Chapter 7 - The Night Southport Burned
Michael Rourke had taught Nicholas to shoot.
His father taught him to hit.
There was a difference.
Michael believed patience separated professionals from angry boys.
“Anyone can pull a trigger,” he'd told Nicholas at sixteen. “The trick is knowing when not to.”
Nicholas remembered that sentence as Southport Court caught fire.
At 2:11 a.m., federal surveillance reported smoke from the basement.
At 2:14, the first explosion broke three windows.
By 2:17, flames climbed the eastern stairwell.
The building was empty.
That was the only reason Nicholas didn't lose control.
Nobody inside.
No children.
No Mrs. Alvarez.
No Emily.
The families were safe.
Still, watching the building burn felt personal.
Daniel's home.
Lucy's home.
Nine families' homes.
Evidence.
History.
Michael was erasing a battlefield.
Emily arrived before Nicholas could stop her.
She stepped from Adrian's car and stared.
“No.”
Flames reflected in her eyes.
Nicholas approached.
“You shouldn't be here.”
“That is my home.”
“I know.”
“No, you don't.”
Her voice broke.
“Lucy's height marks are on the kitchen doorway.”
Nicholas said nothing.
“Daniel painted her room.”
“I know.”
“Our wedding album is there.”
Nicholas looked toward the burning third floor.
He hadn't considered photographs.
Furniture.
Clothes.
The ordinary artifacts wealth made easy to replace but impossible to reproduce.
“I should've let you go back.”
She looked at him angrily.
“And die for photographs?”
“No.”
“Then stop.”
He did.
Emily cried quietly as firefighters worked.
Nicholas stood beside her.
Not touching.
Not offering solutions money couldn't provide.
Finally she said, “I hate him.”
“Michael?”
“Whoever did this.”
“You're allowed.”
“Do you?”
Nicholas looked at the flames.
“Yes.”
“What will you do?”
There it was.
The old question.
Violence sat inside him like muscle memory.
Find Michael.
Punish him.
End it.
But Daniel had trusted Nicholas to fix something larger.
Killing one man wouldn't do that.
“Expose him.”
Emily looked surprised.
“That's it?”
“No.”
Nicholas watched firefighters break windows.
“Then rebuild everything he destroyed.”
By sunrise, investigators confirmed arson.
Accelerant.
Timed ignition devices.
Professional placement.
One device had failed in the basement.
Inside its casing was a component from an old security supply company.
Rourke Tactical Services.
Closed ten years earlier.
Michael had owned it.
Not enough for conviction.
Enough for direction.
Nicholas went to the hotel housing Southport residents.
Mrs. Alvarez met him in the lobby.
She didn't insult him.
That worried him.
“How bad?”
“Very.”
“My apartment?”
“Gone.”
She sat.
Nicholas sat beside her.
“I am sorry.”
“Did you burn it?”
“No.”
“Then stop apologizing like everything is yours.”
He looked at her.
She continued.
“You rich men have strange disease. Think every tragedy belongs to you.”
He almost smiled.
“Sometimes they do.”
“Not all.”
She looked around.
Families sat in hotel chairs.
Children ate breakfast from paper plates.
“What happens now?”
“I rebuild.”
“Same place?”
“Yes.”
“Same rent?”
Nicholas hesitated.
Mrs. Alvarez narrowed her eyes.
“Careful.”
He smiled.
“Same rent.”
“Good.”
“Better building.”
“Better elevator.”
“Yes.”
“Working heat.”
“Yes.”
“Laundry.”
He looked at her.
“You're negotiating.”
“Of course.”
She smiled for the first time.
Nicholas found Emily upstairs.
Lucy was awake.
The child saw him and ran—more of a fast toddler wobble—into his legs.
“Nick.”
He caught her.
Emily looked exhausted.
“She asked where Bunny was.”
Nicholas held up the stuffed rabbit.
He'd rescued it from the mansion, not the fire.
Lucy grabbed it and kissed its head.
“Home?”
Emily's eyes filled.
Nicholas crouched.
“Home got hurt.”
Lucy frowned.
“Hurt?”
“Yes.”
He struggled for words a two-year-old could understand.
“We're going to fix it.”
“Daddy fix?”
Silence.
Emily looked away.
Nicholas said softly, “Daddy helped us know how.”
Lucy seemed satisfied.
Children accepted truths in pieces.
Adults demanded entire explanations and often understood less.
Adrian called.
“We found Michael.”
“Where?”
“Not him exactly. Property.”
A lakefront house in Evanston owned through an old trust.
Purchased twenty-five years earlier.
Used by Michael whenever he visited Chicago.
“Surveillance?”
“Federal team is moving.”
“No.”
“Nicholas.”
“If Michael planned Southport, he expects authorities after the obvious address.”
“So?”
“He wants us looking there.”
Nicholas thought about Michael's lessons.
Patience.
Misdirection.
Know when not to pull the trigger.
“What does he want now?”
Adrian answered slowly.
