After I Left, the Port Boss Begged Me Back

Six months later, Carlo, who once terrorized Port San Vito and forced us to pay protection money, knelt in the muddy water and blocked my path. Red-eyed, he begged me to bring the Moretti convoys back. "Ms. Moretti, if you come back, there'll be no protection money and no parking fees... I'll even pay you." I regarded him coldly and remembered how, six months earlier, he had flicked ash onto my financial statements and looked down at me as he said, "Pay, or get out of Port San Vito." Chapter 1 The day I was formally appointed finance director of the Moretti Logistics branch, not one person in that office could manage a smile. Ten minutes earlier, my phone and the phones of more than thirty coworkers had all received the same anonymous text. "Old friends, given the recent rise in prices and the need to maintain absolute security throughout Port San Vito, the ‘security management fee’ for every establishment will rise by twenty percent starting next month. Regards, Carlo Rossi." I stared at that line on the screen, my nails digging into my palm. It was the fourth increase this year. Every increase came exactly when our company paid bonuses, adjusted salaries, or landed a major contract. David, the veteran employee seated diagonally across from me, slammed his mouse onto the desk. "I worked twenty straight night shifts last month and finally earned an extra five hundred dollars in bonus pay! This increase is the same as snatching that hard-earned money straight out of my pocket!" "How is anyone supposed to work like this?" Beside me, Leah covered her face in despair. "Are we working for the company, or lining the pockets of those Rossi bloodsuckers?" Everyone had reached the limit. Our branch had operated out of Port San Vito for two years. We endured the district's terrible security because Pier One was close enough to save half an hour on every run. Dockworkers demanded a cut, trucks parked at the curb had to pay a protection fee, and even when we went downstairs for coffee, the owner would smile bitterly and say he had been charged per head. As I watched line after line of net profit disappear into a so-called "community relations fee," I knew there had to be a mole inside the company. I was still thinking about it when the glass door of the office was kicked open. Carlo Rossi, a man in his fifties, walked in wearing an ill-fitting gray coat and smoking a cigarette. Three scruffy young thugs trailed behind him. He ignored the employees glaring at him, planted his muddy leather shoe on the edge of the desk I had just cleaned, and let ash fall onto my financial statements. "Good afternoon, Irene." Carlo made my new title sound like a joke. "I hear you've been promoted. Profits are up three percent this quarter. Congratulations." "We received the text, Mr. Rossi." My voice was calmer than I expected. "But twenty percent is too much. Shipping is slow and fuel prices are rising. Another twenty percent would make the storage costs here impossible to cover." "If you can't cover it, that's a problem with how you run your business." Carlo flicked his ash straight onto my keyboard. "Don't play poor with me, Irene. I know how much money your company has. This district is a ten-minute walk from customs and the container yard." He leaned down until his tobacco-reeking face was inches from mine. "I didn't come to negotiate. I only bothered coming in person because you've been tenants here for years. "Either you pay the full increase next month without a fuss, "or you get out of Port San Vito. Plenty of people are waiting to take over your warehouse space." He was certain we would never dare leave. Relocating a logistics company was enormously expensive: we would have to reroute shipping contracts, refit a new site, and relocate employees. To most people, it would be a crippling undertaking. I lowered my eyes to the disgusting pile of ash on my keyboard. I felt nothing. "All right." Chapter 2 "What did you say?" Carlo went blank for a moment, as though he hadn't heard clearly. "I said, all right." I lifted my head and looked straight into those cloudy eyes. "At the end of this month we will stop paying. Not just the protection money. The loading fees, the parking fees, every payment we make to you, all of it stops." Carlo narrowed his eyes as if I were a delusional fool. "Irene, did that promotion rot your brain? Stop paying, and your trucks won't even make it off this street tomorrow." "Suit yourself. Because at the end of this month the Moretti branch is pulling out of Port San Vito completely. The warehouse, the office, we don't want any of it." The announcement stunned not only Carlo but also the coworkers eavesdropping outside. "Pulling out?" Carlo barked out a harsh laugh. "Haha! You think that scares me, sweetheart? Your company spent more than a million dollars fitting this place out! More than