Rain slaps the skylight like it's trying to get in. Heavy, relentless, like fists on a coffin lid. Somewhere above, thunder rolls low—like the city itself is growling. A single bulb dangles from the ceiling, swinging on a frayed cord. It casts dizzy shadows across the warehouse, making monsters out of mannequins, crates, and broken men.
The air stinks of rust, gunpowder, smoke—and something sour underneath. Like fear marinated too long.
Riven stands at the center of it all. Calm. Clean. Calculated.
His tailored vest doesn't have a wrinkle. His crisp white sleeves are rolled to the elbow, revealing forearms that look sculpted, not gym bred. On his right hand? Brass knuckles, bloodied but shining. On his face? Nothing but boredom.
"Blood's harder to clean from silk than they make it look in the movies," he says, voice like velvet dragged over broken glass. He eyes the twitching man crumpled at his feet. "You learn that after the first few bodies. The trick is cold water, fast hands… and never getting your own suit dirty."
CRACK.
Riven's boot drives into the man's ribs, and something inside gives way with a wet pop. The scream that follows is high, sharp, animal.
Riven doesn't flinch. Doesn't even blink.
He lowers himself slowly, wipes his knuckles on the man's designer tie. Burgundy silk, Italian cut. Probably cost more than the guy's spine's worth now.
"I don't wear cheap things," he mutters, tossing the stained cloth aside. "And I don't make cheap threats."
He lights a cigar like it's a ritual. The flame from his silver lighter flickers gold in the shadows. The cigar burns slow. Steady. Like Riven has all the time in the world, and the man bleeding out in front of him is already forgotten.
"You think you're a big man until your kneecaps are somewhere behind you and your piss is soaking into tile grout. Then suddenly, you find God. Or me."
He takes a drag. The smoke coils up toward the ceiling like it's scared to stick around.
"My name?" A scoff, barely a breath. "Doesn't matter. They call me a dog, a ghost, a devil. Depends who you ask.
But I prefer Riven. Short. Sweet. Like the lifespan of people who cross me."
Behind him, the heavy door creaks. The storm outside howls like it wants inside. A silhouette hesitates in the frame—a young recruit, barely twenty, eyes too wide, nerves raw and twitching.
Riven doesn't turn. Doesn't need to.
"Tell Salvatore the mess is handled. And if he sends another rat wearing Armani, I'll send back a head in a Gucci box."
The kid swallows hard, nods, and disappears like a ghost that knows when to vanish.
Riven exhales—slow, unbothered. The smoke dances through the yellow bulb-light. Behind him, the man on the ground shudders, then stills. One last gurgle. One last twitch. Then: silence.
The cigar glows like a dying star in the dark.
Riven checks his watch. He's got another meeting in twenty. Something about territory. Or tribute. Or cleaning up after amateurs again.
Business as usual.
The music is BASS and sex. The air buzzes with perfume, sweat, and expensive cologne. Strobe lights flicker over the crowd like god's judgment in technicolor.
Elias flips a steel shaker in one hand, bottle in the other—liquor arching in a perfect stream. He's not trying. He's showing off. And it works. Three girls at the bar giggle like he's the last man alive.
He wears a fitted white shirt, sleeves rolled, suspenders hanging loose from his slim hips. Bowtie? Untied. Hair? A little messy, like he's already been kissed tonight.
(He hasn't. Yet.)
"One Negroni, one espresso martini... and something a little stronger for the pretty one who hasn't stopped staring since I picked up the ice tongs."
He doesn't wink—he smirks. That lazy, devastating kind. The one that makes people forget how to spell "self-respect."
The girl flushes red. The other two burst into scandalized laughter.
Elias slides the martini down the bar with a flick of his wrist—lands perfectly.
He's smooth. But there's something else. Something restless in his eyes.
He's not here for the tips. Or the girls. Or even the drinks.
"Flirting's fun," he says as he pops a bottle of gin, "but watching people lie to themselves with alcohol? That's the real show."
A beat drops so hard the floor shakes. Someone yells. A guy gets shoved. The club bouncer moves in—
Elias doesn't even glance over.
He's been here long enough to know when a fight's real. This one's not.
"They all think the danger's outside. In the alleys. The gangs. The guns."
He leans in, voice low.
"Truth is… the most dangerous people are the ones who smile while they pour your drink."
He tilts his head—like he hears something. Like fate just shifted.
But nah. Just the music.
The club is noise.
Noise and sweat and light. Bodies pressed too close, heat rising like steam from a city grate. A pounding bass so deep it vibrates in bone, not sound anymore, but a force. A heartbeat too fast, too loud. Like the whole place is alive and hungry.
