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Chapter 8 - The War for the City

Pier 42 was a ghost town of rusted shipping containers and low-hanging fog off the East River.

When Marcus’s sedan slipped into the shadows of an adjacent warehouse, the sound of gunfire was already deafening. The sharp, rapid cracks of automatic weapons echoed inside the cavernous metal structures, accompanied by the occasional concussive blast of a shotgun.

"Stay in the car," Marcus ordered, checking his weapon. "If I'm not back in five minutes, hit the ignition and drive south until you see a police precinct."

"Marcus—"

But he was already gone, moving through the fog like a shadow.

Maya couldn't just sit there. The smell of copper and rain was back, heavier this time, suffocating her. She slipped out of the passenger side, keeping low to the ground as she crawled behind a stack of wooden pallets.

Through the shattered windows of the main warehouse, she saw him.

Damian Voss was pinned behind a overturned steel forklift, his white shirt completely soaked in blood—some of it his own, most of it belonging to the three Marcone thugs lying motionless near his boots. He was reloading his weapon with a brutal, mechanical efficiency, but he was surrounded.

Across the room stood Don Silvio Marcone—a grotesque, heavy-set man in a silk track jacket, flanked by his remaining enforcers and a bound, bleeding Anthony Voss.

"It’s over, Voss!" Marcone bellowed, his voice echoing off the corrugated iron walls. "Your house is burning down in Westchester, your men are dead, and your own cousin handed me the keys to your kingdom. Drop the gun and maybe I let the girl have a quick death."

Damian didn't look up from his weapon. "You should have checked the news before you left your house this morning, Silvio."

"What are you talking about?" Marcone sneered.

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"Your banks in Switzerland," Damian said calmly, his voice carrying perfectly over the lapping waves of the river. "Your logistics hubs in Newark. Your private estate in Long Island. My captains didn't stay at the mansion, Silvio. They were waiting outside your doors. At this exact moment, the Marcone family no longer exists. You have no money, no territory, and no empire left to defend."

Marcone’s face went completely purple with rage. "Kill him! Kill him now!"

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