Chapter 11 - The Ransom
Back at the safehouse, Leo was set up in a medical tent. He was terrified, but Claire’s presence calmed him.
However, Marco Moretti was not finished. Enraged by the failure at the hospital and the terrifying rumors that Lombardi was walking, Moretti made a desperate play.
While Claire was sneaking out to the safehouse’s supply cache in the alley to grab specialized pediatric medicine from a trusted pharmacist courier, a van pulled up.
Before the Lombardi guards could draw their weapons, a flashbang grenade detonated.
Blind and deafened, Claire felt rough hands grab her hair, dragging her into the van. The doors slammed, and tires squealed.
When her vision cleared, she found herself zip-tied in the back of the van, staring at a grinning man with a scar across his cheek.
"Well, well," the man sneered. "The magic doctor. Marco is going to love you."
An hour later, Sebastian's burner phone rang.
"Lombardi," Marco Moretti's voice slithered through the speaker. "I hear you have a new witch doctor pulling strings for you. Tell you what. Surrender the South Side docks to me tonight, or I send her back to you in a dozen separate boxes."
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Sebastian’s grip on the phone was so tight the plastic cracked. "If you harm a single hair on her head, Marco, I won't just kill you. I will erase your entire bloodline."
"Bring the deed to the docks to the old steel mill. Midnight. Come alone. Oh, wait, you can't drive, can you?" Marco laughed and hung up.
