Chapter 6 - The Trap on 4th Street
The abandoned industrial warehouse on 4th Street smelled of damp concrete, rust, and old motor oil. It sat on the edge of the Portland industrial district, surrounded by skeletal shipping containers and overgrown weeds that rustled in the damp wind.
Adrian stood in the center of the cavernous ground floor, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his dark coat, watching the rain beat against the high, grime-covered windows. His left shoulder still throbbed with a dull, persistent ache, but the medication Dr. Maren had prescribed kept the dangerous spikes of his heart rate subdued.
“They’re moving in,” Vincent’s voice crackled through the comm-piece tucked into Adrian’s ear. “Three men. Led by Viktor Reznik, Volkov’s chief enforcer. They think you’re holed up here alone.”
“Let them think it,” Adrian murmured.
A heavy iron side door creaked open, echoing off the concrete walls. Three figures stepped out of the gray drizzle, swallowed by the cavernous shadows of the warehouse.
Viktor Reznik was a mountain of a man with a shaved head and a jagged scar running from his ear down to his collarbone. He held a suppressed 9mm pistol loose in his right hand, his eyes scanning the gloom with casual arrogance.
“Moretti,” Viktor called out, his voice bouncing off the metal beams overhead. “I know you’re in here, you coward. Volkov sends his regards.”
Adrian stepped out from behind a row of stacked wooden pallets, his hands still in his pockets, his posture relaxed.
“Viktor,” Adrian said, his voice cutting cleanly through the damp air. “You’ve come a long way for a funeral.”
Viktor grinned, raising his pistol and aiming it squarely at Adrian’s chest. “The only funeral today is yours, Moretti. Boss says bring him your head, but a bullet through the heart is quicker.”
“Your boss is an idiot,” Adrian replied calmly.
Before Viktor’s finger could squeeze the trigger, the shadows around the perimeter of the warehouse came alive.
Six of Vincent’s veterans stepped out from behind the shipping containers, their weapons raised, red laser sights painting a constellation of crimson dots across Viktor and his two enforcers.
Viktor froze, his pistol lowering by an inch as he realized he had walked straight into an engineered killing box.
“Drop the weapon, Viktor,” Adrian said, walking slowly toward him until he was standing five feet away from the barrel of the gun. “Drop it, or your men die first, and you die last.”
For a second, Viktor’s thumb hovered over the hammer, the muscle in his jaw ticking wildly as he weighed the math of a suicide mission. Then, with a muttered curse in Russian, he let the pistol slide from his fingers, clattering loudly against the concrete floor.
“Smart,” Adrian said quietly. He signaled to Vincent, who stepped out of the shadows with a pair of heavy plastic zip-ties.
As Vincent secured Viktor’s wrists behind his back, Adrian leaned in close, his voice dropping into a register so cold and devoid of mercy that even the seasoned enforcer flinched.
“You tell Volkov something for me, Viktor,” Adrian whispered in his ear. “You tell him that I stayed away for three years because I wanted peace. But if he ever sends another man near my daughter’s school, near her home, or within a hundred miles of the woman I love... I won't just take his port contracts. I’ll take his life. Every last piece of it.”
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Viktor swallowed hard, nodding mutely as Vincent shoved him toward the exit.
Adrian stood in the echoing silence of the warehouse, watching them leave, and for the first time in three years, the knot of permanent terror in his chest felt like it had finally begun to loosen.
