Chapter 6 - The Trial on the Lift
Tony Mercer let out an audible, terrified wheeze from the other side of the fender. The shop manager looked as though he were preparing to dive beneath the Mustang to escape the blast radius of Dante’s wrath. Nobody spoke to Dante Moretti like that. Men had ended up in the industrial incinerators off Gary for less than a sarcastic tone.
Dante did not reach for a weapon. He didn't even raise his hand.
A slow, terrifying stillness settled over his features. He stared at Eli, his dark eyes unblinking, peeling away the layers of her insolence with the cold detachment of an autopsy surgeon. He saw the tension in her jaw; he saw the microscopic pulse beating frantically against the pale hollow of her throat beneath the oversized black collar.
He didn't believe a single word that had just come out of her mouth.
“Is that right?” Dante murmured softly.
He turned slowly on his heel, looking past the black Mustang toward the far corner of the warehouse, where Bay Seven lay shrouded in partial shadow beneath a set of dead fluorescent tubes.
Sitting on the heavy two-post lift was an anomaly: a 1961 Aston Martin DB4 GT, its aluminum body stripped down to raw, brushed metal, its front clip exposed like an open ribcage. The twin-choke Weber 45 DCOE carburetors sat disassembled on a rolling red tool tray beside the front wheel, surrounded by discarded brass jets, float needles, and copper gaskets.
“That car belongs to a collector from Geneva,” Dante said, his voice flat, cutting through the low burble of the Mustang’s exhaust. “Three specialists have flown in from New York to balance those triple Webers. Every time they take it off the lift, the middle bank floods the plugs and fouls the combustion chamber. The customer is threatening to pull his entire transport contract from my docks on Friday.”
Dante turned his head back, fixing Eli with a gaze that felt like cold iron.
“Tony says you’re a mechanic,” Dante said. “I say you’re an orphan with a sharp tongue and a fake social security card.”
He took a step back, gesturing with his hand toward Bay Seven.
“You have until noon,” Dante commanded. “Balance the triple banks. Clear the hesitation on the mid-range throttle. If that straight-six engine doesn't sing like a church choir when I come back down those stairs… you won't have to worry about whether your check bounces, Eli. Because you won't be walking out the gate to cash it.”
Tony’s face went pale as paper. “Boss… those Webers take a specialized synchronization tool from the UK. The courier hasn't delivered the—’
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“I didn't ask you, Tony,” Dante cut in, his voice silky, quiet, and lethal.
He didn't look at Tony again. He kept his eyes locked on Eli for two long, agonizing heartbeats, letting the weight of the sentence settle between them. Then, without another word, Dante turned and walked away, his polished shoes clicking with rhythmic, terrifying confidence against the epoxy floor as he ascended the industrial metal staircase leading to his glass-walled office above.
