The backroom was thick with the copper tang of blood and the heavy, sweet scent of Michael's cigarette smoke.
Sam Matranga slumped in his chair, clutching a cloth to his shattered nose. Pietro leaned against the wall, his hand trembling as he nursed a rib that felt like it had been cracked by a sledgehammer. Tony Russo sat on the floor, his eyes fixed on the knife still buried in the seat of his boss's chair. They weren't just beaten; they were spiritually hollowed out.
Michael Kingston stood by the window, exhaling a long, thin stream of smoke into the morning light. He turned back to the room, the glowing ember of his cigarette the only point of warmth in his cold expression. He flicked the ash onto the blood-stained floorboards, his gaze never leaving Sam's eyes.
"I trust you've regained enough breath to entertain a negotiation. Or should I wait? I find that pain tends to cloud one's ability to see a good deal when it is offered." Michael asked. His voice was calm, devoid of the adrenaline that usually follows a fight.
"Negotiation?" Sam spat, his voice muffled by the cloth. "You besieged my place, you broke me and my men, shattered our pride... and now you want to negotiate? Do we even have a choice?"
"You're smart, Sam. You're right—you don't have a choice. This isn't a negotiation; it's a decree. A command. Whatever you want to call it. And it would be wise to remember that for the rest of this conversation."
The three men bristled, their anger visible but tightly reined in by the memory of the knives in the wall.
"So, what do you want?" Sam asked. "Do you want us to stop everything we're doing? Change our lives completely? Is that it?"
"A leopard doesn't change its spots, Sam," Michael said, "and vermin can't stop being vermin."
Russo swallowed hard, the sound audible in the quiet room. "What... what do you intend to do with us, then?" he asked, his voice shaking with a jagged, nervous edge.
Michael's gaze shifted to Russo, his eyes narrowing slightly as if he were reading the frantic, jagged thoughts racing behind the man's forehead. A faint, cold smile touched his lips.
"Don't worry, Russo. I'm not going to kill you," Michael said, his voice dropping low. "I wouldn't have gone through all this trouble, and certainly wouldn't have wasted my morning on a negotiation, just to end it with a funeral. What would that even achieve?" Michael countered. "Someone else would just take your place in a month, and I have no desire to do this all over again. No, I'm giving you a chance to keep your house—but there are rules."
Michael flicked ash onto the floorboards, his gaze leveling with Sam's. "The ultimate rule," he began, his voice dropping into a low, resonant tone. "The populace—the small businessmen, the street peddlers, the ordinary families—are no longer part of your balance sheet. They don't suffer. They don't burn. And they do not pay you a single cent unless they walk into your office and request your assistance of their own free will."
He paced slowly toward the table, the rhythmic click of his heels against the wood the only sound in the room. "Protection is a service, Sam," Michael said, his voice cold and analytical. "In the old country, the gabellotti of Sicily actually protected the estates and the land. But over the generations, that service mutated into a parasitic tax on the poor. That ends today. From now on, if they give you money, it is because you are actually providing security—not because you are the ones they fear."
"It won't be enough," Pietro groaned, wincing as he struggled to draw a deep breath. "The money from the shops... that's our steady bread. We need that money to pay off the cops—to keep them looking the other way—and to ensure other gangs don't start encroaching. You're asking us to starve."
Michael let out a short, sharp scoff. "It's fascinating that you say that as though you've earned it through blood and sweat. Perhaps you're right—it just happens to be others' blood and sweat."
He stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray with deliberate, slow pressure. "Most of your overhead is currently drained by senseless territorial skirmishes and the opulent lifestyles you flaunt before you've even secured your borders. Temper your appetites, Sam. Stop spending like emperors on a street-thug's budget."
Michael stepped into the center of the room, the smoke from his cigarette still curling around his silhouette like a ghost. "You want money? Then stop hunting sheep and start managing the wolves. There are vices that have existed since the dawn of civilization: gambling, betting, and the oldest profession, prostitution. They are illegal, yes, but they are constants. Men will always want to throw dice, and they will always seek the comforts of flesh."
He looked at each of them, his eyes sharp and clinical. "I want you to pivot. Open bars and nightclubs—estates of 'refined' entertainment. From the outside, they are to be legitimate lounges where men can find a drink away from the prying eyes of the temperance leagues. But in the basements, in the shadows, you will run your high-stakes games and your books."
Michael leaned in, his voice dropping to a low, predatory hum. "If you focus your energy on securing a monopoly over these sectors in Los Angeles, you can live like kings. You won't need to bleed a baker for five dollars when a wealthy man will lose five hundred at your tables and thank you for the privilege."
"Monopoly?" Sam asked, his eyes narrowing in surprise. The boardroom term sounded out of place in a blood-stained backroom.
"In the legitimate market, a monopoly is an eyesore—a breeder of inefficiency and unfair practices," Michael explained, his voice turning clinical, as if he were delivering a lecture at a boardroom table rather than a blood-stained backroom. "But in the underworld, a monopoly is a tool for stability. It ensures that only one hand holds the deck and one voice sets the price. It eliminates the friction of competition and the mess of street wars. I want that order."
Sam shifted in his seat, his eyes narrowing. "We don't run those sectors," he muttered, the bitterness clear in his voice. "The Irish have the gambling locked down, and the independent madams control the prostitution. You're asking us to walk into a hornets' nest."
"Then take them," Michael said flatly, his voice as cold as the morning air outside. "Absorb them if they are weak. Negotiate with them if they are equal. In your world, might is the only valid currency—isn't that right? You will transition your operation into high-stakes gambling dens and organized houses. You will run them with absolute discretion and efficiency, and above all, you will stay out of the sunlight."
"And what if they are strong? What if they refuse to yield?" Sam asked, his voice low with doubt.
