Vinny was young and inexperienced. It would take time for him to become strong, which was part of the reason he was here. To become a man.
“You piece of shit!” Carly shouted, thrashing again in Carmine’s grip. This time, she managed to get free and ran at Vinny.
Christopher intercepted her easily.
“Let her go!” Enzo shouted from the window.
It didn’t take long for the don to walk out of the open garage. An entourage of four more men joined him, along with his gorgeous wife, Lena.
Wearing a three-piece suit, Enzo hurried down the driveway, his balding hair slicked back above his forehead. He looked somehow less Italian than Christopher and Antonio with their sharp noses and chiseled jaws.
“Carly, it’s going to be okay,” Enzo said. He looked at the Moretti men in turn, still taking them for AMP soldiers.
“What is this?” Enzo said as he approached. “Why did you take my daughter?”
Antonio pushed up his helmet so his old enemy could see his face. In an instant, Enzo’s smooth features scrunched into a network of deep lines.
“Antonio …” he stuttered. He looked over at Christopher and then backed away.
“Let her go,” Lena said. “Please, our daughter did nothing.”
“What are you doing?” Enzo said.
“Ending one empire and starting another,” Antonio replied calmly. He gave a nod, and Lino went to work with the M249. The crack of the big gun was almost deafening. Ejected brass bounced off the top of the Humvee as the rounds blew through body armor and flesh.
Every death filled Antonio with the pleasure that revenge brought to a man who had waited many years for it. He brought up his rifle and fired at the other men before they could raise their weapons.
Christopher shouted as he fired, avenging his wife with each trigger pull.
One of the Sarcone men managed to shoot back, hitting the top of the Humvee, but Antonio took the guy down with a 5.56-millimeter round to the neck.
The gunfire died down almost as abruptly as it began. This was the land of Hollywood, but real violence wasn’t like the movies. It was much more chaotic, messier. Narrow trickles of blood ran from the dead guards down the inclined driveway, to the gutter.
Sobs replaced the sound of gunfire. Lena cried in her husband’s arms. Enzo reached out toward his daughter, who was again being held by Carmine. The entire family was unscathed, just as Antonio had ordered.
La Cosa Nostra’s rules were clear: never kill women or children of another family. A rule his enemies had broken in Naples.
Antonio still followed the code, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t bend the rules a little and use women as bait. He lowered his rifle and pointed at the Humvee.
“Get in, Enzo,” he said. “It’s time to take a ride.”
Lena wailed, and Carly pleaded for them to let her go.
Antonio nodded at Carmine, and the girl darted over to her father, who wrapped her in his arms. They embraced for several seconds, but Antonio ended their fleeting last moment together with a jerk of his chin.
“Let’s go,” Christopher said, his jaw tight with rage.
“No!” Carly shouted.
Carmine moved over, his rifle shouldered.
“Why?” the girl wailed. “Why are you doing this to my father?”
Antonio looked to Enzo and said, “Would you like to tell your daughter?”
A few moments of silence passed, broken by Christopher spitting on the ground. “This piece of shit must not remember the day that my wife was gunned down in a house of God.”
“I remember,” Enzo said, raising his chin. “And I truly am sorry for your loss that day.”
“Your apologies are as empty as your soul,” Christopher said. He went over with Carmine and yanked him away from his family.
Lena and Carly screamed as Enzo walked with them, his head down.
At least the son of a bitch had enough self-respect not to beg for his life.
“Take them away,” Antonio said.
Frankie moved the two women back to the house, out of sight, while Enzo stood there, trying to keep his composure.
“One man descends to hell, while a boy ascends to manhood,” Antonio said in Italian.
“For your mom,” Christopher said to Vinny. He watched Enzo while his son raised his SR9 pistol to the man’s forehead. There was only a beat of hesitation before Vinny pulled the trigger.
The bullet penetrated the skull and destroyed the brain of one of the masterminds behind the ambush that nearly erased the Moretti name.
“Hunt the other men down,” Antonio said. “They can swear loyalty to the Moretti family banner, or join their old boss.”
* * *
Hearing the low rumble, Dom ran outside, praying it was just thunder. But the sky had not a wisp of cloud.
His worst fear was coming true.
“Mom! Monica!” he shouted, running back inside.
They had their car packed up and ready to go, but there was no way they were going to get out of the city before the jets came. They had to take cover inside the house.
He ran to the front yard, where Monica and Elena stood outside the sedan packed full of suitcases.
“Dom,” Elena said. “Do you—”
“Get inside!” he yelled, waving from the doorway.
Elena backed up as several black dots emerged on the horizon.
This can’t be happening, Dom thought. But it was. He had known all along that it was a possibility, and instead of leaving when they had the chance, he had stood in line at the Downey Police Department Headquarters. They had offered him a job, and he was due for his first day of training in a few hours.
But Downey wouldn’t even need a police force if President Elliot decided to wipe Los Angeles County off the map.
Dom herded his mom and sister back inside and then led them to the bathroom for shelter. It wouldn’t protect them from much, but with no basement, it was the safest place to hunker down.
“Get in the tub,” he said to Monica.
