Chapter 3 - The Charlestown Salt
The pier at Charlestown smelled of low tide, diesel exhaust, and the bitter, damp cold that rises off the Mystic River when the Atlantic air comes in from the east. It was past midnight, and the giant gantry cranes of the shipping terminal stood like skeletal sentinels against the orange, smog-choked sky of the industrial district.
Nikolai’s Escalade didn't slow down as it approached the chain-link gates of the private yard. Mikhail hit the high beams once, twice, and then simply drove the three-ton armored vehicle straight through the padlocked iron latch. The gate exploded outward with a horrific screech of tearing metal, the chain-link wrapping itself around the heavy brush guard of the SUV like a web as they roared onto the concrete apron of the pier.
Behind them, two more black vans followed, their tires squealing against the salt-crusted asphalt.
In the back seat, Milo sat between Nikolai’s legs. He had been told to stay on the floorboards, beneath the level of the armored glass, but he had found a small gap between the front seats where he could watch his father’s profile. Nikolai had not spoken since they left Back Bay. He had spent the twenty-minute drive assembling a shortened, suppressed black carbine rifle on his lap, his long fingers moving with the mechanical precision of a watchmaker.
"Stay here," Nikolai said as the car came to a violent stop fifty yards from the main warehouse door. He didn't look down at the boy; his eyes were already scanning the silhouettes of the men running toward them from the shadows of the shipping containers. "Mikhail, leave three men with the car. If anyone touches the door handles, you blow the tank."
"Understood, boss."
Nikolai stepped out into the freezing drizzle. The coat was gone; he was in his shirtsleeves now, the white cotton stark against the blackness of the pier, his dark vest buttoned tight, the short carbine held low against his thigh.
Across the concrete, six men were standing under the yellow glare of a sodium security light. In the center was Matteo Leone—the nephew of the old don, a man of thirty-five who wore a long mink coat and had a diamond the size of a tooth embedded in his left earlobe. He was laughing, his hands tucked into his pockets, surrounded by five hired shooters from the North End whose leather jackets looked stiff with grease.
"Vulov!" Matteo shouted, his voice carrying over the low thrum of a container ship’s auxiliary engines across the slip. "You’re late for the meeting, you Russian prick! We thought you were off playing daddy with that orphan boy! We already took the crates! The Rotterdam papers are signed in our name now!"
Nikolai didn't stop walking. He didn't shout back. He moved with a smooth, terrifying stride, his men fanning out behind him in a perfect skirmish line, four paces apart, their weapons held at the low-ready.
"Matteo," Nikolai said when he was twenty yards away. His voice wasn't loud, but it had a peculiar, carrying quality that made the laughter among the North End shooters die out instantly. "Four years ago, you stood on the corner of Beacon Street and watched a Mercedes burn. You thought you were very clever."
Matteo’s smile didn't vanish, but it stiffened. His hands stayed in his pockets. "I don't know what the fuck you're talking about, Nikolai. That was four years ago. The insurance paid you out, didn't it?"
"The insurance gave me two boxes of ash," Nikolai said. He was ten yards away now. The yellow light of the lamp overhead caught the pale, lifeless blue of his eyes. "They told me my son was inside them. But today, I found out your man Savino was a sentimental idiot. He kept the boy. He hid him in Revere."
The silence that fell over the pier was sudden and absolute. Even the gantry crane across the canal seemed to stop its grinding click.
Matteo Leone’s face didn't just pale; it turned the color of a wet sidewalk. His left hand jerked inside his mink coat, but before his fingers could even clear the leather of his shoulder holster, Nikolai raised the short carbine.
The suppressed weapon didn't roar; it made three sharp, rhythmic puffs, like an air hose blowing out dust.
The two men standing to Matteo’s left dropped instantly, their bodies hitting the salt-encrusted concrete with a heavy, wet elasticity. They didn't scream; the rounds had entered through the soft tissue beneath their jawlines and exited through the crown of their skulls.
"Don't move," Nikolai said to the remaining three shooters. His weapon was pointed directly at Matteo’s throat now. "If any of you moves your fingers, your mothers will be looking for your pieces in the harbor on Friday."
The three men held their hands high, their fingers splayed like spiders against the night air.
Nikolai stepped close to Matteo. He was half a head taller than the Italian, his chest nearly touching the wet fur of the mink coat. He reached out with his left hand, his fingers twisting into the lapels of the coat, and dragged the younger man forward until their faces were three inches apart.
"Who told you to take him?" Nikolai whispered.
"I don't know!" Matteo stammered, his eyes rolling back with terror, his teeth chattering from the cold and the sudden proximity of his own death. "It wasn't us, Nikolai! I swear to God on my mother’s soul! It wasn't the Don! It was the people from New York... the Bratva guys from Brighton Beach! They wanted the shipping lanes! They told Savino to take the kid so you’d go crazy and start a war with us! They wanted us to kill each other so they could take the terminal!"
"Names," Nikolai said.
"Kirill!" Matteo gasped, a string of saliva hanging from his lower lip. "Kirill Morozov! The old man’s nephew! He’s the one who paid Savino! He’s the one who’s been handling the Rotterdam grease! He’s in Boston right now, Nikolai! He’s at the hotel on Atlantic Avenue! He’s waiting for the call to confirm we got the crates!"
Nikolai looked at the Italian for five long seconds. He could smell the fear on him—the sour, vinegar odor of a man who knew he had crossed a line that had no return side.
From the back seat of the Escalade, Milo watched through the dark tint of the ballistics glass. He didn't cover his ears. He didn't hide his face. He watched his father stand over the man in the fur coat, his posture perfectly straight, his movements as calm and deliberate as Mrs. Callahan’s when she was signing the daily attendance ledger.
"Mikhail," Nikolai said, not looking back.
"Yes, boss?"
"Take the three men who are still standing. Put them in the back of the utility van. They are going to help us clear the crates from the warehouse. Matteo stays with me."
"And the two on the ground?"
"Leave them for the gulls," Nikolai said. He turned Matteo around with a violent jerk, shoving him toward the Escalade. "Move."
As they reached the car, Nikolai opened the rear door. Matteo stumbled inside, collapsing onto the leather bench seat, only to freeze when he found himself looking into the dark, level eyes of a seven-year-old boy in a oversized gray foster sweater.
Milo looked at Matteo’s diamond earring. Then he looked at his face.
"He has a snake on his watch too," Milo said quietly, pointing a small finger at the heavy gold Rolex on Matteo’s wrist, where an engraved serpent emblem marked the custom dial. "But his beard isn't red."
Matteo looked at the boy, his jaw dropping as he recognized the green eyes, the curve of the mouth, the ghost of Elena Vulova sitting in the back of an armored truck in the middle of a salt pier. "My God... it’s him. It’s the kid."
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Nikolai slid into the seat beside them, the carbine resting across his knees, the barrel still warm enough to make the air inside the vehicle smell of burnt cordite. He reached over, took Milo’s head in his massive palm, and gently pressed the boy’s face back against his thigh, shielding his view from the front.
"Drive to the Four Seasons on Atlantic Avenue," Nikolai told Mikhail. "It’s time to talk to our countrymen."
