Chapter 8 – Vespera
I stack the bottles one at a time.
Tequila first—golden and sharp, catching the light.
Then the gin—clear and clean, a contrast to everything running through my head.
The vodka crate’s swollen from the rain, wood soft and warped.
I pry it open, bracing it with my foot, and pull out what’s still intact.
The necks clink as I line them up. Twelve glass eyes watching me do work that no one else signs up for.
My hands are steady. Everything inside me isn’t.
Tiziano came back hours ago. Blood stained his shirt. Mud marked his boots. His voice was raw, as if he’d scraped it across the bayou. He said one word: “Done.” That was it.
He didn’t say what happened.
He didn’t have to.
I know what he is. I know what he’s willing to do.
I’ve replayed it over and over anyway. The blood on his sleeves, the way it clung to the fabric. The way he stood—not proud, not guilty. Just finished. Like someone who doesn’t second-guess anything.
He went upstairs afterward, leaving mud streaked across the floor. I mopped it twice, but the smell still lingers—metallic and heavy.
I shut the vodka crate and shove it back under the bottom shelf. The wood groans under the force.
The storeroom smells like cleaner and sweat. But underneath it, there’s that trace of iron I can’t shake. A smell that means something violent came through here and didn’t apologize for it.
He walked in like he brought the swamp with him. Left it here, in the floorboards, in the walls. In my skin.
I haven’t stopped feeling it.
My body doesn’t show it, but inside, my pulse hasn’t calmed. Not since I saw him.
I shove a full crate into place too hard. The wood cracks under my hand. A sliver jabs into my palm. I pull back fast.
Tiny cut. Barely anything. A bead of blood appears, bright against my skin.
I wipe it on my jeans. They’re already stained. Doesn’t matter.
Then I stop.
Something changes.
The kind of quiet that means someone’s there. Someone I didn’t hear come in.
I don’t call out.
I grab the rag off the shelf, grip it tight like I might need it for more than wiping bottles.
Then, I hear it.
A step. Light. Measured. One boot hitting the concrete.
I turn.
Tomas stands in the doorway.
He’s not supposed to be here. Said something about a supply run earlier, heading out of town. But he’s here now. Leaning on the frame like he owns it.
His face isn’t the same as usual. No grin. No half-lidded flirt. His mouth is tight, and his eyes are alert.
“Morning,” he says.
I don’t answer.
He steps forward, hand out. Calm. Not fast.
He’s holding something.
It catches the light.
A knife.
Short. Four inches, maybe. Fixed blade. Handle wrapped in black cord. No chips, no marks. Clean, but clearly used.
He flips it once, then offers it to me—handle first.
“You’re gonna need this,” he says.
I don’t move at first. Then, I take it.
The weight settles in my hand. Balanced. Familiar.
“Bit early for presents,” I say, steady.
He shakes his head. “Not a gift. Call it a suggestion.”
I look it over. The edge is sharp. I wouldn’t need much effort to make it count.
“You hand these out to everyone on the payroll?”
“No,” he says. “Just the ones being followed.”
I look up. His voice lands with weight.
“You want to run that by me again?”
He leans back, arms folded, relaxed in posture, but his eyes remain locked on me.
“I hear things,” he says. “Out in the bayou. From guys hauling for the trucks. People talk when they think I’m just the one pouring their drinks.”
I don’t say anything, just keep my grip on the blade. My thumb runs along the hilt.
“Alfeo’s sniffing around again,” he says. “More than usual. Not just hotheads. People who don’t come out during business hours.”
“Hitters?”
He nods. “The kind that skip introductions.”
“And you?”
“I don’t like the way he talks about you. Or this place.”
He says it flat. Like it’s not up for debate.
“Did Tiziano start this?” I ask.
“Probably,” Tomas says. “But it was already coming.”
I glance down at the knife, still in my hand, still pointed down, not out. “You picking sides now?”
He shrugs. “Already did.” He nods at the blade. “That’s me putting my bet on you.”
I look at him. Tomas doesn’t hide things well and doesn’t try to. He doesn’t bluff; he just lets people think he does.
Right now, there’s no game in his face.
No hesitation either.
I flip the knife once in my hand, test the balance. It fits.
“You sure you want to be this close?” I ask. “Could cost you.”
He smiles, small. “Closer I am, the better chance I have of staying ahead of it.”
I stare at him a moment longer, waiting for any sign that he’s second-guessing this.
There’s nothing.
I slide the knife into my boot. The steel rests cold against my ankle.
“Thanks,” I say. Quiet. Solid.
He nods.
Then he turns and walks out.
His boots echo down the hall. Faint. Controlled. Then gone.
I wait.
Ten seconds. Fifteen.
Then, I let out the breath I was holding.
Tomas isn’t just the guy behind the bar.
Good.
The room feels smaller now. Tighter. The rain starts up again, hitting the roof harder. I flex my hand; the cut stings. I glance at the shelf; the rag’s still there.
I think about Tiziano, blood down his sleeves. The look on his face when he came in. Like he’d emptied something out there that he’s not planning to refill.
He did it for me. Didn’t say it, but I know.
And now Tomas has handed me a blade. Another reminder that what’s coming doesn’t care who I used to be.
The knife in my boot feels heavier with that truth.
Tomas is right.