two hundred employees rent apartments nearby! Where would you go, the middle of nowhere?" He was certain I was bluffing, certain I was just a young, hotheaded manager with no grasp of what she was up against. "I've said my piece." Carlo's smile vanished, and his expression turned vicious. "I don't care how you do it. By the end of the month, next month's payment and the full increase go into my account, down to the last cent. Otherwise, none of you will know a moment's peace in my territory." With that he turned and swaggered out with his men, and on the way he made sure to give the glass door of the office a hard kick. The moment the door closed, Leah and David rushed in. "Irene, are you insane?! How could you provoke him to his face?" Leah was close to tears. "They run this whole district! If they come after us, what becomes of ordinary employees like us?" "Exactly. Pull out of Port San Vito? How could headquarters approve a move that expensive with nothing to show for it?" Looking at their anxious faces, I didn't explain much. I only opened my computer and printed out an encrypted internal email attachment. Carlo thought I was throwing a tantrum. He had no idea I had endured every humiliation in that rotten port for two full years, waiting for this exact day. More than three years ago the huge new logistics center at North Port had quietly broken ground. From the climate-controlled warehouses to the office tower, from the high-end staff apartments to the private loading docks, all of it had passed final inspection three months ago. I picked up the desk phone and dialed an encrypted number. "Activate the highest-level relocation plan. I want Port San Vito left without a single cent to squeeze out of us." Chapter 3 At eight in the evening a discreet black armored Bentley stopped in the shadow of the cross-harbor bridge. I opened the door and got into the back seat. Beside me sat a man in a perfectly cut suit, his head down over a tablet. The man was Alessandro Moretti, head of the Moretti Group and the Don feared throughout the East Coast. He was also my older brother. Not one person in the entire branch knew who I really was. When I graduated from business school, my brother threw me straight into the Port San Vito branch, the most complicated place he had, to toughen me up, and had me start at the bottom under my mother's surname. "You've decided?" Alessandro asked in a low voice without looking up. "Decided." I threw the financial statements and the record of Carlo's extortion down hard on the leather seat. "Not only are we moving, we're moving early. The pull-out was scheduled for two months from now. I want all of it done by the end of this month. And I want the mole found. Carlo knew the exact figure on the budget report I had only just signed off on today!" Alessandro finally set down the tablet and turned to glance at me. A cold, murderous glint flashed in his deep-set eyes. "Those petty thugs in Port San Vito have been far too comfortable for too long." He pressed the intercom and ordered Victor, his bodyguard and right-hand man, "Find the mole. I want the name of the informant leaking information inside the branch within twelve hours. Then alert the movers and the security team to back Irene's plan." "Yes, sir," Victor answered in a low voice. With my brother's approval, the weight finally lifted from my chest. I was no longer the junior finance manager forced to tiptoe around Carlo. I was the blade of the Moretti family. It was eleven at night when I got back to the apartment I rented in Port San Vito. I had just stepped out of the elevator when I saw my apartment door standing wide open. Loud footsteps and strangers' voices came from inside. In the living room, Carlo's sister Marianna, the landlord listed on my lease, was showing a young couple around my home. She wore a cheap leopard-print coat and was even holding the imported coffee beans from my coffee table. Spittle flew as she boasted to the couple, "Look at all this natural light! Every piece of furniture and every appliance is top of the line. The current tenant will be gone soon, and for forty-five hundred dollars a month, you can use all of it." The sight of my ransacked drawers and the couple sprawled across my two-thousand-dollar leather sofa sent a surge of anger straight through me. "What do you think you're doing?" Marianna turned. Upon seeing me, she showed not the slightest guilt for breaking into my home; instead, she laughed spitefully. "Well, if it isn't our illustrious finance director." She waddled toward me with her arms folded. "Carlo says you're getting out of Port San Vito at the end of the month. Since you're leaving, of course I brought prospective tenants over early. Am I supposed to let my apartment sit empty and lose money?" "My lease has three months left." I held up my key card and pointed at the door. "Take your guests and get out