Chapter 2: A Gun on the Table
The back room of Cerone’s social club smelled of lost decades—liniment, old cigar smoke, and the sweet, decaying scent of spilled wine soaked into floorboards. It was a tomb of past glories, faded fight posters yellowing on the wood-paneled walls. Cerone sat behind a massive mahogany desk that was too clean, too empty, a stage for a performance.
Draco closed the door softly behind him. The only other person in the room was Silas, Cerone’s shadow, a mountain of quiet meat standing by the curtained window. Silas didn’t look at him. That was worse.
“Sit,” Cerone said. He wasn’t old, not really, but the life had worn grooves into his face that made him look ancient. He poured two fingers of an oily-looking anisette into a small glass, didn’t offer one.
Draco sat in the worn leather chair, its springs groaning. He kept his hands loose on his knees. The calm was a practiced thing, a sheet of ice over dark water.
Cerone took a slow sip, making a face as it went down. “My father drank this shit. Tastes like medicine and lies.” He set the glass down with a precise click. His eyes, flat and dark as river stones, lifted to Draco’s. “You been busy.”
“The lounge is running smooth. Receipts are up.”
“I’m not talking about the lounge.” Cerone leaned back, the chair creaking. “I’m talking about my niece. Jayla.”
There it was. The ice under Draco’s feet gave a subtle, dangerous crack. He said nothing. Waiting was a skill.
“She’s a problem,” Cerone continued, conversational. “Her father, my useless brother, made her soft in the head. Thinks the world is a fight you can win by yelling loudest.” He picked up a letter opener, testing the point with his thumb. “I put up with it. Blood is blood. But now she’s drawing attention. The wrong kind. The kind that makes people ask questions about my family’s discipline.”
“She’s just blowing off steam,” Draco said, his voice even.
“She’s a wildfire. And you…” Cerone pointed the letter opener at him. “You’re the guy who’s supposed to control the burn. Instead, I hear you’re fanning the fucking flames. Getting messy in storage closets. Leaving marks.” His voice dropped, lost all pretense of civility. “You putting your hands on my blood, Draco?”
The air turned to glass. Silas shifted his weight by the window, a subtle rustle of fabric.
“What happens between two consenting adults isn’t a family matter,” Draco said carefully. “It’s private.”
“Nothing is private!” Cerone slammed the flat of his hand on the desk. The glass jumped. “Not when your name is on the door. Not when your ‘private’ shit makes you look weak. Amari saw. You think she doesn’t have her own calculus? You think the boys from the river aren’t watching for a seam to rip open?”
He leaned forward, his anger a cold, radiating thing. “And then there’s the other business. Rico’s crew. Little favors. Smoothing over their collection issues on the west side. Using my goodwill, my reputation, to build your own.” He said it calmly now, which was infinitely more terrifying. “You been playing house with my niece while cutting deals behind my back?”
Draco’s mind raced, calibrating. Amari hadn’t just been sending a warning. She’d been compiling a report. He kept his breathing even. “Rico had a problem with some independents muscling in. It was spilling over into our zone near the docks. I contained it. That protects our interests, too.”
“You contained it by making him owe you.” Cerone opened a drawer. He pulled out a heavy, matte-black pistol and laid it on the desk between them. It wasn’t a dramatic gesture. It was a piece of punctuation. “Loyalty isn’t a buffet, kid. You don’t get to pick and choose. It’s a single plate. You eat what’s on it, or you go hungry. Or,” he tapped the gun’s barrel, “you get taken off the menu.”
The silence that followed was thick enough to choke on. Dust motes danced in a sliver of light from a shaded lamp.
“So here’s your plate,” Cerone said, his voice soft. “Jayla is off limits. You look at her, you breathe near her, you think about her, and Silas here will revisit the conversation with you. Understood? Second. The river stops with you. Rico’s debt is erased. You tell him the favor was from me, and his next payment comes to this office. You are a representative of this family. Your goodwill is mine.”
He pushed the gun an inch closer to Draco. “And third. You need to remember where you sit. A demonstration of loyalty. Benny the Greek is holding out on his percentage from the poker game at The Anchor. He’s using product from Rico’s people, thinks that makes him untouchable. You will go there. You will make him understand the error of his thinking. Permanently.”
The meaning hung in the smoky air. Not a beating. A killing.
It was a test. A trap. If he refused, he was dead. If he did it, he was Cerone’s dog, forever. And the first order—to cut Jayla out—sliced through him with a surprising, sharp pain.
Draco looked at the gun. He looked at Cerone’s impassive face. He thought of Jayla’s laugh, wild and untamed. He thought of the taste of her skin.
He reached out. His fingers closed around the cold, hard steel of the pistol’s grip. It was heavier than he expected.
Cerone’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. “Good. Now get the fuck out. The Greek likes to close up around three.”
