Chapter 6 - Blood on the Docks
The Chicago docks at 2:00 AM smelled of wet concrete, diesel fuel, and rotting lake water.
Victor Cross’s black armored Tahoe was parked right outside Warehouse 4. Inside, twelve of the syndicate’s top enforcers were leaning over crates of imported goods, laughing and smoking cigarettes, completely unaware that the world they thought they controlled had just imploded.
The heavy steel sliding door of the warehouse didn't open quietly.
It screeched against the concrete track as Gabriel kicked it open with a deafening crash.
All twelve enforcers reached for their weapons instantly. But they froze when they saw who was rolling through the doorway.
It wasn't Gabriel.
It was Sebastian Lombardi.
He wasn't sitting back in his chair like an invalid. He was leaning forward, his forearms resting on his thighs, his dark overcoat billowing slightly in the damp lake wind. Standing right behind him, pushing his chair, was me. And flanking us were Gabriel and four of the most lethal enforcers in the city, their submachine guns raised and locked.
Victor Cross stepped out from behind a stack of wooden crates, a confused, arrogant smirk on his face.
“Lombardi?” Cross laughed, stepping forward. “What the hell are you doing down here at this hour? And what’s with the muscle? Did someone forget to load your dinner tray?”
Sebastian didn't answer right away. He rolled his chair another ten feet into the center of the warehouse floor, right under the glaring yellow sodium lights.
Then, slowly, deliberately, Sebastian Lombardi placed his hands on the armrests of his titanium chair.
Cross’s smirk faltered. The enforcers stopped laughing.
Sebastian pushed down with his arms.
Clack.
The locking mechanism of the footplates disengaged.
Sebastian placed his right boot firmly on the cold concrete. Then his left.
For the first time in twenty years, under the flickering lights of a Chicago warehouse, Sebastian Lombardi stood up.
He stood six-foot-two, broad-shouldered, towering over the men who had spent two decades treating him like a disabled king in a gilded cage. His legs trembled slightly as the long-dormant muscles fought to support his weight, but he didn't fall. He locked his knees, squared his shoulders, and stared straight at Victor Cross.
Color drained entirely from Cross’s face. He stumbled backward, his hand fumbling frantically for his shoulder holster.
“No... that’s impossible,” Cross choked out, his eyes wide with primordial terror. “The... the neural block... Dr. Vance said—”
“Dr. Vance talks too much,” Sebastian said. His voice echoed off the steel corrugated walls like thunder.
Cross drew his pistol.
He never cleared leather.
Before Cross’s finger could even touch the grip, Gabriel’s submachine gun barked once. A 9mm round caught Cross squarely in the shoulder, spinning him around and slamming him hard against a stack of steel barrels. Cross screamed, dropping his weapon as blood pooled on the concrete.
The other twelve enforcers dropped their guns instantly, raising their hands and backing away toward the shadows, staring at Sebastian in absolute, trembling worship and fear.
Sebastian walked—slowly, heavily, but entirely on his own two feet—across the concrete floor until he was standing inches away from the bleeding, whimpering traitor.
“You thought you owned me, Victor,” Sebastian whispered, looking down at the man who had helped lock him in a chair.
“Boss... please,” Cross sobbed, clutching his shattered shoulder. “It was Sterling! It was the politicians! They made me do it!”
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Sebastian didn't blink. He reached down, grabbed Cross by the collar of his shirt with one hand, and hoisted him off the ground with a strength that defied two decades of muscle atrophy.
“Tell my father,” Sebastian whispered into the dying traitor's ear, “that I’m coming to dinner.”
