Chapter 7 - The Corporate Execution
Teterboro Airport was freezing, the tarmac swept by a biting winter wind.
My black SUV tore through the security gates, ignoring the frantic waving of airport guards who knew better than to stop a Moretti motorcade. We pulled directly onto the active tarmac, cutting off Julian’s private charter just as it began taxiing toward the runway.
I stepped out of the vehicle into the howling wind, my heavy wool overcoat billowing behind me.
The jet’s engines powered down as the pilot realized he wasn't going anywhere. The emergency stairs hissed open, and Julian appeared at the top, clutching a leather briefcase to his chest, looking terrified.
I climbed the metal stairs slowly, my boots clanking against the steps.
“V-Vincent!” Julian stammered, sweating despite the sub-zero temperature. “What is the meaning of this? I’m on urgent corporate business for the London expansion!”
“You’re running with two hundred million dollars of my liquid capital and trying to sell my shipping routes to a shell corporation in Zurich,” I said, my voice dangerously calm.
Julian swallowed hard, taking a step back inside the cabin. “I—I don't know what you're talking about—”
I grabbed him by the throat and slammed him against the exterior wall of the aircraft, lifting his feet off the floor.
“You thought with me distracted by the Russian hit squad and the baby, you could slip out the back door and take over the empire,” I growled, my face inches from his. “You forgot one crucial detail, Julian.”
“W-What?” he gasped, clawing weakly at my wrists.
“I built this empire from the blood of men much smarter and much more dangerous than you.”
I pulled out my silenced pistol and pressed the barrel squarely against his kneecap.
“Please, Vincent! I have a family!”
“So do I,” I replied.
Bang.
Julian’s scream was swallowed by the roar of the wind as he collapsed onto the metal flooring of the plane, clutching his shattered leg.
I stepped over him, picked up his briefcase, and tossed it to Mateo, who was waiting at the bottom of the stairs.
“Tie him up, put him in the cargo hold, and fly him to our facility in upstate New York,” I ordered without looking back. “Let him think about treason while he shovels gravel for the next ten years.”
As I descended the stairs, my phone buzzed. It was Sloan.
I answered immediately, my heart skipping a beat. “Sloan? Is everything alright with Willa?”
“She’s fine,” Sloan’s voice came through the speaker, breathless and hurried. “Vincent... you need to come back to the penthouse right now. There’s someone here in the lobby waiting for you. She says she’s your mother.”
May you like
I froze on the tarmac.
My mother had died twenty years ago in a car crash in Sicily. Or so my father had always told me.