But Riven sits untouched.
The chaos never quite reaches him.
A half-circle booth of black leather cradles his frame, cushions him like a throne built for a king who never wanted the crown. The low table before him is glass, rimmed in gold, reflecting fractured flashes of strobes and spotlights. A crystal tumbler rests at his elbow — bourbon, expensive, aged longer than some of the dancers have been legal — untouched, its amber depths glowing faintly.
A cigar burns between two fingers, lazy and slow, smoke curling upward in silver spirals that blur the edge of the world. A veil of scent and haze that keeps the chaos at bay.
From here, behind thick panes of soundproof glass and a curtain of velvet shadow, Riven watches.
He does not move. He does not speak. He does not need to.
His men are scattered across the room — some near the bar, others leaning against walls or swaying with the crowd. Hidden in plain sight. Predators in tailored suits. But Riven?
Riven is stillness incarnate.
And then—
he sees him.
Center of the storm.
Not the DJ, not the dancers, not the influencers clinging to their phones like lifelines.
The bartender.
Not quite boy. Not quite man. Something in between. Something dangerous.
Something Riven doesn't have a word for yet, but already wants to claim.
The black button-up is rolled to the elbows, sleeves clinging to sinewed forearms like a lover's grip. The collar is loose, hinting at skin — just enough to tempt, never enough to satisfy. His slacks are fitted in ways that should be illegal, hugging hips with sculptor's precision, creasing just right when he leans forward to pour, to flirt, to move.
And God, those hands.
Fast. Precise. Beautiful.
The kind of hands that know the weight of a bottle before it lands. That move with thoughtless efficiency born of long practice and quiet confidence.
He flips a bottle behind his back. Catches it without looking.
Pours without measuring.
Flicks a lime from the counter, catches it between his teeth — cocky — before sliding a shot to a girl who flushes pink and leans in too close.
Riven exhales, slow and long.
His cigar burns low between his fingers, forgotten.
"That one," he murmurs. Voice barely audible. Not even meant for company.
He doesn't register that he's leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, eyes locked and unblinking.
He hasn't looked away in ten minutes. Maybe longer.
There's something in the way the bartender moves — not desperate, not attention-hungry — just magnetic. Like light bends for him. Like music times itself to his rhythm.
A smirk plays across the bartender's mouth — sharp, confident, just a little bit cruel.
The kind of smile that belongs to someone who's never had to beg for anything in his life. The kind of smile people dream about and never admit to.
That face — all angles and edge — has that rare, infuriating beauty: not polished, not pretty-boy, but rough. Real. Messy like sin. The kind of beautiful that dares you to ruin it.
And Riven?
Riven is exceptionally good at ruining beautiful things.
He watches the bartender toss a lemon wedge into the air. It spins once, twice, catches in a perfect arc behind his back. A girl nearby squeals, breathless with delight. Her boyfriend frowns, but tips anyway.
The bartender doesn't count the bill. Just bites the edge, teeth flashing white against inked fingers, and tucks it into the waistband of his apron.
Fucking showman.
"Knows he's pretty," Riven thinks. "Knows exactly how to use it."
The thought is not fond. Not admiring.
It's possessive.
He presses a button at the side of the booth. A soft chime. Seconds later, one of his men appears — tall, clean-cut, expression blank behind expensive glasses.
Riven doesn't look away from the bar.
"Get me his name," he says, voice like velvet soaked in oil. "Quietly."
The man hesitates. "Sir?"
"The bartender," Riven says, as if it should be obvious. "The one with the attitude."
Another pause. A breath. "Should I… invite him?"
That gets Riven's attention.
He turns his head slowly. Eyes like polished obsidian, cold and depthless.
A longer pause. Then:
"Not yet."
He turns back.
And there he is.
Elias.
Laughing now — really laughing. Something must've cracked him up. His head tips back, throat bare and shining with sweat under the pulsing lights. He tosses a rag at someone with a grin that could shatter glass.
Riven's jaw tightens.
He licks his teeth behind closed lips, sharp and slow, like a predator tasting the scent in the air.
Because this isn't just curiosity.
Not a passing interest.
Not the idle hunger of a man too used to getting what he wants.
It's something deeper.
Older.
Primal.
It's recognition.
That boy is fire in a glass — golden, untouchable, reckless.
And Riven?
Riven's been thirsty for years.
Elias had noticed that guy the moment he walked in.
Tall.
Still.
Like a blade tucked into a silk sheath, hidden in plain sight but unmistakably dangerous. He walked like he didn't need to make space—the world just moved around him. That kind of presence you didn't see so much as feel. Like a cold draft through a warm room.
