Chapter 3 - The Gathering Storm
By 1:00 AM, the Monarch Room was empty of customers, but Table Twelve remained occupied. Preston Hale and his friends were forced to sit perfectly still, their hands flat on the table, watched over by Victor and three armed guards.
Elena sat in the manager's office, wrapped in a heavy cashmere coat that Dominic had ordered one of his men to fetch from his car. A private physician, brought in through the service elevator, was carefully applying a soothing ointment to her scratched scalp.
Dominic stood by the window, looking out over the Chicago River. The city lights reflected in his cold eyes.
"You should have called the driver, El," Dominic said, his back still turned to her. There was a rare, raw strain of pain in his voice. "The moment they became rowdy. You should have called."
"If I called every time a customer was rude, Dom, I wouldn't be doing the job," Elena replied, her voice dropping as the doctor finished his work and quietly left the room. She stood up and walked over to her husband, placing a hand on his rigid shoulder. "I didn't think they would go that far. They were drunk. They felt invincible."
"No one is invincible," Dominic turned, his hands framing her face, his thumbs wiping away the lingering dust of the restaurant floor from her cheeks. "Especially not boys who hide behind their fathers' bank accounts. I let you do this because you wanted your independence. But this... this is a declaration of war against my house."
"What are you going to do?"
"Richard Hale thinks he owns the city council," Dominic said, a dark smile touching his lips. "He thinks his public contracts are secure. By sunrise, the union workers on every single one of his construction sites will lay down their tools. The concrete supply trucks will turn around. The shipping ports will refuse his freight. I am going to freeze his entire empire before he even wakes up for breakfast."
"And Preston?" Elena asked.
Dominic’s eyes darkened. "Preston belongs to you. Whatever you want done with him, it will happen. But first, we destroy his father."
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The door to the office opened, and Victor stepped in. "Boss, Richard Hale is downstairs at the security gate. He brought his personal attorney and the deputy police chief. He’s demanding to see his son."
Dominic straightened his vest. "Tell the deputy chief that if he takes one step onto my property, I’ll release the ledger from the East Side docks from 2024. He’ll know what that means. As for Richard Hale... bring him up alone."
