Chapter 3 - The Gathering Storm
By the time I turned nine years old, I had grown taller, my hair was longer, and I no longer wore the red hoodie, but the city of Chicago was changing around us.
The quiet peace that Vincent Kane had maintained over the city for fifteen years was beginning to crack at the edges.
It started with small things that I wasn't supposed to notice.
Mommy began coming home later from the Kane Foundation, her forehead creased with worry as she sat at the kitchen table, reviewing financial ledgers until long after I was supposed to be asleep. Salvatore, who still drove me to school every morning, stopped listening to the radio and spent the entire drive checking his side mirrors, his hand resting closer to his shoulder holster than usual.
And Vincent was busy.
I didn't see him at his office on Fridays anymore. When I did catch a glimpse of him—usually late at night when his black sedan would idle outside our house on Maple Street while Salvatore went inside to talk to Mommy—he looked tired. The dark shadows under his eyes were deeper, his sharp jawline set in a permanent, tight line.
"Who are the Valenti family, Mommy?" I asked one evening while helping her chop carrots for dinner.
Mommy froze, her knife hovering over the cutting board. She looked down at me, her blue eyes sharp with concern. "Where did you hear that name, Rory?"
"Sal was talking on his earpiece in the car today," I said truthfully. "He said Don Valenti is moving men into the West Side. He sounded angry."
Mommy set the knife down and wiped her hands on her apron. She knelt beside me, taking my hands in hers just like she used to when we lived in the old apartment.
"Rory, listen to me," she said softly. "Mr. Kane is a very powerful man, but he also has enemies. People who want the power he has. The Valenti family comes from New York, and they don't play by the same rules Mr. Kane does. They don't care about the neighborhoods, or the youth centers, or the people living in them."
"Are they bad men?"
"Yes," Mommy said flatly. "Very bad men. So if Sal ever tells you to stay in the car, or if anyone you don't know ever approaches you at school, you run straight to a teacher or an officer. Do you promise me?"
"I promise," I whispered.
The storm broke two weeks later, on a rainy Tuesday in October.
I was sitting in my fourth-grade classroom, drawing a picture of a dragon on the back of my spelling worksheet, when the intercom on the wall buzzed with a sharp, static whine.
"Rory Carter to the main office, please. Rory Carter."
My teacher, Mrs. Gable, looked up from her desk, her eyebrows pulling together. "Rory, sweetie, did your mother say she was picking you up early today?"
"No, ma'am," I said, feeling a sudden, cold knot form in the pit of my stomach.
I gathered my pencils, zipped up my backpack, and walked down the long, linoleum-tiled hallway toward the office. The school felt strangely quiet, the sound of my sneakers squeaking against the clean floors echoing off the locker doors.
When I stepped into the front office, my heart slammed against my ribs.
Salvatore wasn't there.
Instead, standing by the principal's desk, was a man I had never seen before. He was thin, with slicked-back dark hair, wearing a pinstriped suit that looked too shiny. He had a small, thin mustache and pale yellow eyes that looked at me the way a hawk looks at a mouse in a field.
"Ah, there she is," the man smiled, his teeth yellow and crooked. "Little Rory Carter."
Principal Higgins stood behind her desk, looking uncomfortable. "Rory, this gentleman says he's an associate of Mr. Kane's. He says your mother had an emergency at work and asked him to collect you."
I stopped right by the door, my hand gripping the cold metal knob behind my back.
"Where is Sal?" I asked, keeping my voice as flat as I could.
The man chuckled—a dry, greasy sound. "Salvatore was delayed. Important business downtown. Mr. Kane personally asked me to come pick you up, kid. My name is Frankie. Frankie Valenti."
Valenti.
The name echoed in my head like a warning bell ringing in an empty church.
"You're lying," I said, taking a small step backward into the hallway. "Mr. Kane never sends strangers. And Sal never leaves his phone off."
Frankie's smile instantly vanished. The fake polite warmth in his eyes died, replaced by a cold, greasy glare.