“You?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because this isn't about money.”
It had never been.
Patrick wanted power.
Graham wanted money.
Marcus wanted protection.
Claire wanted revenge.
Michael had assembled all of them.
But why?
Nicholas called Patrick.
His cousin was under federal questioning but hadn't been arrested.
“Nicky.”
“Who recruited you?”
Silence.
“Patrick.”
“You think I'm going to help you?”
“I think Michael promised you the company.”
More silence.
Nicholas continued.
“He was never giving it to you.”
“You don't know what you're talking about.”
“Claire told me.”
That was only partly true.
Patrick's breathing changed.
“What did she say?”
“Enough.”
Nicholas waited.
Patrick cursed.
“Uncle Michael said you'd destroyed the family.”
There it was.
“He said our fathers built an empire and you were selling it piece by piece to impress people who would always see us as criminals.”
Nicholas almost laughed.
“Did you agree?”
“Yes.”
Honest.
At least now.
“He said you'd eventually hand everything to outsiders.”
“So you built fake evidence to remove me.”
“We were supposed to force you out.”
“And Daniel?”
Patrick became quiet.
“I didn't order that.”
“Who did?”
“Marcus told me it was an accident.”
Nicholas closed his eyes.
Cowardice.
Everyone believed whatever protected them.
“Where is Michael?”
“I don't know.”
“Yes, you do.”
Patrick sighed.
“He has a place.”
“Where?”
“Old St. Vincent Church.”
Nicholas frowned.
The church had been closed for eight years.
It stood in Bridgeport, two blocks from the neighborhood where Nicholas's father and uncles grew up.
“Why there?”
“Because that's where he says the Rourkes became a family.”
Nicholas understood immediately.
Not logistics.
Symbolism.
Michael wanted a confrontation.
Adrian objected.
Federal agents objected.
Emily objected the loudest.
“You're walking into exactly what he wants.”
“Yes.”
“So don't.”
“If I don't, he keeps escalating.”
“Let police handle it.”
“They will.”
She stared.
“But?”
“But first he's going to talk.”
“Why?”
“Because men like Michael always need someone to understand why they were right.”
Emily folded her arms.
“And if he's armed?”
“He will be.”
“Nicholas.”
He looked at her.
For the first time, she touched his hand deliberately.
Not accidentally.
Not because Lucy pulled them together.
“Come back.”
Two words.
They affected him more than threats ever had.
He closed his fingers around hers.
“I plan to.”
At 11:47 that night, Nicholas entered St. Vincent Church.
Only a handful of candles burned.
Michael sat in the front pew.
Seventy years old.
White hair.
Dark suit.
A cane beside him.
“You came.”
Nicholas walked down the aisle.
“You burned a building to get my attention.”
Michael smiled.
“I knew you'd evacuate them.”
“Did you?”
“Yes.”
“That's convenient.”
“I am not a murderer.”
Nicholas stopped.
“Daniel Mercer.”
Michael's smile disappeared.
“That wasn't supposed to happen.”
Nicholas laughed softly.
It sounded dangerous even to him.
“How many men say that after building the machine that kills someone?”
Michael looked toward the altar.
“You destroyed your father's work.”
“I cleaned it.”
“You castrated it.”
There was the real grievance.
Not money.
Not Patrick.
Legacy.
“You think fear made the Rourkes strong,” Nicholas said.
“It kept us alive.”
“Until everyone inside the family started lying to each other.”
Michael stood.
“Your father would be ashamed.”
Nicholas thought of Southport residents.
Emily.
Lucy.
Daniel.
“Good.”
Michael's jaw tightened.
“You don't mean that.”
“I do.”
“You're willing to lose everything he built?”
“No.”
Nicholas looked around the empty church.
“I'm willing to decide which parts deserve to survive.”
Michael reached into his jacket.
Nicholas's hand moved toward his weapon.
But Michael produced no gun.
A photograph.
Nicholas's father.
Michael.
Young Nicholas.
Standing outside the same church.
“Look at us.”
Nicholas did.
“What about it?”
“We were feared.”
Nicholas looked at his uncle.
“You say that like it's the same as being loved.”
Michael's face changed.
Footsteps sounded at the rear.
Federal agents.
Michael looked back.
“You brought them.”
“Yes.”
“You really have changed.”
Nicholas remembered Michael's lesson from twenty-six years earlier.
Anyone can pull a trigger.
The trick is knowing when not to.
“I had a good teacher.”
Michael understood the insult.
Agents approached.
Then a shot cracked from the choir balcony.
Nicholas moved instinctively.
The bullet struck wood near Michael.
Another shot.
Nicholas dragged his uncle behind the pew.
“Who the hell—”
A figure ran above.
Not federal.
Not Nicholas's people.
Michael's face went pale.
“Graham.”
Nicholas looked at him.
“You didn't know?”
“No.”
For the first time, Michael appeared genuinely afraid.
May you like
The conspiracy had outgrown its creator.
Graham Pike no longer needed Michael either.