"As I said before, this is a mandate," Michael replied, his eyes cold and fixed. "If they refuse the logic of the market—if they attempt to disrupt this new order with fire or lead to halt your expansion—my men will intervene. We will crush them with a finality they cannot imagine."
Sam looked up, his bloodshot eyes widening in genuine disbelief. "You... you would actually help us? You'd fight our wars for us?"
"Don't flatter yourself, Sam. It isn't for you," Michael corrected him, his voice like grinding stones. "It is for the stability of this city. I am not protecting a gang; I am protecting the order of the streets. A dead gangster in an alley is a mere statistic—a variable I can afford to ignore. But a burned-out shop, a riot, or blood spilled in the sunlight is a public eyesore I will not tolerate. If I am forced to intervene, it is only to ensure the peace is maintained by the most efficient—and most permanent—means possible."
The room went silent. The weight of the offer settled over them—Michael wasn't granting them a kingdom; he was offering a gilded cage where he held the only key.
"Why?" Sam finally asked, the word sounding small in the vast quiet. "I mean... why are you doing any of this?" Sam repeated, his voice gaining a desperate, raspy edge. "You have the money. You have the power. You have the whole world at your feet, Kingston. Why do you care about people you've never even met? Why do you care about the street?"
Michael was silent for a moment, his gaze drifting as if he were thinking on how to answer it. "Tell me," he said softly, "do you believe in God?"
The three men nodded instinctively, a reflex of their upbringing. Michael let out a short, dry scoff.
"The Bible says: 'Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,' and 'Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.' You nod your heads and call yourselves believers, yet you prey on the very people your book commands you to protect. People speak of God's words, but they rarely follow them; they take what suits their appetite and ignore the rest. If you truly believe in God, then you should ask 'why' when a man does wrong—not question 'why' when a man like me decides to do right."
"So, you are doing it for God?" Sam asked, searching for a motive he could actually understand.
"I don't believe in God," Michael said in a flat, clinical tone.
The three men looked at one another, their confusion deepening. To them, if a man wasn't acting out of greed or the fear of Hell, he was a total enigma.
"I do it because it is correct," Michael continued. "Not for the people, not for praise, and certainly not for God. I do it because my own reason dictates it is right. And I will continue to do it even if the entire world says I am wrong. Do I make myself understood?"
They were stunned by his conviction.
"You can't go against the world, Kingston," Sam said, his voice low. "You have to bend to fit it. You have to be flexible."
Michael met his gaze directly, his expression unreadable. "I am flexible, Sam. If the day comes that I find my logic is flawed, then I will change. But I do not alter my course simply because a majority disagrees."
"You'll make an enemy of the entire world," Sam warned.
"I think I'll manage," Michael said, a faint smirk ghosting his lips as if the threat were a private joke. "And as for the world... let us see which yields first. After all, I am notoriously stubborn."
"You're a madman," Pietro whispered, Russo nodding in frantic agreement.
"Perhaps. Who knows?" Michael's grin was sharp, devoid of any real warmth. "Regardless, we have strayed from the point, and I have said more than enough for one morning. So, do we have an accord?"
They looked at each other and gave a slow, reluctant nod. "We agree to your offer," Sam said.
"Good. You have made a wise decision. Your operation will grow larger than you ever imagined possible."
"And what if we grow too large?" Russo asked, a flicker of his former bravado returning. "What if we expand until we can't be contained?"
Michael looked at him, and a small, predatory smile touched his lips. It was the smile of a man watching a brave lamb trotting toward the butcher.
"You will never be large enough to challenge me," Michael said, his voice ringing with absolute, bone-deep confidence. "Do not harbor the illusion that you can escape my grasp. My men will surveil you—always. I am building a net, Russo. And just as I am watching you, I will be watching every other shadow and every other gang that thinks they can operate in the dark."
He reached for his coat and draped it over his arm. Michael walked toward the door, his silhouette framed by the harsh gold of the rising sun. "We will not meet again anytime soon. All contact goes through my representatives. And do not ever make me return. If I am forced to clean this room a second time, I won't use my hands. I will simply burn the whole fucking building down with you inside."
He stepped out into the cool morning air, leaving the broken men of the Matranga family to contemplate the gilded future he had drafted for them.
As Michael walked toward his vehicle, he signaled to Miller, the head of his security detail. His mind was already accelerating past the Matrangas. To police an entire city's underworld from the shadows—to monitor every gang, every alleyway, and every dock—he realized that a hundred and twenty men was a mere drop in the ocean.
"Miller," Michael said as he climbed into the back of the M-2. "Initiate a new recruitment drive. Double our numbers by the end of the year. I want veterans, disgraced detectives, and locals who know every brick of this city. "
Miller adjusted his cap as he held the door open. "Do you believe they will abide by the terms, sir?"
"I have simply given them an opportunity," Michael said, his voice level devoid of sentiment. "If they fail to adhere to the agreement, there are dozens of others waiting to take their place. I only selected the Matrangas because they were the first to cross my path. In this city, Sam and his brothers are a replaceable commodity."
"Anything else, Mr. Kingston?"
"Yes," Michael said, looking out at the waking city. "Observe the gangs, but look past them as well. I want a comprehensive list of every suspected corrupt officer on the force—from the beat cops to the precinct captains. I want to know who is on whose payroll."
He paused as he climbed into the car, his eyes narrowing as he caught Miller's gaze. "But do it discreetly, and from a distance. I don't want them to feel the weight of our gaze until I am ready for them to."
Miller didn't ask why. He simply nodded, his face a mask of professional obedience. "It will be done, sir."
As Michael entered the car, the engine settled into a steady, rhythmic thrum. The vehicle pulled away from the curb, leaving the grimy plaza and the broken Matranga gang behind.