Chapter 1
ONE
Guns n Roses blared through the speakers and I shifted on the black leather chair, which got me a dark look from Romero, his tattoo machine stilling.
“Problem?” I raised an eyebrow.
“No.” He grinned before glancing down at the lit joint in my fingers. “Just that I have to look at your shitty face.”
“That’s not what your mom said last night.” I shot him a knowing smirk, passing it over.
“Mmm,” he raised his eyebrows, then sat back, inhaling. He held the smoke in his lungs before passing it back. “Hope she gave you crabs.”
I chuckled and, leaning in, he fell back to deep concentration, subconsciously toying with his thick, metal lip ring while he worked his machine.
The pain shooting through my shoulder was like ants munching on my skin so I tried to focus on something else - the red, Victorian wallpaper plastered on the walls; the skull-faced Santa Maria statue in the corner with lit candles, and a picture of Romero’s grandmother, long since passed. The display of intricate drawings lining the wall—obligatory pictures like a heart, prickled and bleeding by thorns, a skull with a rose crown.
Motherfucking Bourbon King, the new Vegas mafia Don and my boss.
I’d never had a tattoo before, never planned on having one. But now, we were all lined up like ducklings while he lorded over us like a silent, broody king.
I loved the asshole but his moody glaring was getting on my nerves. “Stop staring.”
He grunted, looking away, but his brother and my best friend, Coulter, turned in his seat, giving me one of his infamous smirks.
“But it’s so fun.” Coulter’s smile was Las Vegas famous for making girl’s panties melt, but ever since he’d gotten married, he grinned with the confidence of a man who had the biggest dick in the room. “Seeing you in pain is as fun as watching my bank account go up.”
“It’s also fun to punch you in the face, but you see me holding back.”
He lifted a shoulder, shrugging, still with that fucking grin, and looked away. I pulled on my joint and let it settle deep in my bones, calming me.
Someone had been fucking with my business lately. Starting with a suspicious rise in online complaints, then workers were quitting—citing better offers from other employers. There was an increase in random attacks on my secure servers, more than the usual, then, finally, accounts were starting to come up short. Accounts that affected the Kings, which was a problem. I’d also heard that someone wanted to kill me, something I’d only confessed to Coulter.
I was handling it but it was a pain in my ass, and clearly not a coincidence. I had a sense that bigger things were coming, and the weed helped with the stress.
Also, months ago, I’d been taken captive while trying to protect Bourbon’s now wife, Rose. During that time, I was severely tortured. When the Kings rescued me, they’d had to amputate two half fingers and one toe. I still felt the phantom pains from that experience.
Smoking helped keep my demons quiet but I was becoming more and more reliant on it. I really should stop.
I should also stop lusting after Tatiana, but I may as well try to stop breathing.
Last night, I’d called her up to me, claiming her in front of the whole King outfit. I couldn’t stop thinking about how her gorgeous, deep blue eyes had widened in surprise, then narrowed into thin slits when I'd announced her name. How her hips swayed, her tongue parting luscious lips, her movements graceful, flowing like water as she came towards me.
She’d met my stare as she walked, her expression filled with scorn and hatred, and… secret devotion . Something she tried to bury long ago but that still remained, no matter how hard she tried to cleanse it from her.
The crowd of powerful men had parted for her , their gazes burning into her , unable to resist the pull of her seduction. And yet, her eyes, only for me . Her breath, eager and aroused, for me …her very soul, entwined with mine .
It made me hard, just thinking about it.
This was how it was meant to be: her, always coming to me, so that I could worship at the alter of her heart.
Burying my adoration of her was like a star trying to reduce its brilliance to the shimmer of the moon.
It wasn’t possible.
A star would always shine with the brilliance of the sun, just like my love for Tatiana. It incinerated me with the its intensity and nothing would ever change that.
Ever since she'd arrived in Vegas five years ago, in my own fucking backyard, she'd seduced and teased, playing hard to get. She fucked her way through both the men and the women of this city. We flirted and conversed in public, but we never spoke about our past, the secrets between us, or our real feelings.
We played a game that only the two of us knew about, both never willing to admit the truth.
That we were meant to be together. That the sun, stars, moon and even the motherfucking ocean had tilted the day we’d met, bringing us together in a clash of fervor and fate. And that nothing would ever tear us apart.
And now that we’d killed the old bastard Don of Vegas, things were safe enough to pursue what I really wanted in this life, and that was her.
My little polva .
It was time to stake my claim, and this Friday, her birthday, was the perfect time to do it.
To remind her that no matter what she did, where she went, or who she was with , she fucking belonged to me . Not him.
Because, fuck Rook. Fuck her contract with him, and fuck Rook’s and my history.
