Chapter 5 - The Siege of Greystone
At three-forty-five in the morning, the storm reached its terrifying crescendo. Lightning cracked across the Hudson River, illuminating the dense forest surrounding the northern perimeter of the Greystone estate.
Near the heavy iron rear gate, the rain poured down in relentless sheets.
Suddenly, a loud EXPLOSION shattered the quiet night.
A thermite charge detonated against the hinges of the iron gate, sending a shower of white-hot sparks into the darkness. The heavy gates collapsed outward into the mud.
Six black, heavy-duty SUVs roared through the breached entrance, their headlights cut off, their tires churning up the manicured gravel drive.
Inside the lead vehicle sat Marco Bellini.
He was wearing a dark tactical jacket, a leather-wrapped automatic pistol resting on his lap. His face was contorted in a mixture of frantic panic and psychotic ambition.
"Move fast!" Marco roared into his radio headset to the twelve mercenaries distributed across the convoy. "Target one is the staff cottage behind the kitchen garden! Eliminate the woman and the child immediately! Target two is the main house! Secure Vincent Moretti in his study!"
The convoy tore up the long driveway, surrounding the stone staff cottage.
The mercenaries spilled out of the vehicles like roaches, clad in dark body armor, holding suppressed automatic rifles. They kicked the front door of the cottage open with a heavy crash, storming inside, clearing the ground floor with tactical precision.
"Clear!" one mercenary yelled.
"Clear upstairs!" another shouted down the stairs. "The place is empty! They're not here!"
Marco stepped into the cottage hallway, his eyes wide with rage. He smashed his fist against the wooden doorframe. "Dammit! Where are they?!"
Suddenly, every exterior floodlight across the forty-acre estate snapped on simultaneously.
BLINDING. WHITE. LIGHT.
The entire courtyard, the kitchen gardens, and the driveway were illuminated with fifty thousand watts of halogen brightness, turning night into absolute day.
Over the estate’s powerful emergency PA system, a calm, resonant voice echoed across the storming sky.
"You always were impatient, Marco."
Marco froze. He spun around, staring toward the stone terrace of the main mansion fifty yards away.
Standing on the elevated stone balcony, framed by the blazing floodlights, was Vincent Moretti. He wore his long wool overcoat, his hands casually tucked into his pockets, looking down at Marco and his mercenaries as if they were nothing more than trespassing vermin.
Flanking the entire perimeter of the courtyard—positioned on the roofs, behind the stone pillars, and along the garden walls—were twenty-four of Vincent’s elite tactical guards, their laser sights painting two dozen red dots across the chests of Marco’s mercenaries.
The mercenaries froze, instantly realizing they had driven straight into a perfectly executed kill box.
"Drop your weapons!" Anton’s voice boomed over the loudspeakers. "Drop them now or you will be erased!"
Clatter. Clatter. Clatter.
The mercenaries, recognizing that they were completely outmatched and outpositioned, dropped their automatic rifles onto the wet gravel, raising their hands in immediate surrender.
"You cowardly fools!" Marco screamed, pulling his automatic pistol from his belt and firing wildly toward the balcony.
BANG! BANG!
The bullets whined harmlessly off the reinforced stone balustrade.
Vincent didn't even flinch. He didn't step back.
Anton raised his sniper rifle from the roof, taking aim. "Permission to eliminate the target, Boss?"
"No," Vincent’s calm voice came over Anton's earpiece. "He belongs to me."
Vincent walked slowly down the grand stone staircase leading into the courtyard, stepping out into the pouring rain. His guards stepped forward, instantly securing the surrendering mercenaries, forcing them to their knees on the wet stone.
Marco stood alone in the center of the courtyard, soaked to the skin, his gun shaking violently in his hand, his eyes wild and bloodshot.
"Stay back, Vincent!" Marco shrieked, backing toward his SUV. "Stay back, or I swear to God I'll blow your head off!"
Vincent continued walking toward him, his leather shoes clicking against the wet flagstones.
"Five years, Marco," Vincent said softly, his dark eyes locked onto his former friend. "I gave you power. I gave you wealth. I gave you my trust. I treated you like a brother when my own blood was gone."
"You made me a servant!" Marco screamed, tears of rage mixing with the rain on his face. "I did the dirty work! I built this empire while you sat in your study crying over a dead kid! I earned this place!"
Vincent stopped ten feet from him.
"You didn't earn anything, Marco," Vincent whispered, his voice cold as the grave. "You tried to murder your own sister. You tried to murder my daughter. You are nothing."
"She’s a bastard!" Marco yelled, raising his gun directly at Vincent's chest. "She’s a worthless little—"
Vincent moved with terrifying, blinding speed.
Before Marco could pull the trigger, Vincent bridged the distance, his broad hand snapping out like a steel vise, grabbing Marco’s wrist and twisting it violently upward.
CRACK!
Marco shrieked in agony as his wrist snapped. The gun fell into the puddle below.
Vincent grabbed Marco by the throat, driving his heavy frame backward against the hood of the black SUV with bone-crushing force. Marco choked, clawing wildly at Vincent’s arms, but Vincent’s grip was absolute—a grip forged in thirty years of violence and unyielding willpower.
"Look at me, Marco," Vincent commanded, his face inches from Marco's terrified, bruised face.
Marco looked into Vincent’s obsidian eyes. He saw no mercy there. He saw only the dark, ancient justice of a Don who had been pushed too far.
"You took five years of my daughter's life," Vincent whispered into his ear. "You will spend the rest of yours in a dark cell beneath federal jurisdiction, praying every night that I don't decide to visit."
Vincent turned his head slightly. "Anton."
"Sir?"
"Call the Federal Prosecutor’s Office. Tell them Don Moretti has a gift for them—a complete treason dossier, illegal weapons charges, and contract murder attempts on Marco Bellini."
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"Understood, Mr. Moretti."
Vincent released his grip. Marco collapsed into the mud, sobbing, clutching his broken wrist, as two security guards pulled him to his feet and dragged him away into the dark rain.
