Chapter 9 - THE EDGE OF THE DRAKE
The wind on the twenty-fourth-floor terrace roared like a jet engine.
Freezing rain whipped across the stone parapet, coating the black tiles in slick, lethal ice.
Gabriel pinned Leo against the low decorative railing.
Leo’s upper torso hung out over the abyss, his polished leather shoes scrambling for purchase on the slippery terrace floor.
Below them, Michigan Avenue was a river of blurred headlights and wet asphalt, hundreds of feet straight down.
Leo’s snub-nosed revolver was jammed between their chests.
Leo pulled the trigger.
BANG.
The bullet struck Gabriel’s ceramic chest plate, shattering the Kevlar outer layer and bruising his ribs with the impact of a sledgehammer.
Gabriel didn't even blink.
He caught Leo’s wrist with both hands.
With one sharp, brutal twist of his forearms, he snapped Leo’s radial bone.
CRACK.
The gun fell from Leo’s ruined fingers, spinning into the darkness below.
Leo screamed into the howling blizzard, his voice swallowed by the wind.
“Gabriel! PLEASE!”
“I built the north docks with you!”
“I was your brother!”
Gabriel leaned down until their foreheads were touching.
The rain washed the blood from Gabriel’s temple into Leo’s terror-stricken eyes.
“My brothers died in the shipyard fire, Leo,” Gabriel whispered.
“You are just the ghost that crawled out to steal their boots.”
Gabriel shifted his grip.
His right hand caught Leo by the collar of his silk vest.
His left hand caught the waistband of Leo’s trousers.
He lifted his former second-in-command clean off the terrace flags.
Leo flailed wildly, his hands clawing at Gabriel’s wrists, his feet dangling in empty space above the city.
“CLARE!” Leo shrieked toward the shattered doorway.
“TELL HIM TO STOP!”
“YOU'RE A CHRISTIAN WOMAN! TELL HIM!”
Clare stepped out onto the freezing terrace.
The wind tore at her camel-hair coat, whipping her dark hair across her pale face.
She looked at Leo dangling over the edge of eternity.
She looked at the man who had ordered an old man run down on the ice.
The man who had broken her bones and smiled while her husband choked on smoke.
Clare walked to the edge of the parapet.
She looked Leo straight in the eye.
“My husband gave you a life, Leo,” she said softly.
“You chose the fire.”
She turned her back and walked back inside the warm suite.
Gabriel did not hesitate for another second.
He opened his hands.
Leo did not even have time to scream.
The wind took his body, tumbling him backward into the freezing dark.
Silence returned to the terrace.
Only the roar of the blizzard and the distant sirens on the avenue remained.
Gabriel stood at the edge for three seconds, his chest heaving, his dark coat billowing like the wings of an avenging angel.
He turned and stepped back through the shattered glass into the suite.
Carlo Moretti was still pinned to the dining table, sobbing in agony, his hand nailed to the mahogany wood.
Marcus and Paul stood over him, their weapons lowered, their eyes fixed on Gabriel with absolute, unquestioning loyalty.
Gabriel walked to the table.
He picked up a clean linen napkin and wiped the rainwater from his hands.
He looked down at Carlo Moretti.
“Carlo.”
“G-Gabriel... please...” the old mob boss wept, blood pooling beneath his cheek.
“I surrender the commission.”
“I give you the south docks.”
“I leave Chicago tomorrow.”
Gabriel leaned down until his lips were two inches from Moretti’s ear.
“You are leaving Chicago tonight, Carlo,” Gabriel said calmly.
“On a cargo vessel bound for Palermo.”
“You will never see an American port again.”
“And if I ever hear the name Moretti whispered north of the Ohio River,”
“I will send Marcus to your villa in Sicily with six gallons of diesel and a match.”
Gabriel gripped the hilt of the combat blade embedded in Moretti’s hand.
With one smooth, violent pull, he ripped the steel free from the table.
Moretti let out a strangled shriek, clutching his mangled hand to his chest, curling into a ball on the floor.
“Marcus,” Gabriel ordered.
“Clean this room.”
“Put him on the four-thirty freighter at Calumet Harbor.”
“Yes, boss,” Marcus replied.
Gabriel walked over to Clare.
She stood near the bar, her good hand resting against the edge of the marble counter.
Her breathing was slow, deep, steady.
She looked at the blood on his hands.
She did not flinch.
She reached into her coat pocket, pulled out a clean white handkerchief, and took his right hand.
She began to wipe the blood from his knuckles with gentle, deliberate care.
Gabriel looked down at her bowed head.
The monster that had roared through his veins for the last six hours finally receded, replaced by an overwhelming, suffocating reverence for the woman holding his fingers.
“It is finished, Clare,” he whispered.
Clare looked up into his amber eyes.
A small, beautiful, tired smile touched her lips.
May you like
“Then take me home, Gabriel,” she said softly.
“Take me home.”