Tiziano might’ve bought time, but he lit a fuse doing it. And Alfeo doesn’t like waiting for things to explode on their own.
I grab another bottle and put it on the shelf. My hands keep moving.
But my thoughts are already ahead of me.
Steel. Blood. Debt.
I’m not ready.
But I’m not backing down.
Not now.
The storeroom door creaks.
I don’t turn right away.
He’s here.
Tiziano moves like the room wants to make space for him. Hours earlier, after telling me he was “done,” he slipped upstairs, boots dragging mud across the steps. Quiet enough to make every part of me go still.
My back straightens. Muscles lock in place. I feel him before I see him.
He smells like steel, sweat, and something older—earth and water. The swamp still clings to him, even hours later.
He steps in without saying anything, but I know exactly where he is—three feet back, near the broken crate I left by the wall. I don’t have to look. I know the way he watches, how still he gets when he’s deciding whether to speak.
I’m stacking bottles. The new bourbon shipment—necks clean, smooth, unbroken. They catch the light just enough to shine. Neat and steady. Not like the rest of us.
He stays quiet. The silence hangs there, full of something I can’t name.
I feel him watching. His eyes don’t move fast. They track everything—shelves, boxes, the rag on the ground, the mess I haven’t cleaned up yet. Then me.
Then the knife I’m threading into the sheath at my belt.
“That from Tomas?” he asks. His voice is low, rough.
I slide the last bottle into place before answering. “He’s paying attention.”
“So am I.”
He’s closer. I didn’t hear him move.
I adjust the sheath. My fingers move steadily, but my pulse doesn’t match.
He’s still watching. That doesn’t surprise me.
What does is the touch.
His hand brushes mine.
Not by accident.
He places his fingers there on purpose, just enough contact to make it clear.
Warm. Solid.
Not demanding.
Intentional.
I don’t move away. Neither does he.
His hand is rough. Callused. It lingers a second—no pressure, no rush.
Just a connection. Simple. Real.
“You’re not alone in this,” he says, quieter now. Not unsure. Just stripped of everything but the point.
I look at him.
His eyes are steady and focused, with no questions in them—only truth.
He doesn’t blink. Doesn’t smile. He just looks at me like the words already belong to me.
I don’t respond with anything big. Just a nod.
But it’s more than I gave him yesterday.
He notices. His expression shifts slightly, and something eases in his face.
The room feels different for a second.
Not softer.
Just still.
Held.
I finish securing the knife under the back of my waistband. The steel rests cold against my skin. His hand’s not there anymore, but I still feel the warmth from where he touched me.
He watches the motion. Doesn’t move again. Doesn’t need to.
He’s not pressing. He’s not crowding.
He’s anchoring.
Help’s showing up, I think. Some of it I asked for. Some of it just arrived.
I take a step toward the door and push it open. The hinges creak lowly.
The sound cuts through the quiet.
Outside, the bar breathes again, life pouring in like it never left.
Chairs scrape the floor.
Glasses knock together.
Someone laughs too loudly.
The regular sounds. Familiar.
I step into the hallway. Tiziano follows, his steps behind me quiet, measured.
I left the knife in my waistband, but the weight of it feels different now. Not just a tool. A line in the sand.
Tomas warned me.
Alfeo threatened me.
Tiziano bled for me.
None of that changes what I’m walking into. But it sharpens me.
I glance into the main room as I step through the threshold. People are where they usually are. Faces I’ve seen a hundred times, but now every one of them feels like a question mark.
The bar smells like old beer and lemon cleaner. The kind of scent you stop noticing until something goes wrong.
Rain hits the windows, soft but steady.
Tiziano doesn’t come all the way in. He stops at the doorway, leaning into the frame. Tomas stood there earlier, too, but the energy is different now.
Tomas looked ready to act.
Tiziano looks ready to hold the door shut behind me.
His shirt’s clean. No blood. No mud.
But I remember.
I remember every inch of him when he walked in, soaked in what he did for me. It hasn’t left my mind.
I walk to the counter, boots tapping softly on the hardwood. The bar feels normal, but thin—like it’s barely holding together.
I pick up a glass and wipe it out. It’s a habit, something to do with my hands.
My fingers follow the rim while my brain runs the same cycle. Tomas’s blade. Tiziano’s blood. The steps they took toward me. The ones I didn’t ask for, but didn’t stop either.
I feel Tiziano’s stare on my back. It doesn’t push. It doesn’t claim.
But it’s there.
Constant.
I don’t have to look to know he’s watching every move I make.
The knife’s cold against my spine.
Whatever it means—gift, warning, shield—I took it.
Same way I’ve taken everything else that’s come for me lately.
Tiziano takes one step forward.
Just one.
But I feel it.
He doesn’t speak.
He doesn’t need to.
The moment holds.
Loud voices echo from the far end of the room. Glasses clink. The sound of life pressing forward.
But none of it breaks the moment between us.
I turn my head, just enough to catch his eyes.
He’s not hiding anything. There’s want in his stare, sure. But there’s more.
Conviction.
He didn’t just fight for me.
He stayed.
And that means something I’m not ready to name.
But I feel it.
I’m not alone.
And that—more than knives, more than blood, more than Alfeo—makes everything real.
Too real.
More dangerous than anything waiting outside.