Chapter 4 - The Shadow of Marcus Vance
At 4:00 AM, the heavy iron service elevator descended to the subterranean security vault on sub-level three.
Adrien Vale sat strapped to a reinforced steel chair in the center of the concrete room, his bespoke jacket stripped away, his white shirt stained with sweat, his wrists and ankles bound in heavy transport chains.
Vincent and I walked into the vault, accompanied by Marco Costa and two armed tactical operatives.
Vincent pulled up a metal stool, sitting directly opposite his former partner, setting the silver Olympus recorder on the table between them.
"You have three minutes, Adrien," Vincent said, his voice conversational and completely void of human warmth. "Tell me when Marcus Vance’s cargo vessel docks at the Calumet terminal."
Adrien looked up, his bloodshot eyes darting between Vincent and me, a bitter, venomous sneer curling his lips.
"You think you're a king, Vincent?" Adrien rasped, his voice cracked with exhaustion. "You run this city like an ancient patriarch while the rest of the world has modernized! Marcus Vance offered me a seat at the global maritime table! We were going to consolidate the entire Eastern Seaboard into a multi-billion-dollar automated logistics network!"
"By trafficking un-serialized military hardware through my container berths?" Vincent asked, dropping a stack of seized freight manifests onto the metal table.
Adrien’s sneer faltered. The color drained from his face in a sudden, sickening wave.
"How... how did you get the manifests?" Adrien stammered.
"Your private safe in the carriage house was cracked thirty minutes ago, Adrien," Vincent said calmly. "We have the bill of lading for the Northern Star. Forty tons of illegal defense components arriving from Hamburg at 6:00 AM. Consigned directly to your private logistics LLC."
Vincent stood up, leaning over the table until his face was inches from Adrien’s trembling features.
"You sold my name, Adrien. You tried to destroy the woman who raised her child in my house. And you thought a piece of plastic would protect you from the reckoning."
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Vincent turned to Marco.
"Notify Special Agent Raymond Callahan of the FBI’s Organized Crime Strike Force. Tell him the Calumet terminal is surrounded by forty of our tactical operators, and that we are delivering Marcus Vance’s arms pipeline directly into federal hands."
