Dance of Ruin: Chapter 23

The first body is slumped over a card table, face down in a pool of blood and scattered poker chips. The second is across from him, his face similarly planted in a red, wet pile of playing cards and money.

The third is slumped over sideways in the corner under a neon exit sign, like he just happened to bleed out mid-cigarette. The fourth is halfway out the back door, his bloodied hand still wrapped around a fistful of hundreds.

Nero is standing over the first guy, his sleeves up to his elbows, gloves on, half-unbuttoned shirt streaked with drying blood, a lit cigarette dangling from his lips.

Roman walks in behind me, nose wrinkling. “What the fuck, Nero?”

“Gloves are over there,” Nero says casually. “If the smell gets to you…I dunno, light one of these.” He tosses Roman, who doesn’t smoke, a pack of cigarettes.

“Yeah, or don’t,” I growl, snatching the pack from Roman’s hand. “Don’t light anything, for that matter.”

I nod my chin at the shelf on the far wall of the basement room, peppered with bullet holes, and the gallon bottle of paint thinner on one of said shelves, dripping the last of its contents all over the floor in a big, smelly, highly flammable puddle.

Nero follows my gaze, his brow furrowing. Not out of concern for the massive explosion waiting to happen, but like he’s wildly curious about what might happen if that explosion actually occurred.

Nero is fucking nuts. I tend to think of him as “Carmine-adjacent”: not quite the same level of psychopath that my brother is, but not far off.

But where Carmine is methodical, rigid, and utterly in control in that Dexter way he has, Nero is the exact opposite.

He’s a lunatic. Unhinged, manic, and basically a reincarnation of his namesake, the mad Roman Emperor Nero, known for his barbarism and debauchery.

And this is the guy in charge of the De Luca mafia family.

God fucking help us all.

He’s still staring almost lovingly at the puddle of paint thinner, a canine grin on his face, when I walk over and snatch the cigarette from his lips.

“Rude,” he snaps pettishly.

“I just feel like living past the next five fucking minutes, if that’s okay with you. My apologies,” I grunt, dropping the cigarette into a glass of whiskey and melted ice.

“Fuck. Me.”

Laz walks in behind Roman, an amused look on that pretty-boy face of his that made him so ridiculously popular with girls while we were at Knightsblood together. His brows arch, surveying the carnage.

“Glad I answered this text,” he grins, his tone devoid of sarcasm.

Laz and Nero share the same fascination with blood, bodies, and violence.

“What the fuck actually happened here?” Roman grunts, nodding to the holes in the wall and shattered light fixtures.

Nero shrugs, lifting the guy at the table up by a handful of hair and tipping his head back, his mouth falling slackly open.

“You really wanna know?”

Roman frowns. “Why the boss of the De Luca family is down here getting blood on his shoes? Like fuck I wanna know. Isn’t the whole point of being the boss having underlings?”

Nero glances up. A wild glint flickers in his eye. “And let them have all the fun?” He blows air through tight lips. “As fucking if. Anyway, if you guys want in, there are more hedge clippers and pliers in that bag in the hallway.”

I snort a dry laugh and turn to glance at Roman, who has a sour look on his face.

“When you said you needed help cleaning up some bodies, Nero,” he mutters, “I assumed you meant rolling them in tarps and putting them in a trunk.”

“Nah,” Nero shrugs. “They’re staying here. I just need to…sanitize first.”

He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a pair of pliers. Then he leans over the dead guy’s open mouth and starts to stick the pliers inside.

“Oh, hell fucking no,” Roman rumbles as I chuckle. “Absolutely not.”

“Pussy,” Nero retorts, the room suddenly filling with the horrifying sound of a tooth being yanked out of its socket.

Wetly.

Roman makes a face. “I’ll do fingers. I’m not touching teeth. Fucking filthy.”

“I’ll play dentist,” Laz shrugs casually.

“A true officer and a gentleman,” Nero murmurs, peering into the mouth before him and going in once again.

I grab the gym bag from the hallway and hand Laz a pair of pliers, grabbing garden shears for Roman and myself. We each take one of the guys away from the table, the snip-snip sound of shears cutting through flesh and bone contrasting with the disgusting dental sounds behind us.

“Hey, speaking of pussy,” Nero grunts. “Roman, where the fuck did you go last night? You had those two blondes all over you and you just dipped out.”

‘Seriously,’ Laz grunts. “You left those poor girls hanging, their mouths still open.’ Laz grins. “Luckily, I was there to help fill those mouths.’

Roman scowls. ‘I was drunk.’

‘You were shitfaced,’ Nero corrects.

Roman shrugs, clipping off another finger from the body he’s squatting down beside. “Just having a good time.”

“Not as good a time as I did after you left,’ Laz chuckles.

I shake my head, methodically cutting. My thoughts aren’t on Nero or the bloodstains or whatever war he’s clearly fighting within his own house.

They’re on Naomi.

The way she danced. The way she moaned for me, barely hidden by the bass and the lights and her dress as I rammed into her, taking her there on the dancefloor.

The way she came apart, squeezing my cock with her tight little pussy.

I shouldn’t have let it go that far. I shouldn’t have touched her like that, not there, where people could have seen.

But I’d do it again. Over and over. And fuck anyone who⁠—

“You were busy last night too, I hear,” Nero says, like he’s reading my mind.

What?

I blink, stopping mid-cut, keeping my head turned away.

Roman chuckles. “Fucking the good Congressman’s daughter?” He grins and shakes his head. “What’s the play there? Film a sex tape and send it to her dad⁠—”

I slam into him, my forearm against his throat as I pin him to the bullet-riddled wall behind him.

“The fuck is your fucking problem!” he snarls, shoving me back and almost throwing me off him. But I manage to keep my grip and my footing, slamming him back against the wall again.

“Take it easy!” he hisses. “Jesus, I was just making a joke⁠—’

‘What the fuck are you talking about?’ I spit.

Roman frowns. His eyes slip past my shoulder to Laz and Nero standing behind me. Then they drag back to me. “Have you…not seen it?”

“Seen what?”

“Nico.”

When I glance around, Nero is holding up his phone.

Fuck.

On the screen is a photo—Naomi against the club wall, her lips crushed under mine, her leg wrapped around my hip.

There’s another of me carrying her into my building.

Something hot and violent surges up my throat.

Not shame.

Not guilt.

Rage.

She belongs to me. Not the tabloids, not a bunch of fucking strangers to gawk at and talk about or even think about.

“Nico.”

Roman’s voice is still edged but devoid of anger as he grabs my arm and gently prys it away from his throat. I allow it, taking a step back, my shoulders tight.

“I wasn’t trying to⁠—”

“It’s fine,” I growl.

“So are you…” He frowns. “Like, seeing her? Naomi, I mean.”

I don’t answer.

Saying it out loud might make it too real.

Nero catches his phone as I toss it to him, then I drop my hedge trimmers on the card table.

“Clean up your own mess,” I say. “I need to go deal with something. And are we good?” I grunt, turning to Roman. He nods back at me.

“You know we’re good, man.”

Nero, meanwhile, makes a face. “You’re seriously leaving?”

“I think you can manage four fucking bodies without me.”

“But you’re gonna miss the bonfire!”

He grins, holding up his Zippo and nodding eagerly at the puddle of paint thinner.

“Just save me a fucking s’more,” I growl as I turn and march out the door.