She climbed in, and with his mother’s help, he hauled the mattress from the twin bed into the bathroom and put it over Monica.
“No, I don’t want …” she said.
“It’s okay, baby,” Elena said. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
Dom heard the uncertainty in her voice and saw the fear in her eyes. He felt the same stabbing fear of not being able to protect them. “Get down and stay down,” he said.
Elena reached out for him as he left the bathroom. “Where are you going?”
“I’ll be right back.”
Dom ran down the hallway and grabbed his shotgun, then the bug-out bag he had stuffed full of rations, a water purification system, a medical kit, space blankets, ammunition, and batteries for his flashlight and hand-crank radio.
He stopped to look out the window just as the squadron of twelve F-16s screamed over the eastern edge of the city. Their first pass was a dry run—perhaps a warning, or a flyover to check ground troop movements.
Or maybe, just maybe, they were here to help.
Dom stayed there a moment, praying that was the case.
Then he saw more black dots to the north.
Ten of them.
The F-16s curved to intercept the incoming fighters.
Dom’s gut clenched at the sight and the roar of what appeared to be F-35s. They were almost twice as loud as the older F-16s.
He was right: the first squadron wasn’t here to drop its payload on the rebels. It was here to protect them from the AMP pilots.
Missiles curved away from the fighters as the battle for Los Angeles began.
“Dom!” Elena shouted. “What’s happening?”
“Just stay put, Mom!”
A low emergency siren sounded
in the distance. It rose into a wail. Ignoring it, he opened the door and walked outside. At this point, it didn’t matter much whether he stayed in the fragile house, or just stood in the driveway. If a bomb fell, they were all screwed, and he had to see this.
Missiles in the first salvo found targets, blowing two F-16s to pieces over the city and maiming an F-35. The pilot dipped low enough to rattle windows as he fought for altitude.
Another explosion rang out, and Dom walked out farther into the front yard, rotating as he watched the battle in the heavens. The F-35s quickly took control of the airspace, taking out three F-16s and losing only one of their own.
An injured F-16 came screaming overhead, smoke trailing as it banked hard to the right to get on the tail of an F-35. Just as it moved into position, another F-35 came from the west and launched a Sidewinder into the F-16’s cockpit.
A massive fireball burst over the city, raining down shrapnel into the yard.
Dom slowly backed toward the house, eyes locked on the sky.
Six F-16s remained against eight of AMP’s F-35s.
Another F-16 went down in a meteor of flames.
Dom tripped on the bottom porch step, falling on his ass. He sat there, watching the dogfight. Somewhere in the distance, he heard the familiar voice of his mom shouting, but he couldn’t pull himself away from the mesmerizing sight.
Two more F-16s met fiery ends in almost the same instant, leaving only three to take on the eight F-35s. And still the pilots didn’t cut and run. They launched another salvo of missiles, blowing apart two F-35s and giving the rebel pilots a flicker of hope.
The six F-35s regrouped to hunt the two F-16s, which peeled off in different directions. The AMP pilots gave chase, three on each rebel fighter.
Two of the AMP fighters flew over Downey, so low that the draft knocked Dom back on the porch steps. He shielded his face and turned as the fighters climbed and each launched a Sidewinder at the F-16.
A brilliant blast lit up the skyline, leaving a single rebel pilot to protect Los Angeles from the AMP pilots.
Dom pushed himself to his feet as a chunk of F-16 came crashing back to earth, landing on a house a few blocks over. Flames billowed into the air.
Over the wail of sirens came the sound of a heavy vehicle screeching around the corner. He bolted back into the house and grabbed the shotgun, and got back outside as a Humvee roared down their street.
Dom brought up the shotgun, aimed it at the windshield, and looked for any military insignia on the side.
If these were AMP soldiers, would he have the guts to protect his family?
He had only a second to contemplate the question. The Humvee screeched to a stop outside the house, giving Dom his first look at the AMP logo on the driver’s door. He fired a warning shot, the recoil jerking him backward slightly. The buckshot spread out, bouncing off the armored hood.
Dom pumped the barrel, chambering another shell, and yelled a verbal warning, but his voice was no match for the screaming F-35s.
A man got out of the passenger seat, hands in the air.
Closing one eye, Dom aimed at the man’s helmet. He blinked away a bead of sweat and focused on a familiar sunburned face.
“Dad,” he whispered, lowering the shotgun.
“Dom!” Ronaldo shouted. “Where are your mother and sister?”
He came running up the driveway as Sergeant Marks opened the driver’s-side door.
“Come on!” he shouted. “We have to get out of here!”
There was no time to hug his dad or ask questions.
The last F-16 exploded in the sky, and the F-35s moved in with free rein to strike their targets.
-9-
Six Moretti soldiers huddled in the basement beneath the Compton warehouse where they packaged their drugs for distribution to the dealers. The five stainless steel tables were clean now, with only the scales, trays, and pill-counting spatulas remaining as evidence of their purpose.
Between the high-volume enterprise with the AMP colonel, and the death of Enzo Sarcone, the Moretti family had much to celebrate. But the wine and vodka the men were passing around in the glow of a battery-powered lantern was more to ease their nerves under the AMP jets’ bombardment than to celebrate any victories.