The night air outside the social club was a physical relief, cold and sharp in his lungs. The gun was a lead weight in the inner pocket of his coat. He walked without direction, his mind a static hum. The order was clear. The line was drawn.
He found himself outside her apartment building not by decision, but by instinct. It was a narrow walk-up in a block that had seen better days, the kind of place she could afford on a bartender’s cash and whatever else she scrounged together. Her light was on, third floor.
He didn’t call. He took the stairs two at a time, a momentum building in him that had nothing to do with thought. He knocked on her door, a hard, rapid staccato.
A pause. Then the locks disengaged. She opened the door, dressed in a worn tank top and panties, her hair piled in a messy knot. She’d washed off her makeup. She looked younger, and tired, and her eyes widened in surprise before they narrowed in suspicion.
“Draco? What the—”
He pushed inside, kicking the door shut behind him. He backed her into the small, cluttered living space, his hands coming up to frame her face, his kiss swallowing whatever she was going to say. It wasn’t tender. It was desperate, a claiming, a confession. He poured every ounce of the night’s tension—the threat, the gun, the ultimatum—into it.
She resisted for a second, her body stiff. Then, with a muffled sound against his mouth, she yielded. No, not yielded. She met him. Her hands fisted in his jacket, pulling him closer, her tongue tangling with his in a fierce, angry dance.
He broke the kiss, breathing hard, his forehead resting against hers. “Tell me to leave,” he rasped.
“Fuck you,” she breathed, her eyes blazing.
That was all he needed. He spun her around, bent her over the arm of her shabby sofa. He didn’t undress her. He yanked the thin cotton of her panties aside, tore at his belt and zipper with frantic hands. He was already painfully hard, driven by a need that was more fury than desire.
He entered her in one brutal, deep thrust. She cried out, her fingers digging into the fabric of the couch, but she pushed back against him, taking him deeper.
“Is this what you want?” he grunted, pulling out and slamming back in. The wet, filthy sound of it filled the small room. “This what you’re looking for when you play your fucking games?”
“Shut up,” she gasped, arching her back. “Just… fuck me. Fuck me hard.”
He obliged. He set a punishing pace, each drive of his hips a rebellion against Cerone’s order, a defiance of the gun burning a hole in his coat on the floor. He gripped her hips, his fingers sure to leave bruises, holding her in place as he pistoned into her. He leaned over her, his mouth at her ear. “You feel that? That’s me. Remember it.”
She was tight, hot, soaking wet for him. Her moans were ragged, uncontrolled. “Draco… god, yes…”
He snaked a hand around her front, down between her legs, finding her clit. He rubbed hard, fast circles, his movements rough and uncoordinated. He felt her inner muscles start to clench, a fluttering tension building.
“Come on,” he snarled. “Come for me. Now.”
It was an order, not a request. A shudder wracked her body, and she let out a sharp, broken cry as her orgasm hit, her body convulsing around him, milking his cock in hot, rhythmic pulses. The sight of her coming undone, the feel of it, shattered his control. With a final, deep thrust, he buried himself to the hilt and came, a guttural groan tearing from his throat as he emptied himself inside her.
He collapsed over her, his weight pressing her into the couch, their sweat-slicked skin sticking together. The only sounds were their ragged breaths and the faint traffic noise from the street below.
Slowly, the world came back. The reality of what was in his coat pocket. The order hanging over him. The look in Cerone’s eyes.
He pulled out, his body already missing her heat. He fixed his clothes, not looking at her.
Jayla straightened up, pulling her tank top down. She turned to face him, her expression unreadable. “What was that?”
“That was goodbye,” Draco said, his voice hollow.
She flinched as if slapped. “What?”
He finally looked at her. He saw the mark on her shoulder from the night before, faint now. His mark. “It can’t happen again. Cerone knows. He gave me a choice.”
Her face hardened, the vulnerability snuffing out like a candle. “And you chose him.”
“I chose to stay alive,” he snapped, the anger flaring hot and defensive. “You think this is a game? He gave me a gun, Jayla. He gave me a name. Benny the Greek. Tonight.”
The color drained from her face. She knew what that meant. Everyone knew Benny. He was a loudmouth, a middleman, but connected. A job like that was a line you didn’t come back from.
“So you’ll be his killer now,” she said, her voice flat. “And I’m just… a distraction you can’t afford.”
He had no answer. The truth of it was a stone in his throat.
She walked to the door, opened it. The gesture was final. “Then go do it. And don’t come back.”
He picked up his coat, feeling the deadly weight in the pocket. He paused at the threshold, wanting to say something, anything. But the words were ash.
He stepped into the dim hallway. He didn’t look back as he heard the door shut, the locks clicking firmly into place behind him.
The street was empty. He checked his watch. It was past two. Benny would be closing up The Anchor soon.
He reached into his coat, his fingers wrapping around the cold grip of the pistol. He started walking, his footsteps echoing in the silent night, each one taking him further from her, and deeper into the long, dark shadow Cerone had cast.