I was going to pry her from his cold, heartless fingers.
I’d inscribed my name on her heart years ago, and it was embedded as deep as the damn Grand Canyon and more permanent than this goddamn tattoo Bourbon had instructed us to get.
There was no getting her out of my system, and she needed to be reminded of that.
The prickling on my shoulder stopped, and Romero leaned back, admiring his work and making final adjustments. He made a final flourish before placing his machine on his black and chrome station.
“Good?” He grunted at Bourbon, who looked over the tattoo carefully before nodding. Romero stood, cleaning off the extra ink, then began to apply the petroleum jelly and wrapping.
Familia est vita. Domus Regum.
Family is life. House of Kings.
I had to admit that it looked good.
And even though Bourbon had branded us with this tattoo, as well as making us make a blood oath in front of all the made men in our outfit, all this was a formality. A way to demonstrate our loyalty in front of everyone.
You messed with one of us, you messed with us all.
Once Romero was done giving me aftercare instructions, he grabbed the remote and changed the neon-lit Bluetooth speakers to Metallica, then began to prepare the next booth for Dante, my other best friend, also heavily involved in our line of work. We’d come in out of the regular hours, and had the whole shop to ourselves.
Bourbon finally stopped looming and sat in the newly vacated tattooist’s chair. He faced Coulter and Torian, who were sitting on the black velvet couch. “Now that the rest of the men have sworn their loyalty to me, as soon as we've fleshed out anyone else still loyal to Nero?—”
"And killed them," Coulter interjected.
“—And taken care of them ,” Bourbon paused to glance meaningfully at Romero, who was gesturing for Dante to sit, “we're going to give the Mendozas what they want.”
The past few months had been a warfare between Nero, the old Don—who also happened to be their father, and an utter waste of oxygen on this earth—and us. After trying to kill Bourbon, Coulter had to retaliate, killing the man whose heart was as hard as glass but, apparent-fucking-ly, just as fragile.
After that was weeks of weeding out men who would betray us and reestablishing our dominance in the city.
In the process, Coulter had brought in the Mexican cartel for help. They’d not only betrayed us but put out a hit on Coulter, just for shits and giggles. We were currently in the negotiation process with them. Right now, we were the dominant force in Vegas, with connections to California, New York, Russia, Cuba and Guatemala. We had routes across the world but concentrated our efforts near home.
Right now, the Mendoza cartel was asking for both money and territory, something both Coulter and I were vehemently against giving up.
I blinked, and turned in my chair towards Bourbon. "Excuse me?"
“The territory they’re asking for is only a couple of blocks?—“
“A couple of very profitable blocks,” I reminded him.
“—and it won’t hurt our bottom line too much. To them it’s a lot, but to us, it’s not. It only reflects our strength, not our weakness.” No one spoke, so Bourbon continued. “For now, we need to cut down on the violence. We’ve gotten rid of all of Nero’s loyal men, except for one. My contact in the FBI tells me that they’ve noticed."
"What about the Senator? He owes us." Dante protested.
“His wife died because of us,” Coulter said. “Why would he help us now?”
“Because her death thrust him to the top of the polls,” Dante countered. “He won that election because she died.”
"Nothing like a grieving widow to endear the public to you." Taking one last hit, I ground my joint in the ashtray provided.
“Exactly. He should be kissing our asses for that,” Dante agreed. “Then at least her death would mean something.”
“All right, Dante, ensure that the Senator clearly understands our needs, and what the consequences are if he doesn’t fall in line.” Dante nodded his head, and Bourbon continued. “Regardless, I want us to strengthen our position by becoming as legit as possible."
"You'll never make as much money going legit," I countered. I'd been the money man all my life, first under my grandfather's tutelage, then as the accountant for Coulter’s clubs. Now that Nero was dead, I was digging through all his accounts.
Nero had some legitimate businesses, but they weren’t pulling in near as much as the illegal ones.
"Maybe money isn't all I care about." Bourbon replied with a cool voice. His wife, Rose, also one of my closest friends, was going to have a baby, and going legitimate would help make things safer for them.
“Okay,” I shrugged.
"I'm fine with going legitimate, but we have to take care of the cartel. They're going to give us problems." Coulter said. "Plus, we finally have Nicholi under our thumb. Our first new shipment of ozone arrived yesterday." Ozone was Vegas’ newest, most desired drug of choice, and we’d had to strong-arm the Russians into selling it to us.
"I'm fine with the ozone," Bourbon waved him off, “but I don't want to start a war with the cartel. Not yet.”
“They almost fucking killed me,” Coulter growled.
“And for that, they will pay, but we will handle it as a business transaction, not with violence.”
