Chapter 5 - The Slaughter at Pier 14
The rain was falling in thick, icy sheets over the salt-crusted asphalt of Pier 14.
Warehouse 14 was a massive, rusted structure of corrugated steel, its windows long broken, its interior smelling of diesel fuel, wet wood, and iron.
Inside, thirty armed Duca soldiers were positioned behind shipping crates and steel barrels, their assault rifles aimed at the front entrance.
In the center of the concrete floor, six Moretti enforcers were tied to steel chairs, beat-up and bleeding, but alive.
Standing over them were Marco and Gianni Duca—two brutal, arrogant men in their thirties, wearing heavy leather coats and carrying automatic handguns.
"He's not coming," Gianni spat, wiping rain from his forehead. "The coward is sitting in his mansion surrounded by his guards."
"He'll come," Marco grunted, checking his watch. "Alessandro Moretti never lets his men die for him. That's his weakness."
Suddenly, the heavy iron sliding doors at the front of the warehouse didn't just open—they blew completely off their hinges.
BOOM!
A breaching charge shattered the lock mechanism, sending two tons of steel crashing onto the concrete floor in a blinding cloud of smoke and sparks.
Before the Duca soldiers could clear their eyes, a dark figure stepped through the haze.
Alessandro Moretti stood alone in the center of the doorway, holding a high-caliber shotgun in his right hand, wearing a heavy Kevlar tactical vest over his dark shirt.
"Alessandro!" Marco screamed, raising his pistol. "Kill him!"
Thirty rifles opened fire simultaneously.
The warehouse erupted into a deafening roar of gunfire, muzzle flashes lighting up the dark interior like jagged lightning strikes.
But Alessandro didn't flinch.
He dove behind a massive steel shipping container as bullets ricocheted off the iron sides with deafening screeching noises.
From the high glass skylights forty feet above, ten Moretti snipers who had climbed onto the roof fifteen minutes earlier smashed through the glass, dropping down on steel cables.
RAT-TAT-TAT-TAT!
The battle was over in less than ninety seconds.
The Moretti snipers swept through the warehouse with clinical, terrifying precision, disarming and neutralizing the Duca soldiers before they could even reload their weapons.
When the smoke cleared, twenty-eight Duca men lay disarmed and captured on the floor.
Marco and Gianni Duca were forced onto their knees in the center of the room, their weapons stripped, their faces pale with absolute terror as they stared up at the Don of New York.
Alessandro walked out from behind the steel container, blowing a small trail of smoke from the barrel of his shotgun.
He stopped three feet from the two brothers.
"You took my ships," Alessandro said, his voice echoing off the high iron rafters. "You threatened my men. And you brought chaos to my city."
Marco sobbed, lifting his hands in surrender. "Alessandro! Please! We'll surrender the New Jersey territory! We'll leave the country! Just spare our lives!"
Alessandro looked down at them with absolute, unyielding coldness.
"I gave your father a chance to retire gracefully," Alessandro said softly. "He chose poison. You chose war."
He turned his back on the brothers, stepping toward the captured Moretti hostages, snapping his fingers once to Dante.
"Clean the pier," Alessandro commanded flatly. "And make sure the Duca family name is never spoken in this state again."
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As Alessandro walked out into the cool rain of Pier 14, the gunfire behind him signaled the final, absolute end of the war.
The Moretti empire was secure.
