Chapter 2 - The Iron Gates
The taxi smelled faintly of stale peppermint and wet upholstery.
The driver, an older man with a gray cap pulled low over his eyes and a medallion hanging from the rearview mirror that clicked like a metronome, had looked twice at Maya’s flour-dusted sweater and Lucia’s red coat, but he hadn't asked questions. People in Brooklyn learned early: if someone is climbing into your cab at ten o'clock at night with a child who smells like expensive soap and cold air, you turn up the radio and look straight ahead.
As they crossed the bridge, the city lights fell away, replaced by the dark, looming shapes of old-growth trees and high stone walls that looked like they had been built during the Gorse-Era boom.
“Here,” Lucia whispered, pressing her face against the side window. “That’s the gate with the horses.”
The taxi slowed. Rising out of the dark woods like the set of a gothic film was a pair of massive wrought-iron gates, spiked at the top like iron teeth. They were flanked by two stone pillars carved with rearing stallions whose eyes had been weathered smooth by decades of salt air. Beyond them, a long, winding driveway vanished beneath a canopy of ancient, weeping beeches whose white-barked trunks gleamed ghostly in the headlights.
The cab driver hit the brakes twenty feet short of the gatehouse. A pair of heavy-duty security lights mounted on galvanized poles suddenly clicked on, blindingly bright, turning the falling rain into a cage of silver needles.
“Whoa,” the driver muttered, his hands tightening on the steering wheel. “Lady, we shouldn't be here. This is private property. That’s the Vitale place.”
“I know,” Maya said, reaching into her pocket for her worn leather purse. She pulled out a twenty and dropped it onto the console. “Keep the engine running, mister. We’ll be right back.”
“Are you nuts?” the driver hissed, pointing through the windshield.
From the shadows behind the stone guard shack, three men had stepped into the glare of the floodlights. They didn't look like night watchmen. They wore identical charcoal-gray overcoats, their collars turned up against the cold, and their hands were resting casually inside their pockets—though the stiff, unnatural bulges beneath their left arms left no doubt as to what they were carrying.
Maya pushed the door open. The cold air rushed in, carrying the sharp scent of pine needles and damp earth.
“Stay in the car, Lucia,” Maya said gently.
“Don't go out there,” the girl pleaded, grabbing the hem of Maya’s sweater. “They have guns. Uncle Vinnie keeps one in the drawer by the humidor.”
“I’m just going to return some lost property,” Maya said, offering a reassuring smile that felt a little tighter than she intended. “And give your father a piece of my mind about his schedule.”
She stepped out into the mud, the rain instantly plastering her dark hair to the back of her neck.
Before she had taken three steps toward the gate, the world seemed to multiply.
From the dark tree lines on either side of the private road, the low, throaty purr of idling engines erupted. Headlights flared—dozens of them. Sleek black sedans and heavy-duty utility vehicles pulled out from the gravel tracks, their high beams locking onto the taxi like searchlights on a runway.
Doors slammed in unison—a sharp, metallic chorus that echoed off the stone walls.
Shadows detached themselves from the trees, moving with the disciplined, silent efficiency of wolves. In less than ten seconds, the taxi and the small stretch of road around it were completely boxed in by a wall of black metal and broad-shouldered men.
Twenty men. All armed. All watching her with the cold, dead-eyed stillness of statues.
The driver inside the cab threw his hands up against the wheel, his mouth opening in a silent shout of terror.
May you like
Maya didn't run. She stood her ground in the middle of the wet asphalt, her large frame planted solidly, her hands tucked deep into the pockets of her wool jacket to keep them from shaking.
“Well,” she muttered to herself, the wind whipping her shawl across her face. “The local reception committee is certainly thorough.”