“You can’t trust them,” Coulter shook his head. “They’ll only see that tactic as weakness.”
“I can’t start a war with the cartel while my wife is pregnant!” Bourbon exploded in a rare show of emotion, and silence fell over the tattoo shop. There was even a pause in the music, a brief nothingness hovering in the space between us.
Then the music began again, and Coulter spoke in a calm voice. “If we do nothing, it will only become more dangerous for us down the line. That will put all our families in danger.”
“Then we’ll handle them the same way we’ve handled things in the past. But we need information first; we don’t even know the identity of their Jefe . It requires patience, but we’re experts at that by now. We find their weaknesses, then, when it’s time , cut them down with it. For now, we practice patience—” At Coulter’s protest, Bourbon snarled out, “then, after my wife has her fucking baby, we cut off the head of the snake.” At this concession, we all nodded in agreement. “But we’ll do it quietly. By the time they notice we’ve taken over, I want them to have nothing left to stand on.”
“Fine,” Coulter reluctantly agreed, and Bourbon stood. He looked like he wanted to get the hell out of here, and I didn't blame him. He had a nice piece of ass to go home to.
"Got somewhere to be?" Coulter asked with a grin.
“And you don’t?” Bourbon said, peering over Romero's shoulder, who was still working on Dante’s tattoo.
Coulter just chuckled. “Speaking of women, Tatiana almost shit a brick when you called her up last night, Knight.” Coulter's knowing smirk had my protectiveness surfacing.
"How about you just worry about keeping your firecracker under control. I can take care of my own problems."
“Tatiana's not going to make it easy for you to claim her,” Coulter shook his head.
"And Aster's going to lock you in your room and burn it down if you don't get home soon.”
"She'll do no such thing,” he smirked, "as she's currently tied to the bed."
"Goddamn," I choked out a laugh, and Bourbon just ran his hand through his hair, smiling and shaking his head.
"If you're done gossiping like old ladies," Torian, who had been quiet the whole time, even when he was getting his tattoo, stood up, slipping his phone into the pocket of his black jeans. “I’ve got somewhere to be.” Torian was Bourbon’s concierge: his official enforcer, in charge of ‘special projects’.
“Who's the one in a rush to leave now?" I asked, winking at him. We all knew what Torian was preoccupied with these days.
"Unlike you and your useless dick, I have work to do." He gave me a hard stare. I only smirked back at him, not saying anything. When he was bored with my lack of response, he scowled, then turned towards Bourbon. "Unless you have anything else for me, I need to go take care of my project .”
“Actually you two,” Bourbon looked between Torian and me, “I need you, Knight, to find Benny. Then give him over to Torian.”
Benny was the last of the old Don’s loyal men. He’d promised to be at the swearing in ceremony last night but he’d disappeared in the middle of the night.
Bourbon didn’t need to explain what he meant by ‘give him to Torian’. We all understood that Benny’s disappearance was a clear sign he wouldn’t switch his loyalties over to Bourbon, and for that, he needed to die. As Bourbon’s enforcer, it was Torian’s job to make that happen.
Personally, I could kill Benny in my sleep, but no one here knew about my past. There was only one person alive who knew about the trail of blood behind me, and I wanted to keep it that way.
After agreeing, Torian pulled out his wallet, stopping to place a hundred dollar tip on Romero's desk before walking out the door without a backwards glance. That was my cue to leave; I had somewhere to be, too—the sweetest part of my day. Even if she was asleep, she wouldn’t mind waking up for some midnight tea.
After that, I needed to finish my plans for Tatiana. If the cartel was becoming more dangerous, I needed to have everything in place to protect her, my number one problem being re-gaining her trust.
I stood to leave, tipping Romero and saying my goodbyes, and Coulter jumped up after me. “I’ll walk you out.”
Bourbon barely gave us a backward glance. He was back to brooding, silently watching Romero finish Dante’s tattoo.
As soon as we were a few steps out the front door and out of earshot, Coulter stopped. “You and Bourbon weren’t here when things went down with the cartel, but you saw how fucked up I was that night. The Mendozas are ruthless, and they won’t wait for us to take them down. I need you alert and ready, you understand?”
I stared down the street, watching the crowds walk past the intersection, thinking about how tore up Coulter had been that night. He was lucky they hadn’t killed him. I wasn’t sure they hadn’t meant to.
I never wanted that to happen again.
These men, my family , had saved my life on more than one occasion, and I owed them my loyalty and my life.
“You got it.” I nodded. “Whatever it takes.”
If only I’d known then what was brewing in my own backyard, and the danger that my own woman was in, I’d have warned him to be ready to kill.