Chapter 5 - The Snake in the House
While Dominic knelt in the small kitchen in Sunset Park, a very different meeting was taking place in a high-rise penthouse overlooking the East River.
Julian Moretti, Dominic’s younger brother, poured himself three fingers of aged scotch. Across from him sat Marcus Vance, the former chief administrator of St. Vincent’s Hospital.
“You’re sure?” Julian asked, his voice smooth, cold, and entirely devoid of warmth.
“I’m positive,” Vance said, wiping sweat from his double chin. “My contact at the Fort Lee lab confirmed it an hour ago. Dominic ran a private DNA test on a comb taken from a school in Sunset Park. It came back a 99.9% match for Anna.”
Julian’s glass paused halfway to his lips. His jaw tightened. “The kid survived the river?”
“Apparently some orderly pulled her out three years ago,” Vance muttered nervously. “We thought the current took her to the Atlantic! If Dominic finds out that the car crash wasn't an accident—if he realizes we paid the mechanic to cut those brake lines—he’s going to hang us from the Brooklyn Bridge.”
Julian slammed his glass onto the marble coffee table, shattering the base. “He’s not going to hang anyone,” Julian snarled. “Dominic has been a shell of a man for three years. He was weak. He was distracted. That’s why I was able to take over fifty percent of the shipping port contracts while he was busy mourning his dead family!”
“What are we going to do?” Vance stammered. “Dominic survived the warehouse kidnapping last week—your Albanian guys failed to eliminate him!”
“The Albanians were idiots,” Julian spat, walking toward the floor-to-ceiling windows. He looked down at the glittering city grid below. “Dominic doesn't know I was behind the warehouse. He thinks it was a turf dispute with the waterfront union. But if he has the girl... he’ll become dangerous again. A man with nothing to lose is easy to handle. A man who gets his miracle back is lethal.”
Julian turned back to Vance, his eyes dead and vacant. “Where is the child right now?”
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“In an apartment on 42nd Street in Sunset Park. Living with the old orderly, Eleanor Hayes.”
“Send the strike team,” Julian ordered coldly. “Finish what the river was supposed to do three years ago. And make sure Eleanor Hayes doesn't survive to testify about who walked into St. Vincent’s that night.”