of my home. Now." Marianna raised her voice as if she had heard the funniest thing in the world. "Your home? Get this straight: it's my apartment. I can come in whenever I want! And don't try to intimidate me with that superior attitude. You're nothing but hired help. Cross the Rossi family, and you won't even make it through the month!" The couple hurried to their feet and watched me with open curiosity, eager for the spectacle. I took out my phone and snapped three photos of the ransacked room, the open door, and Marianna's smug expression. "Why are you taking pictures?!" Marianna lunged for my phone in a panic. "I'm documenting your unlawful entry." I slipped the phone back into my pocket and turned to the couple. "I should also warn you: I paid for the sofa, television, refrigerator, and even the curtains myself. At the end of the month, movers will strip this place bare. There won't be so much as a lightbulb left. If you want to pay forty-five hundred dollars for an empty concrete shell, be my guest." The couple's expressions changed at once. The young man coughed awkwardly. "Uh, ma'am, didn't you say the furniture came with the apartment? We wouldn't rent an empty place even for two thousand dollars. We'll be going." With that, the couple fled the apartment. "You little bitch! How dare you ruin my deal?!" Trembling with rage, Marianna jabbed a finger at my face and cursed. "Just wait! If I don't keep every cent of your deposit, my name isn't Rossi!" "I'll be waiting." I stepped forward and slammed the front door in her face. Marianna's curses continued outside the door. Keep my deposit? We would see whether the Rossis lived long enough to spend it. Chapter 4 By the end of the month, cold rain had been falling for days, and Port San Vito smelled of mildew and brine. I took half a day off, called the family's moving crew, and had them remove everything I owned: the furniture, the appliances, and even the floor lamp I had bought myself. The vast apartment held nothing but the battered sofa Marianna had originally provided and a coffee table with one broken leg. At two that afternoon, someone pounded on the door with undisguised aggression. The moment I opened it, Marianna barged in on high heels. She had not come alone. Carlo came in next, wearing his gray coat. Behind him was Nico, Marianna's son and Carlo's nephew, a heavyset street thug in his early twenties with a shoddy tattoo on his neck. This was not the look of a move-out inspection. This was a raid. "Well, you certainly cleared the place out." Marianna surveyed the empty living room, her shrill voice bouncing off the bare walls. "Irene, where did you hide my good furniture? Are you trying to steal your landlord's property?!" Leaning against the entryway wall, I watched her performance coldly, then pulled a file from my bag and tossed it onto the broken coffee table. "These are the time-stamped photos I took with this old furniture when I moved in two years ago, along with the email confirmations. "I haven't touched one piece of your garbage. Now inspect the apartment and give me back my nine thousand dollars. I'm in a hurry." Carlo scoffed. Nico stepped forward, produced a high-powered flashlight, and began prowling through the apartment. He also carried a stack of red sticky notes. "There's a scratch in this corner, less than half an inch long." Nico smiled coldly and stuck a red note on the wall. "Repainting: five hundred dollars. "The refrigerator seal is worn out, so it doesn't stay cold." He stuck another note onto the broken, ten-year-old refrigerator. "Imported replacement part: one thousand dollars. "Floor wear and dents: two thousand dollars. "Snagged curtains: eight hundred dollars." In less than ten minutes, glaring red labels covered the once-empty apartment. Finally, Carlo leisurely pulled a calculator from his pocket, made a show of pressing a few buttons, and slapped a handwritten bill down in front of me. "I've added it up." Carlo blew a smoke ring and looked down at me. "Irene, for old times' sake, I'll round it down. Your entire nine-thousand-dollar deposit is gone, and it still doesn't cover the damage. You owe us another seven thousand." I looked down at that absurd bill. When I moved in two years ago, even the lock on the door of this apartment was broken. "This is daylight robbery." I swept a cold gaze over the three greedy faces. "I'm not paying a cent." "That isn't up to you!" Marianna stepped forward and blocked the door. "You don't hand over seven thousand dollars today, and you don't leave this apartment! The Rossi family's word is the only contract that matters!" I said nothing. I pulled my phone from my coat pocket, ready to signal Victor downstairs. The instant my screen lit up, Nico lunged at me like a rabid dog and snatched the phone away. He smashed it against the concrete floor, then ground his heavy boot over it twice. "Calling the