked into his pockets, an expression of supreme, chilling confidence on his face.
"Ethan Cole," Vincenzo hissed, his eyes narrowing to slits. "You're a long way from Seattle, boy. This doesn't concern you. That rat stole from me."
"He stole from everyone," Ethan replied smoothly. "Including me, when your men decided to use a six-year-old girl as a pawn in your little game."
Vincenzo laughed, a harsh, grating sound. "A pawn? That brat walked into your office because her mother was drowning in debt. And now, you're going to die here, Cole. My men have this warehouse surrounded."
"Do they?" Ethan tilted his head slightly.
Suddenly, red laser sights flickered to life across the chests of every single Moretti enforcer. From the rafters above, from the broken windows, and from every dark corner of the warehouse, dozens of red dots locked onto their targets. Mark and the Vanguard squad had them outflanked and outgunned before they even realized they were the ones trapped.
Vincenzo’s face drained of color. He pressed the barrel of his silver revolver directly against David’s temple. "One move, Cole, and I blow his brains out right now!"
Ethan didn't blink. He didn't even slow his pace as he walked straight toward Vincenzo, ignoring the shaking gun.
"Do it," Ethan whispered, his voice dripping with lethal poison. "Kill him. He abandoned his daughter. He let his wife starve. He's a dead man whether you pull that trigger or I do."
Vincenzo hesitated, his finger twitching on the trigger. He looked at Ethan’s eyes—eyes that held no fear, no hesitation, only the absolute void of a man who had already conquered death.
In that split second of hesitation, Ethan moved with blinding, inhuman speed.
He lunged forward, grabbed the barrel of Vincenzo’s revolver, forced it upward as a shot rang harmlessly into the ceiling, and delivered a devastating palm strike straight to Vincenzo's chest. The old mafia boss collapsed backward, gasping for air as his gun clattered across the concrete floor.
Mark and the Vanguard team swept in like a tidal wave, disarming the remaining enforcers in seconds without a single shot being fired.
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David slumped in his chair, weeping hysterically, while Vincenzo glared up from the floor, defeated and broken.
"It's over, Vincenzo," Ethan said, looking down at his enemy with utter disdain. "Seattle belongs to me. And the Moretti family is history."
