Chapter 7 - The Reckoning
Mark didn't move. He couldn't. His legs seemed to have frozen to the floorboards.
Vincent didn't ask a second time.
Marco took one step forward outside. He didn't use the crowbar on the lock. He simply raised his right boot and planted it directly beside the deadbolt with the kinetic force of a battering ram.
The entire door frame tore clean out of the plaster wall. The wooden door, along with the wedged chair, blew inward, crashing onto the living room carpet in a shower of splintered wood and flying dust.
Through the clouds of white drywall dust, four men stepped into our apartment.
They didn't look like criminals. They looked like executives who had just stepped out of a boardroom, save for the dark leather gloves on their hands and the cold, lifeless efficiency in their movements.
In the center of the group walked Vincent Moretti.
He stepped over the shattered door, his expensive leather shoes stepping cleanly over the drywall debris. He adjusted the cuffs of his dark coat, his pale grey eyes sweeping across the dingy apartment until they landed on me.
I lay slumped against the sofa, my broken arm pinned against my side, my face wet with tears and sweat.
Vincent’s gaze softened for a fraction of a second as he met my eyes. He gave a single, subtle nod—a silent confirmation that my eight minutes were up, and I was still alive.
Then, he turned his head to look at Mark.
The air in the room felt like it lost ten degrees in an instant.
Mark was trembling so hard the brass wrench was rattling in his grip. "Who... who are you?" Mark whispered, his voice small, pathetic. "This is private property. Get out of my house!"
Vincent didn't answer him. He didn't even acknowledge Mark’s words. He simply gestured with two fingers toward Marco.
Marco moved like a strike from a viper. Before Mark could raise the wrench, Marco closed the distance, grabbed Mark’s right wrist with one hand, and delivered a short, brutal palm-strike directly into Mark’s nose.
CRACK.
Blood spattered across Mark’s shirt as he let out a choked scream, dropping the wrench to the floor. Before Mark could hit the ground, Marco grabbed him by the back of his neck and slammed him face-first onto the heavy oak dining table.
Mark screamed out in terror as two other men stepped forward, pinning his shoulders and legs to the wood, locking him in place like an animal on an altar.
Vincent walked slowly across the room, taking a pair of thin leather gloves from his pocket and pulling them over his fingers, one by one.
"You're Mark, correct?" Vincent asked softly, standing at the head of the table, looking down at my husband's bloodied, terrified face.
"Please!" Mark sobbed, tears mixing with the blood pouring from his broken nose. "Please, mister! I don't know who you are! She's my wife! It was just an argument!"
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Vincent leaned down until his face was inches from Mark’s ear.
"She was a waitress who showed me kindness on a night when I was very tired," Vincent whispered, his voice icy and clear. "And you broke her arm."
