Chapter 5 - The Ambush at Gary Airfield
The wind blowing off the industrial salt flats near the Gary Regional Airport was harsh, tasting of ash, sulfur, and frozen lake water.
At 0330 hours, a sleek, twin-engine private jet taxied silently to the far end of Runway 4, away from the main terminal lights. The engines whined to a stop, the landing gear settling into the cracked asphalt.
Five men stepped down the airstairs. They were dressed in dark tactical coats, carrying heavy leather duffel bags that clanked with the distinct sound of short-barreled automatic weapons and heavy suppressors.
Leading the team was Bernardo "The Hammer" Rizzoli—the chief enforcer for the Genovese family in New York. A hulking brute of a man with a scarred jaw and eyes like a dead shark.
"Where is Victor's car?" Bernardo barked, looking around the pitch-black airfield. The rain was turning into sleet, stinging his face. "He was supposed to have three vehicles waiting near the hangar."
"I don't like this, boss," one of the hitmen muttered, unzipping his bag to grip an MP5 submachine gun. "It's too quiet. The tower lights are off."
Suddenly, the floodlights atop the three surrounding industrial hangars burst into blinding, white life.
The entire apron was illuminated with thousands of watts of glaring halogen light.
The five hitmen raised their arms to shield their eyes, cursing as they reached into their bags for their weapons.
"Drop the bags," a voice boomed out through a high-powered loudspeaker.
Standing thirty yards away, flanked by three black armored SUVs, was Dominic Moretti. He stood alone in front of the headlights, his heavy black coat open, his hands resting casually in his pockets. Behind him, positioned on the roofs of the hangars, were twelve of his best marksmen, their laser sights painting bright red dots across the chests of the five New York hitmen.
Bernardo froze, his hand frozen inside his duffel bag. He looked at the red laser dots dancing across his coat, then looked at Dominic.
"Moretti," Bernardo spat, his voice filled with hatred. "Victor said you were dead."
"Victor was mistaken," Dominic replied calmly, walking five steps closer. "As were your bosses in New York."
"You think you can stop us with a few snipers?" Bernardo sneered, trying to buy time as his men subtly shifted their stances. "The Don knows everything, Moretti. If we don't call back in ten minutes, twenty more men come down from Manhattan. You can't fight the whole East Coast!"
Dominic pulled a small satellite phone from his pocket and tossed it onto the wet tarmac between them.
"Call him," Dominic said.
Bernardo frowned, looking down at the phone, then back at Dominic. "What?"
"Call Don Carmine," Dominic ordered. "Put it on speaker."
Bernardo hesitated, then knelt down and picked up the phone. He dialed a private, encrypted number he knew by heart. The line rang twice before a raspy, elderly voice answered.
"Bernardo? Is it done?"
"Don Carmine," Bernardo said, his eyes fixed on Dominic. "We're at the Gary airfield. We have a problem. Moretti is here. He has us surrounded."
There was a long, heavy silence on the other end of the line.
When Don Carmine spoke again, his voice was no longer that of a confident mafia Don. It sounded broken, tired, and terrified.
"Bernardo... drop your weapons."
Bernardo’s jaw dropped. "What? Boss, we can take him! We have—"
"Drop your weapons, you idiot!" Don Carmine shouted over the phone, his voice shaking. "The feds just raided six of our headquarters in Brooklyn! Federal marshals are outside my house right now with a RICO indictment! Someone gave them thirty years of internal ledgers! The whole family is finished!"
Bernardo felt his knees go weak. He slowly let the satellite phone slip from his hand. It fell to the asphalt, the elderly Don’s frantic voice continuing to buzz from the small speaker until it went dead.
Dominic took two slow steps toward Bernardo.
"Your bosses are going to prison for the rest of their natural lives, Bernardo," Dominic said softly, his voice cutting through the cold wind. "You have thirty seconds to lay those weapons flat on the ground and get back on that airplane."
"And if we don't?" Bernardo growled, his pride wrestling with his survival instinct.
Dominic didn't raise a weapon. He simply looked up at the roof of the hangar, where the twelve red laser dots converged precisely on the center of Bernardo’s forehead.
"If you don't," Dominic murmured, "you die in Gary, Indiana, for a family that no longer exists."
Bernardo stared into Dominic’s dark, unyielding eyes for five long seconds.
Then, slowly, Bernardo dropped his duffel bag to the ground. He raised his hands high above his head and backed up toward the airstairs. His four men followed suit, dropping their weapons onto the wet pavement with heavy, metallic thuds.
"Get on the plane," Dominic commanded. "And tell anyone who asks in New York that Chicago belongs to the ghosts now."
The five men scrambled up the stairs, slamming the aluminum door shut behind them. Within two minutes, the twin engines screamed back to life, the jet turning sharply on the tarmac and roaring down the dark runway, disappearing into the sleet and clouds above the lake.
Dominic stood on the cold asphalt, watching the red tail lights of the aircraft fade into the dark sky.
Leo walked up beside him, throwing a thick blanket over Dominic’s shoulders. "It's done, boss. The city is clean."
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Dominic took a deep, long breath of the cold winter air. For the first time in thirty-five years, he felt his shoulders drop. The heavy, invisible armor he had worn since he was a teenager seemed to melt away into the rain.
"Let's go home, Leo," Dominic said quietly. "We have a hospital visit to make."
