The Chicago docks were a labyrinth of shadows, the air heavy with the tang of salt and diesel, the distant clank of cranes echoing through the fog. Rocco Varga stood at the edge of a rusted warehouse, his silhouette sharp against the dim glow of a single sodium lamp. At fifty-two, his weathered face bore the lines of a life spent in the underworld—hard eyes, a crooked nose from too many fights, and a scar slashing across his left cheek, a memento from a deal gone sour. Once the kingpin of Chicago’s smuggling rings, Varga had been dethroned four years ago by Daniel Isiah, his former protégé, in a calculated betrayal that still burned in his gut. Now, he was a ghost, plotting in the margins, his name a whispered threat among the city’s criminal elite.
Varga leaned against a stack of crates,
