Chapter 10 - The Web Snaps Shut
Grant stood frozen in the center of the Brooklyn warehouse, his breath coming in ragged, visible white puffs in the freezing air. The eight private security guards he had paid a fortune to protect him took one look at the Five Family dons, glanced at the twenty armed Caruso soldiers lining the catwalks above, and slowly, deliberately, lowered their assault rifles to the floor.
"What are you doing?!" Grant screamed at his men, his voice cracking with hysteria. "I paid you! Shoot them! Shoot Caruso!"
The lead mercenary stepped backward, raising his empty hands. "Contract is void, Mercer. We don't fight the Commission."
Within seconds, Grant's guards turned and retreated through the side exits, leaving my brother standing completely alone in the center of the vast concrete floor.
"Traitors! Cowards!" Grant shrieked, swinging his pistol wildly around the room until the barrel pointed directly at Don Antonio. "You can't do this to me! I am the head of the Mercer family! I own this harbor!"
"You own nothing, boy," Don Antonio said with chilling indifference. "You are an insect who killed a lion in the dark, and now the pride has come to claim your flesh."
Don Antonio and the other four bosses stood up, turned their backs on Grant, and walked out through the secure rear corridor, leaving the warehouse entirely in the hands of Roman Caruso.
Roman stepped forward, the heels of his leather boots clicking sharply against the concrete.
"Drop the gun, Grant," Roman said calmly. "Or my men on the catwalk will take your hand off."
Grant turned his trembling weapon toward Roman, his finger twitching nervously against the trigger. "Stay back, Roman! I'll kill you! I should have killed you three years ago along with your saint of a brother!"
"Michael was ten times the man you will ever be," Roman replied, continuing to advance without a single trace of fear. "You killed him with a bomb because you were too weak to look him in the eye. Just like you beat my wife in locked rooms because you knew she was smarter, stronger, and more honorable than you could ever hope to be."
"She's my property!" Grant screamed, tears of rage and panic streaming down his face. "Father gave her to me to manage! She's nothing!"
I stood up from my chair and walked forward, stopping beside Roman. I looked at the man who had terrorized my entire existence—the monster who had left me scarred, broken, and bleeding in the dark—and all I felt was profound, liberating pity.
"I was never your property, Grant," I said, my voice ringing clear and strong through the warehouse. "I was the one keeping the Mercer empire alive while you bled it dry. And tonight, I am taking back everything you stole from me."
Grant stared at me, realizing for the first time that his power over me was completely, irrevocably shattered. In a final, desperate spasm of cowardice, Grant swung his gun away from Roman and aimed it directly at my chest.
Crack!
A single sniper shot echoed from the catwalk above.
The high-caliber bullet struck Grant’s right wrist with surgical precision, completely shattering the bone and sending his pistol clattering across the concrete floor.
Grant dropped to his knees, clutching his ruined wrist, screaming in agony as blood poured onto the cold ground.
May you like
Roman walked over, kicking the fallen pistol far out of reach. He looked down at Grant with an expression of cold, detached disgust.
"Matteo," Roman ordered. "Secure him. Take him to the docks at Terminal 9. It's time for Grant to see what happens to men who break their vows."
