Luca Moretti's Arc

Chapter 4 of 9

Luca folded the photo into his pocket and stepped out back to check the lot. A patrol car sat across the way, engine low, parked beside a glass bus shelter that had not been there a year ago. The cop pretended to read a clipboard. Luca counted the hours in his head. Third night this week. Same shelter. Same slow stare at his garage door. He walked back inside and killed the office light. Moving the crew was out. Moving the guns was out. Every time his door rolled up, the old bell box on the brick wall clanged like a church on Sunday, and the cop across the street had ears. Luca needed a way to feed his people without feeding the file the commissioner was building. He made two calls from a burner. By morning, a corrugated metal warehouse two blocks over was rented under a dead cousin's name. He had his men drop supplies there instead. Couriers walked in light, walked out lighter. Nothing crossed his garage threshold. The bell stayed quiet. The patrol car kept watching an empty box. It worked. For three days, it worked. Then Luca got a text from the warehouse lookout: a second patrol car had rolled past, slow, twice. Someone had told them where to look again. The leak was not just inside his shop. The leak was close to him.