Chapter 5 - The Runway
The roar of the Cessna’s engines masked the sound of my approach, but Marcus didn't need to hear me. The sight of me walking across the wet tarmac, flanked by four heavily armed men and a 120-pound Rottweiler, was enough.
Marcus took a frantic step backward, stumbling against the aluminum stairs of the plane. He looked toward the cockpit, shouting something I couldn't hear over the engines, desperately waving for the pilot to take off.
The pilot, recognizing the men surrounding the aircraft, wisely killed the engines. The propellers whined down to a slow, defeated halt.
The sudden silence on the tarmac was deafening.
I stopped ten feet away from him. Rocco stood at my side, a low, menacing growl rumbling in his chest. He remembered Marcus. He remembered the man who used to pat his head nervously at family dinners.
"Going somewhere, Marcus?" I asked, my voice carrying clearly in the cool night air.
Marcus clutched his leather briefcase to his chest like a shield. He was trembling so violently I could see it from where I stood.
"Dante," he stammered, his voice cracking. "Listen to me. It's a misunderstanding. I was just taking a vacation."
"A vacation with two million dollars of my money and a briefcase full of bearer bonds from my floor safe?" I took a slow step forward. "That’s a very expensive trip."
He realized Vivienne had talked. The last shred of hope drained from his face.
"She made me do it!" Marcus cried, immediately throwing his sister under the bus. "Vivienne manipulated me! She said you were going to divorce her and leave her with nothing! I was just trying to help my family!"
"By murdering an eight-year-old girl?"
Marcus flinched as if I had struck him. He looked wildly at my men, searching for a sympathetic face, but found only stone-cold killers waiting for an order.
"It was an accident!" Marcus shrieked, panic pitching his voice an octave higher. "She startled us! I just grabbed her arm to stop her from running! I didn't mean to push her down the stairs!"
"But you left her there," I said, my voice dropping to a lethal whisper. "You, a doctor, sworn to save lives, looked at a bleeding, crying child and decided your sister’s payout was worth more than her life."
Marcus fell to his knees on the wet tarmac, dropping the briefcase. It popped open, spilling thick stacks of hundred-dollar bills and banded bearer bonds into the puddles.
"I panicked," he sobbed, burying his face in his hands. "I'm sorry. I'll give it all back. Please, Dante. Don't kill me."
I looked down at the pathetic, cowardly man sobbing at my feet.
I had ordered men killed for less. I had destroyed rival operations for minor disrespect. The urge to draw my weapon and end his miserable life right there on the runway was overwhelming. It would be quick. It would be satisfying.
But it wouldn't be justice for Sophie.
I remembered Elena’s face at the funeral. The absolute, shattering devastation of a mother who had lost her only child. A bullet in the head wouldn't give her peace. It would just create another headline.
I looked at Rocco. He was staring at Marcus, waiting for the command.
"I'm not going to kill you, Marcus," I said quietly.
Marcus looked up, tears and rain streaking his face, a pathetic glimmer of hope in his eyes. "You aren't?"
"No," I replied, stepping back. "I’m going to do something much worse."
I turned to Tommy, my head of security.
"Zip-tie him," I ordered. "Put him in the back of the SUV. Leave the money."
Tommy nodded, moving forward swiftly. He hauled a weeping Marcus to his feet and secured his hands behind his back with heavy plastic ties.
"Where are we taking him, Boss?" Tommy asked, shoving Marcus toward the vehicles.
"We are taking him to the police station," I said.
Tommy paused, looking at me in surprise. I never involved the cops. It went against everything the syndicate stood for.
"The police?" Marcus gasped, struggling slightly. "But you're a mob boss! You can't go to the cops! You’ll implicate yourself!"
"I won't implicate myself in anything, Marcus," I smiled, a cold, terrifying expression. "Because you aren't going to tell them about the money. You aren't going to tell them about the safe, or the affairs, or the mob."
I stepped close to him, grabbing him roughly by the collar of his expensive trench coat.
"You are going to walk into that precinct, and you are going to confess to the accidental manslaughter of Sophie Bennett," I whispered into his ear. "You will tell them you were drunk, you stumbled into the pool house, and you accidentally knocked her down the stairs. And then you panicked and fled."
Marcus shook his head frantically. "No! I'll lose my medical license! I’ll go to prison for years!"
"If you don't," I said, my voice dropping to a demonic register, "I will ensure that every day you spend outside of a cell is a living nightmare. I will hunt you. I will hunt Vivienne. I will dismantle your entire family piece by piece until you beg me for death. But if you confess to the police, you go to a nice, safe, minimum-security prison. You do your time. And you live."
I released his collar, letting him stumble back into Tommy’s grip.
"The choice is yours, Doctor," I said. "Prison, or me."
Marcus looked at the dark, desolate airstrip, then at the heavily armed men surrounding him. He realized the absolute finality of my threat.
"I'll confess," he wept, hanging his head in defeat. "I'll tell them."
"Good," I said, turning away from him.
We drove back to Chicago in silence. The rain had stopped, leaving the city slick and gleaming under the streetlights.
We pulled up a block away from the 12th District police precinct.
"Take him in, Tommy," I instructed. "Make sure he talks to Detective Harris. He’s on our payroll; he’ll ensure the confession is recorded cleanly without any... unnecessary details."
"Yes, Boss," Tommy nodded, hauling Marcus out of the SUV.
I watched from the tinted windows as Marcus, defeated and broken, walked up the steps into the precinct, surrounded by my men.
The immediate threat was handled. The murderer was behind bars.
But as I sat in the quiet SUV, stroking Rocco’s massive head, I knew the war wasn't over.
Vivienne was still locked in the warehouse. She had betrayed me, stolen from me, and lied about the death of a child.
She was my wife. And I had no idea what to do with her.
My phone buzzed, breaking the silence. It was an encrypted message from an unknown number.
May you like
I opened it.
I know what you did at the airstrip, Dante. You think you solved the problem, but you only cut off one head of the snake. Check your offshore accounts.