"Listen to me, you little brat," Frankie sneered, dropping his hand into his coat pocket as he took two fast steps toward me. "We can do this the easy way, or we can make this real messy for your school principal."
"Rory, run!" Principal Higgins screamed, suddenly realizing what was happening and reaching for the desk phone.
Frankie turned his head for a fraction of a second to glare at the principal—and that was all the time I needed.
I slammed the office door shut, turned on my heel, and sprinted down the hallway as fast as my legs could carry me.
"Hey! Get back here!" I heard Frankie yell behind me, followed by the heavy wooden door crashing open against the wall.
I didn't head for the front exit—the glass doors were locked from the outside during school hours, and I knew he would catch me before I could push the emergency bar. Instead, I turned hard to the left, diving through the double doors that led into the school gymnasium.
The gym was empty, the dark hardwood floor gleaming under the high stadium lights. I sprinted across the bleachers, scrambling up the metal steps like a squirrel, and ducked behind the rolled-up wrestling mats stored in the far corner under the balcony.
I pressed my back against the rubber mats, pulled my knees to my chest, and held my breath, my heart hammering like a trapped bird inside my ribs.
A second later, the heavy doors of the gym swung open with a loud BANG.
"Rory!" Frankie's voice echoed through the massive room, distorted and hollow against the high ceiling. "Come on out, kid! Don't make this hard on yourself! Don't you want to see your mommy?"
My chest tightened. Mommy. Did they have Mommy, too? Was she hurt?
I heard his leather shoes squeaking slowly across the basketball court, step by step, getting closer to the bleachers.
"Your old man Kane is finished, kid," Frankie called out, his voice moving closer to my hiding spot. "He's surrounded in his own building. By tonight, the Valenti family runs Chicago. And you... you're our insurance policy."
He was right at the base of the bleachers now. I could hear him climbing the metal stairs, one heavy step at a time.
One. Two. Three.
I squeezed my eyes shut, clutching the tiny silver dragon key chain on my backpack.
Suddenly, the glass windows high up on the gym roof shattered into a million falling pieces.
CRASH!
Heavy black ropes dropped through the broken skylights, snapping taut against the rafters.
Before Frankie could even raise his gun, two men dressed in black tactical gear slid down the ropes, landing on the hardwood floor with a heavy, synchronized thud.
Right behind them, descending slower, holding a heavy tactical rifle with absolute, terrifying ease, came Salvatore.
"Frankie Valenti!" Salvatore's voice roared through the gym, loud enough to shake the dust off the rafters. "Get your hands off your weapon or I'll leave you spread across this court like a spilled coat of paint!"
Frankie froze on the bleacher steps, three stairs away from my hiding spot. He slowly lifted his hands into the air, his slicked-back hair messy with fallen glass.
"Salvatore," Frankie gasped, his voice squeaking. "Wait... wait a minute... we were just talking—"
Salvatore didn't waste time talking. He kicked the back of Frankie's knee with a heavy boot, sending the thin man tumbling down the metal bleachers to crash onto the floor below, where the two tactical guards immediately pinned him down with heavy boots on his back.
Salvatore sprinted up the stairs, his eyes wild with fear until he spotted me ducked behind the mats.
"Rory!" he shouted, dropping his rifle to his shoulder and dropping to his knees beside me. "Kid! Are you hit? Did he touch you?"
I shook my head, my eyes wide as I looked at him. "Sal! Where's Mr. Vincent? Frankie said—"
"Mr. Kane is fine, kiddo," Sal breathed out, pulling me into a massive, steel-hard hug that smelled like gunpowder and rain. "He knew Valenti was going to make a move on the school. He sent us forty minutes ago. We had to take out three of their spotters on the block before we could breach the building."
He pulled back, holding my shoulders, his rough face trembling slightly.
"You did good, Rory," Sal said softly. "You ran. You hid. You're a smart kid."
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"Is Mommy safe?" I asked, tears finally slipping down my cheeks.
"She's already at the house, protected by six of our best guys," Sal assured me, standing up and scooping me up onto his hip like he used to when I was four years old. "Now come on. Mr. Kane wants to see you."