Obscenely expensive suit, jet-black, like it was cut from shadow and arrogance. Not a wrinkle in sight. Dark shirt underneath, no tie, just the bare suggestion of collarbone and control.
Back booth, of course. The kind of booth reserved for people with more money than God and less patience than the devil. The air around it somehow quieter, like the bass itself bowed around the man.
Flanked by men who looked like they didn't know how to smile. Broad. Suited. The type that said nothing and meant violence. Elias didn't need a résumé. He'd seen that kind of guy in alleyways and hospital waiting rooms. They didn't escort. They enforced.
And the man in the middle?
He smoked like he was in a noir film, like time bent differently around him. Like every slow drag was a calculated move in a long game only he understood. Didn't look at the dancers. Didn't touch his drink.
He just watched.
Watched him.
Elias.
Didn't blink. Didn't flinch. Didn't even try to be subtle about it.
Like Elias was a performance. A prize.
A possession.
It sent a chill up the back of his neck—not fear. Something colder. Slimier. The crawling itch of being wanted for the wrong reasons.
"Creep," Elias had thought.
Filed the man away in his head as another rich asshole with a God complex.
So when one of the tailored drones peeled from the wall and oozed up to the bar, Elias didn't bother pretending to be surprised.
"You." The guy's voice was like sandpaper and silence. "The boss wants a word."
Elias dried his hands on a bar towel, tossed it to the counter like it owed him money. Rolled his eyes with the dramatic flair of someone who'd had enough of this exact energy before.
He didn't ask who "the boss" was.
Didn't need to.
Just cracked his neck, flexed his fingers, and said:
"Fine. I've got five minutes. If he tries to touch me, I bite."
He walked in like a stormcloud with a temper. Elias didn't knock. Didn't hesitate. Just strolled into the lion's den like it owed him rent.
He stood with one hip cocked, hands in his pockets, body all sharp angles and coiled wire.
Defiant.
Riven looked up slowly.
Not startled. Not annoyed. Just… interested. Like he was finally getting to see the painting he'd commissioned, and it was better than he expected.
His eyes dragged over Elias, slow as molasses and twice as heavy. Measuring him like a man who'd already decided where he wanted to break him first.
"Your name," Riven said.
Low. Velvet. A question dressed as a command.
Elias snorted.
"Why?"
"I like knowing what I'm looking at."
The laugh that left Elias's mouth was sharp, bitter, beautiful.
"Elias," he said, with mock courtesy. "What—gonna add me to your little collection? Want my number too? Favorite color? Blood type?"
Riven didn't react. Didn't blink. His face was a marble sculpture of calm. That made it worse.
"Age?"
Elias bared his teeth in a smile that wasn't friendly.
"Legal. That's all you need to know."
A silence stretched between them, taut as a wire.
Elias leaned forward, bracing his palms on the table. His eyes sparked, not with warmth, but warning. Fire that burned, not lit.
"Look, I don't know what this is," he said, voice steady, "but just so we're crystal clear?"
He leaned in a fraction closer, lips curling with disdain.
"I'm not gay."
The words landed like glass shards on silk.
"So if this is some weird rich-guy fantasy where you pick out a bartender like a wine bottle—stop. I'm not interested."
Riven's brow lifted. Barely. Like a king amused by a peasant's tantrum.
"Oh."
That was all. Just that. Oh.
No anger. No pushback. No apology.
Which somehow made Elias's pulse tick faster.
He let out a breathless scoff.
"If you're done playing twenty questions, I've got better things to do." His voice dripped with derision. "Like literally anything that doesn't involve this freaky godfather cosplay."
Then he turned on his heel—quick, clean—and walked out without waiting for permission.
Left behind only the echo of his disdain and the scent of sweat and citrus and defiance.
Silence lingered.
The booth felt heavier now. Like the air had thickened around Riven.
One of his men stepped closer, expression flat but his eyes hard.
"Sir. Want me to handle him?"
Riven didn't respond at first. Just stared after the fading figure of Elias as if the boy's heat still lingered in the air.
Then, slowly, he took a drag from his cigar. Held it.
Exhaled.
Smoke curled like silk ribbons in front of his face.
And then he laughed.
Quiet. Low. Dark.
A chuckle with no warmth at all.
"No."
He set the cigar down in its tray, leaned back like a predator who'd just caught the scent of something wild. Something worth chasing.
"No," he repeated, more to himself than anyone. "He's… feisty."
A pause.
And then:
"I like it."
The other men didn't move. Didn't speak. They knew that tone. They'd heard it before.
It wasn't interest.
It was intent.
And then, softer—dangerous—voice like silk soaked in gasoline:
"I want him."