Chapter 7 - The Unraveling
The headquarters of the Marconi family was housed behind an innocuous-looking import-export warehouse down by the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
It was midnight when the unmarked black SUV pulled up to the loading dock.
The heavy iron doors didn't even have time to slide open before a burst of automatic gunfire blew the electronic keypad to pieces. The doors groaned and shuddered, then collapsed inward under the force of a hydraulic ram fitted to the front of Dominic's armored vehicle.
Inside the warehouse office, Don Vincente Marconi looked up from his desk, his cigar halfway to his mouth, his eyes widening in sheer disbelief as Dominic Moretti walked through the wreckage with an MP5 hanging casually from one hand and blood spatter across his white shirt.
"Moretti..." Marconi sputtered, scrambling for the gold-plated revolver sitting on his desk.
He never touched it.
Dominic raised his weapon and blew the revolver off the desk with a single, deafening shot that sent wood splinters flying into Marconi's face.
"Sit down, Vincente," Dominic said, walking slowly across the room, his boots crunching on broken glass.
Marconi collapsed back into his leather chair, trembling violently. "You're crazy. You're attacking a family seat over a couple of street kids? You've gone soft!"
Dominic leaned over the desk, planting both hands on the mahogany surface, bringing his face inches from the older mob boss.
"You touch my family, Vincente, and you find out just how hard I really am," Dominic whispered, his voice like grinding stones. "Salvatore is dead. Your hit squad is dead. And if you ever breathe the name Rossi in anything other than a prayer again, I will scatter your ashes across the Atlantic before the sun comes up."
Marconi nodded rapidly, his face slick with sweat. "I swear... I swear on my mother's grave, Dominic. No more. We're done."
Dominic straightened up, flicked the safety on his weapon, and turned toward the door. As he reached the threshold, he stopped and looked back over his shoulder.
"One more thing, Vincente."
"What? What is it?"
"Who drove the car that hit Elena Rossi two months ago?"
Marconi blinked, caught completely off guard. "The... the hit-and-run? That wasn't us, Dominic! I swear to God, that was an accident! Some junkie driving a stolen sedan off the Manhattan Bridge ramp. The driver was picked up by the cops that same night in New Jersey — name was Frankie 'The Tooth' Salvo. He’s doing twenty years in Trenton state prison right now!"
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Dominic stared at him for a long, heavy moment, reading every micro-expression on the old man's face. Marconi wasn't lying.
Dominic turned and walked out into the night, leaving the Marconi family broken, terrified, and utterly defeated.
