Chapter 5 - Fire in the WarehouseThe North Avenue warehouse was a massive brick fortress storing millions of dollars in electronics and imported goods. By the time Adrian’s black SUV tore through the chain-link perimeter fence, flames were already licking at the loading bays, turning the night sky an angry, bruised orange.

Armed men in tactical gear were retreating toward a fleet of black vans.

“Cole,” Adrian commanded as the car skidded to a halt. “Secure the perimeter. Leave no survivors who can identify our plate numbers.”

“Understood,” Cole said, stepping out with an assault rifle already raised.

Adrian didn’t wait for backup. He kicked open his door and stepped into the smoke-filled courtyard. A Moretti gunman stepped out from behind a stack of burning pallets, raising a submachine gun.

Bang.

Adrian’s shot took the man clean through the shoulder before he could pull his trigger. As the gunman screamed and hit the pavement, Adrian walked past him without a second glance, his face as cold and blank as a tombstone.

Inside the burning warehouse office, Salvatore Moretti himself—an old, gray-haired wolf with a gold Rolex on his wrist—was holding a smoking pistol to the head of a terrified night watchman.

“You think you can squeeze my family out of Baltimore, Crowe?” Salvatore roared over the roar of the flames. “I’ve been running these docks since you were in diapers!”

Adrian stepped into the office doorway, his gun leveled directly at Salvatore’s chest.

“You had a choice, Salvatore,” Adrian said, his voice cutting through the fire like glass. “You could have retired to Florida. Instead, you sent men into my building. You tracked mud onto my floor.”

“Your floor? You’re willing to start a city-wide war over a goddamn office building?”

“No,” Adrian said softly, pulling back the hammer of his pistol. “Over a pair of shoes.”

Salvatore sneered, his finger tightening on the watchman’s trigger. “Let’s see how much you care about shoes when—!”

Thwack.

A heavy steel fire extinguisher, hurled from the warehouse rafters with surprising accuracy, smashed directly into the back of Salvatore’s head. The old mob boss dropped like a stone, unconscious before he hit the floor.

Adrian froze. He lowered his gun slowly and looked up toward the catwalks.

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Steaming slightly in the heat of the fire, wearing a damp beige coat, carrying a canvas bag, and coughing from the smoke, Harper Lane leaned over the railing.

“I told the light rail conductor I was going to be late,” Harper called down, wiping soot from her forehead with a blue-ink-stained thumb. “I didn't realize ‘late’ meant ‘breaking up an illegal mafia execution in a burning warehouse.’ Is this also part of logistics, Mr. Crowe?”