cops? Or your spineless boss?" Nico's heavy features quivered with excitement as he pulled a folding knife from his belt. "On this street, even the cops know better than to interfere with us! Pay up!" "Do you know what you just smashed?" I asked quietly. "It's just a crappy phone! I'll pay for it—" "No." I cut him off and glanced at the Patek Philippe on my wrist. "What you smashed was your last chance to stay alive." Chapter 5 "Who the hell do you think you're scaring?" My calm gaze enraged Nico, and he reached for my collar. Just then a phone rang sharply in the living room. It was Marianna's phone. She frowned and answered, "Hello? What is it... What? You're not coming to see the apartment this afternoon? Why? We already agreed..." The caller hung up on her. Marianna swore, and before she could put the phone down it rang again. "You're canceling too? If the price is the problem, we can negotiate... What do you mean this district is done? Explain yourself!" A third. A fourth. A fifth. Within five minutes, every prospective tenant scheduled to view the apartment that day called Marianna to cancel, one after another, as if they had coordinated it. Carlo immediately sensed that something was wrong. "What's going on?" When the final call came, Marianna put it on speaker and shouted in frustration, "Did you all conspire to make a fool of me?! What do you people want?" A cold male voice came through the speaker. "Ma'am, do you not read the news or internal bulletins? Moretti Logistics Group issued an official company-wide relocation notice this morning. By the end of the month, more than two hundred employees, every convoy, and every piece of equipment will have moved to the new North Port campus. "Not even a dog would rent in Port San Vito now. You might as well keep the place as your tomb!" The call ended. The living room was quiet enough to hear water dripping in the pipes. "Moving... everyone is moving?" Every trace of color drained from Marianna's face. Nico stared at me in disbelief. "Is that true?! Your whole company is leaving?! Then who are we supposed to collect from?" Carlo stared at me, his lips trembling. "Impossible... A logistics company that size, with more than a million dollars in renovations—where would you find another dock this close to customs? You're lying!" "What exactly did I lie about?" I brushed dust from my coat and regarded the narrow-minded fools with pity. "Three years ago, we bought industrial land at North Port. The new office tower, climate-controlled warehouses, staff apartments, and even private loading docks are already in operation." I watched Carlo's face turn ashen and began to deliver his sentence: "Mr. Rossi, you've squeezed us for the last time. Starting tomorrow, you won't get another cent out of us." "You bitch! You dare cut off our money!" Nico went berserk. He lunged, seized my wrist, and thrust the folding knife at me. "Hand over the money! Cancel the company's relocation! Or I'll finish you here today!" The knife point was a breath from my coat when— "Bang!" The reinforced door flew off its hinges and slammed into the living room wall. Four men in black trench coats appeared in the corridor like ghosts. The man in front had a deep old scar above his left eyebrow. "I'm counting to three." Victor's low, hoarse voice echoed through the room. Nico froze. Instinct warned him that Victor radiated a suffocating menace, the kind carried only by a man who had fought his way through piles of bodies. "One." Nico's hand jerked. The folding knife clattered to the floor, and he released me as if shocked. The moment Carlo recognized Victor, his legs buckled and he nearly dropped to his knees. "V-Victor..." Carlo's voice shook uncontrollably. Every trace of his usual swagger vanished, and he cowered like an old dog before its master. "This is a misunderstanding... We have no quarrel with the Moretti family. None at all..." "Of course you didn't." Victor stepped over the shattered glass, entered the living room, and picked up my crushed phone. He raised his emotionless eyes to Carlo. "At least, you didn't ten minutes ago." Nico still did not understand. He craned his neck and shouted, "Who the hell are you? This is our territory, and she owes us money—" Carlo backhanded Nico hard enough to split the two-hundred-pound thug's lip and knock him to the floor. "Shut up! Do you want to die?" Carlo screamed himself hoarse. Victor ignored the farce. He approached me respectfully and bowed his head. "Are you hurt, madam?" At Victor's deferential address, Marianna and Nico froze as if struck by lightning. Carlo's eyes nearly popped out of his head. He pointed at me, his finger shaking violently. "Isn't she just a finance manager at your company?" Victor turned his head. "Allow me to introduce her properly. "The woman you just held hostage and tried to extort is Mr. Moretti's own sister. Her name is Irene Moretti."