Chapter 5 - Infiltrating the Safehouse
The old grain terminal by the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal was a monolithic ruin of gray concrete and rusted iron, its towering silos rising against the dark morning sky like the pillars of a forgotten cathedral. The air smelled of stagnant river water, damp grain dust, and the heavy oil of the barges that plied the canal in the dark.
Adrian stood in the shadow of a collapsed conveyor belt, his dark wool coat buttoned to the chin, a submachine gun held flat against his thigh. Beside him stood Artie Pendelton, a seventy-year-old enforcer whose face looked like it had been carved out of a dock piling, holding a short-barreled shotgun with the casual familiarity of a man holding a broom.
Six other men—gray-haired, broad-shouldered, wearing the faded leather jackets of the old union guard—moved through the high weeds of the perimeter with silent, disciplined efficiency.
"The gate is locked from the inside, Adrian," Artie whispered, pointing toward the heavy steel door at the base of the central silo. "Victor’s personal security team has two men on the catwalk above the loading bay. They’ve got high-powered rifles and night-vision scopes."
"They’re looking at the road, Artie," Adrian said, his eyes scanning the concrete walls. "They don't know about the old intake tunnel beneath the wharf. My father used it to ship illegal spirits into the city during the thirty-two strike. It runs directly into the basement of the silo."
"The tunnel’s flooded, Adrian," Artie said. "It’s four feet of river mud."
"Then we wade," Adrian said, stepping down into the dark, foul-smelling water of the canal bank.
The intake tunnel was a narrow brick cylinder, the roof covered in thick clumps of black mold and sleeping bats that stirred as the men moved through the chest-deep slush. The cold water was numbing, biting through Adrian’s clothes, but the heat in his chest—the pure, unadulterated fury of twelve years of deception—kept his limbs steady.
They reached the end of the tunnel after twenty minutes of silent progression. A rusted iron grating blocked the exit, leading into the lower maintenance room of the terminal.
Artie reached into his pocket, pulled out a small, hydraulic jack, and wedged it between the iron bars. With a slow, creaking groan, the metal gave way, the welds snapping with a dull thud that was lost to the sound of the river outside.
Adrian climbed through the gap, his weapon raised, his eyes instantly adapting to the pitch-black interior of the basement. The air was dry here, smelling of old concrete and the distinct, unmistakable scent of human habitation—canned soup, rubbing alcohol, and damp wool.
From the far end of the chamber, behind a heavy steel security door reinforced with iron bars, a low, rhythmic sound echoed through the dark.
It was a man’s voice, hoarse, broken, singing an old Italian lullaby that Adrian’s mother used to sing to them when they were boys in the tenement flats of Little Italy.
"...ninna nanna, ninna noh... la bambina a chi la do..."
Adrian’s breath caught in his throat. He ran toward the door, his boots loud against the concrete floor, his hands flying to the heavy iron bolt.
"Luca!" Adrian shouted, his voice cracking through the silent tomb. "Luca! It’s Adrian!"
The singing stopped.
A face appeared behind the small, barred viewing window of the door. The skin was the color of old paper, the hair long, gray, and matted with dirt. The scar over the eyebrow was twisted into a deep white furrow, but the eyes—the wide, dark hazel eyes—were the eyes of his brother.
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"Adrian?" the voice whispered, a trembling hand reaching through the bars, the fingers thick and scarred where Victor’s enforcers had broken them to get the verification codes. "Adrian... you're dead. Victor told me you died in New York."
"I'm alive, Luca," Adrian said, his hands gripping his brother’s scarred fingers through the steel. "And I’m bringing you home."
