Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 83755 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83755 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 419(@200wpm)___ 335(@250wpm)___ 279(@300wpm)
“Not bad,” Julian commented, Slater holding his phone up to his ear.
“Yeah?”
“I’ve got Graham.”
“Sweet. How long till you get here? We’re going in now.”
“Good. Ten minutes or so.”
I put the laser cutter back in my backpack and zipped it up. I crouched through the hole, for a moment considering using the flashlight in my pocket. There wasn’t much light in there. The light pole right across the street provided little illumination. I could hardly make out the grouts in between the tiles as I straightened myself out. Yet even a single beam of light could give away our presence. So, when I reached the far side of that lobby, I pulled my mask down my face while Leonardo set his bag down on the floor.
“Here,” he said, slamming a rifle into my palm.
“Over there,” Julian spoke, pointing at a closed door down the hall and to the right.
We jogged off, heavy footsteps resounding through the lobby, the faint noise of cars passing by coming through the glass façade. Being the last one to enter that storage room, I kept the door open. My side to the four guys behind me, I stood by the pane and looked out. A car’s headlights washing across the road, I turned to Julian.
“They’re here,” I said, my voice a little more than a whisper.
The headlights switched off, and Rocco’s large figure stepped out and reached the rear door. In a matter of seconds, he was dragging a smaller man towards the hole in the glass. Thrashing and kicking, hands bound together, that man attempted to break free from the vise-like grip around his neck.
It wasn’t going to happen.
Rocco tossed him through the hole, making him struggle to retain his footing. Grabbing him by the back of his neck, I signaled to him, Graham’s muffled cries reaching my ears.
“Boys, I’d like you to meet a good friend of mine,” Rocco announced, before I pushed the door shut behind them. I pressed the light switch on the wall and shut my eyes for a second; the lush illumination was too much. Undoing the knot on the scarf around his head, Rocco pressed his elbow into Graham’s chest.
“Say ‘hello’ to my friends, rich boy.”
“Hello,” Graham spoke in a faint voice, his wet, brown locks sticking to his forehead. Sweat was dripping down either side of his neck, his chest rising and falling fast and hard.
“Graham here lived up to his rep tonight,” Rocco said, a sarcastic smile on his face. “When those two girls rang his bell, he went wild. He invited them in right away. I was hiding right behind them.”
“Where’s his daddy?” I asked, the idea of spending more time goofing off with Howard’s boy not exactly thrilling me.
“We called him on the way,” Rocco replied. “He should be here any minute. “He should be here any minute. And he knows calling the cops will get his boy whacked.”
At that point, the noise of tires squealing to a halt made me grab the doorknob. I yanked the door open, and spotted a black Mercedes right behind the car Rocco had arrived in. A taller man exited that Benz and headed for the entrance. He shoved the key in the lock, Leonardo and Slater whooshing past me.
“Where are you? Where is my son?!” He cried out, those two gripping his wrists and yanking him back. I walked out of that room, aiming at his head.
“Hey, Howard,” I smirked, approaching him at a quick pace. “Your boy’s with us. You know, the two crews you tried to blow up in a bar in Brooklyn.”
“What?!” Howard yelled, Leonardo and Slater leading him to the room we had been in.
“Don’t play dumb, old man,” Rocco grumbled, pinning Graham against the wall with an elbow to his chest. “We know it was you who put out the fucking hit.”
“All right! All right!” Howard exclaimed, holding his arms over his head. “Yeah, I did. Your crew had fucked up, DeLuca. You’d let these nobodies steal from me. You let them off with a warning the first time they tried ripping me off. I couldn’t have that.”
I stayed out of the room and threw a glance over my shoulder, Cesare’s snarls rising above Graham’s heavy breathing.
“You’re goddamn right we stole from you, you fucking prick.”
Kanin should have been terrified.
All alone, surrounded by six, armed men, and with his son being held at gunpoint should have scared the crap out of him.
Nope.
My eyes staying on the road outside, I heard him chuckle. I shifted my attention back to him in surprise. He had his hands in his pockets, his gaze on Cesare as my cousin stood inches from his spot, trying to intimidate him with his sheer size.
“You’ll fucking regret that, Borelli,” Kanin said, smiling up at him. “That and tonight.”
Right at the end of his sentence, a sense of worry tied my stomach into knots. I felt the back of my neck tightening, my ears picking up noises of screeching tires. A glance outside revealed why Kanin seemed so relaxed. Two cars pulled up behind his Benz. Eight men burst out, rifles in their grasp as they sprinted towards the open entrance.