The deep whump of the bombs and the pom-pom-pom of the antiaircraft rattled the bones of the makeshift bunker and the men inside it.
Seated on an ammunition crate with his jacket for a cushion, Vinny looked around him. Carmine sat on a torn leather couch, his normally slicked-back hair hanging loosely over his eyes. Frankie stood with his back to the wall, tattooed arms folded across his chest, his scarred face staring at the floor. Yellowtail sat backward on a chair, and Christopher leaned against the wall next to Vinny. Doberman was messing with the radio on a cutting table.
The attack had started shortly after the mission to kill Enzo, and the team had rushed back to the warehouse—all but Antonio, who had taken the Escalade to Anaheim with Lino, to stay with Marco and Lucia.
Vinny put his head in his hands, trying to block out the distant and not-so-distant sounds of war.
“It’s normal to feel like that after you kill someone,” Yellowtail said. “You did good, kid.”
“Not a kid,” Christopher said, raising the bottle of vodka. He took a drink and handed it to Vinny. “You’re a man now.”
Vinny took a slug, welcoming the burn. He wasn’t feeling all that bad about killing Enzo, but he couldn’t tell the other men the truth.
He felt worse about tricking Carly at the beach. She had trusted him, and he had kidnapped her for the sake of killing her father.
If that was what it took to be a made man, then maybe he wasn’t right for this way of life—assuming that their way of life survived actual war on the streets outside.
The walls of their hideout rumbled from a bomb impact. A fighter jet screamed overhead, and Vinny put his hands over his ears.
“Jesus Christ,” Frankie said, looking at the fine dust floating down from the ceiling. “We’re sitting ducks down here.”
“I should have gone with Antonio to Anaheim,” Christopher said. He brushed dust off his black uniform, which still had flecks of Enzo Sarcone’s blood on one lapel.
“No,” Yellowtail replied. “He gave you specific orders—and good ones too. If something happens to him, you’re in charge of the family.”
Christopher seemed to consider the words and looked over at Vinny.
The bombardment continued, and more dust sifted down from the ceiling. Doberman had finally gotten the radio to work, and static crackled through the room. The men gathered around to listen to a female reporter. She spoke fast, her voice quaking with fear.
“Battles between AMP soldiers and rebels are occurring throughout the country,” she said. “We’re getting reports of attacks on civilians in major metropolises including Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, and—”
Static crackled from the speakers, and Doberman cursed. “I can’t get a clear signal.”
“Civilians?” Christopher said. He looked at the stairway leading out of the basement, clearly even more concerned about his brother and the other Moretti men who were out there in various locations.
Another bomb detonated, shaking the ground.
Vinny looked down at his shaking hands. He stuffed them in his pockets, not wanting the other men to see him this way.
Times like these made him miss his mom. He had heard that was what soldiers in foxholes often thought of, and while this wasn’t exactly a foxhole, it had the same effect.
The metal tables rattled from another impact. Yellowtail pulled out his gold cross and kissed it. Frankie and Carmine bowed their heads.
Los Angeles was officially rebel territory, and if the reports about attacks on civilians were true, no one was safe, even in a basement.
Chri
stopher walked over to the stairs, his head tilted slightly.
Banging sounded in the brief respite between explosions.
“You hear that?” he asked.
Vinny stood up to listen.
The clanking of the garage door sounded above them.
Someone was upstairs.
Christopher grabbed his M4, and Vinny pulled out the SR9 from the concealed holster behind his back. While the other man loaded their weapons, the father and son tiptoed up the stairs.
Two bombs exploded back to back.
Christopher continued up the dark stairwell, determined to protect their warehouse. He angled the gun at the door overhead.
“Stay behind me,” he whispered back to Vinny.
Vinny aimed his gun for the second time that night, prepared to kill again for the Moretti banner.
The clanking stopped, and voices sounded, then footsteps. The door at the top of the stairs swung open, and Vinny moved his finger to the trigger.
Christopher held up a hand a second later and lowered his rifle barrel from the ash-dusted figure standing in the doorway.
“Antonio,” Christopher said.
The leader of the Moretti family slowly walked down the first two steps. His black AMP uniform was ripped, and blood ran down his ash-streaked face.
“What the hell happened?” Christopher said, moving aside for his brother. Lino followed him onto the stairs and closed the door behind them.
The men all gathered around Antonio in the basement, none of them saying a word as their tired, injured leader stood there. His normally stoic features had twisted into a mask of disorientation, as if he were really drunk.
“We wrecked the Escalade and had to turn back on foot,” Lino said.
“I couldn’t make it to Anaheim,” Antonio said, shaking his head. “I couldn’t …”
“I’m sure your family is okay,” Christopher said.
“They will be,” Lino assured Antonio. He held his right arm, dripping blood through his fingers onto the floor. “We got hold of Lucia on the phone,” he said. “They’re in the basement of the apartment building with the other residents.”
Antonio gingerly touched the gash on his head, and pulled away a finger slick with blood.
Sons of War Page 12
