“Elevators, right, then up to three. Signs will point you.”
I’m already moving. The elevator feels slow; my pulse does not. When the doors open on three, I step out into bright hall light, turn left, and see them: Luca standing rigid, Elena at his side, Nico pacing a short track, fists opening and closing.
“Where is he?” I ask as I reach them.
“They took him back,” Luca says, voice flat with effort. He grips my forearm. “No update.”
“Nico?” I press. “Tell me.”
Nico drags a hand over his face and plants his feet like he’s bracing. “We were meeting a new supplier at the Fulton warehouse, the one near the river. Antonio wanted eyes on the quality before we moved forward.”
“What supplier?” I ask. “Name.”
“Calls himself Ferro,” Nico says. “Came through a cousin-of-a-cousin. Looked good on paper. We ran the basics. It checked out.
“Two cars. Me, Antonio, two of our guys. We kept the second car back a block. Warehouse door was up, lights on. Looked normal. Pallets staged. Forklift working. The whole thing was for show.”
“How many?” I ask quietly.
“Six, maybe eight.” Nico’s jaw tightens. “They were in the shadows above the office and behind the racks. Antonio clocked the odd spacing first. He said ‘back out’ and it started. First muzzle flash came from our left. He pushed me and took the hit.”
“Where?” I ask.
“High right abdomen,” Nico says, eyes unfocused for a second like he’s seeing the moment again. “Close range. He stayed on his feet, got me behind a stack, started directing fire. Our second car came in hot when they heard it. We laid down enough to peel out through the loading bay.”
“Faces?” I press. “Marks.Accents.”
Nico shakes his head. “Masks. Ball caps. Standard. I didn’t recognize any of the shooters.”
“The Russos?” I say, watching his eyes.
“I don’t know,” he fires back, frustrated. “It could be, but if it was, they farmed it out, or they’re pulling people we haven’t seen. No hand signs, no names thrown, nothing. Just rounds.”
Elena touches Luca’s sleeve, grounding him. “Security cameras?”
“Already sending a team to pull them,” Luca says. “If they left anything, we’ll have it.”
I glance down the corridor toward the double doors marked OPERATING ROOMS. “What did the surgeon say on intake?”
Nico swallows. “They said the bullet tracked across the upper abdomen and may have nicked the liver and something near the vessels. They said they needed to control the bleeding now. They didn’t wait. They took him right back.”
“Anyone else hit?”
“One graze on Franco’s forearm. He’s downstairs getting stitched. Everyone else walked.”
“And Ferro?” Luca asks. “Where was he?”
“Not there,” Nico says, mouth hard. “It was his name on the text, and nobody on the floor matched the description we had.”
“So a catfish setup,” I say. “Pulled you to a controlled space and opened up.”
“Yeah.”
He’s holding it together with force of will. His right hand keeps flexing. Blood speckled his cuff; I clock it and say nothing.
The doors at the far end whisper, and my brother Giovanni comes in at a fast clip, Bianca on his shoulder, her hair twisted back, face bare. He scans, finds us, and closes the distance.
“What happened?” Giovanni says.
