41
“WELCOME BACK, ANTONIS TSAGKARAKIS. I KNEW A BULLET WOULDN’T BE ABLE TO PUT YOU DOWN,” Sophoklis Kyrkos said, holding his glass up. He sat amongst six other men at the center of the Gentlemen’s Club, at the table the ladies of the club often referred to as the Lion’s Den because only men of wealth and power could sit there. It only made sense tonight that the heads of the American brotherhood for the Drakos family gathered at that very table tonight, and Nikos sat amongst them.
Nikos held up a glass of 60-year-old cognac that Sophoklis brought as a present to welcome Antonis back. All seven menclinked their glasses together in honor of the man of the hour before downing their glasses.
“Ah!” Sophoklis said as if he had downed a fresh glass of water. He snapped his fingers, gesturing for Wendy, the bottle girl, to refill his glass again.
A few months ago, Nikos would have gladly shared a glass with these men to celebrate his uncle’s return, but a few months ago, he hadn’t been in a relationship with Honey, and now as he drank this glass, he found that the cognac was not going down as smooth as 60-year-old liquor should have.
“It nearly did,” Antonis admitted bitterly between clenched teeth as he patted his abdomen, where he had been shot twice. Though loud music blared around them and women danced around half-naked, the men at the table hung onto his every word. Even Brittany, who was performing on stage with her big breasts exposed to the audience, couldn’t get their attention. “But I’m still here. I’m still alive, and my enemies are all dead. They thought they could take me down and ruin this empire, but no one can take me down.”
Eric, who ran the shipment operations in the New Jersey area, snapped his fingers and Wendy poured them each a glass. Once she finished, Eric raised his glass again with respect clear in his eyes.
“Yamas,” Eric said.
“Yamas!” Sophoklis echoed loudly, nearly competing with the music that the DJ played. Although Sophoklis was the oldest man at the table, with gray hair coating every inch of his body, he was the most rowdy among them. He ran the drug operations in Brooklyn and frequented many of Antonis’s clubs even still.
“I guess we should be toasting to Nikos too then,” Richard drawled, cutting through Sophoklis’s teen-like energy. His greeneyes shined with mischief even under the blue lights that spilled from the ceiling. “After all, he was the one to kill Ricardo while you were out of commission.”
One of the things Nikos quickly learned after coming to New York was that their line of work had politics like most organizations. There were fractions within, sides to be taken, and agendas and propaganda to sell. After his success in taking down Ricardo and restoring order in Antonis’s absence, that had become more clear to him. There had been many people who pledged loyalty to him during that time and that included Richard, who ran his business in Manhattan.
“I must admit,” Sophoklis started, his tone already begrudging. “You surprised me. I was sure that this would be the beginning of the end when your father said that he wanted you to run the clubs in Antonis’s absence, but it wasn’t. You restored order when Ricardo and the wolves were out to get us.”
Out of all the men here, Sophoklis had been the least thrilled about him taking over his father’s spot, even going as far as requesting a meeting with his father, so Nikos was surprised that Sophoklis was even admitting this. Most of the men here hadn’t necessarily been happy with his father’s order but had held their tongues, knowing that they could not go against Giannis Drakos’s orders, the very man who had built this organization they were a part of.
“Yes, my dear nephew killed my enemy for me in my absence,” Antonis admitted with a light shrug of his shoulders as if it had been a small feat, one that anyone could do, as if he and Ricardo had not been at war for years because neither one of them could take each other down.
“To Nikos,” Eric said, lifting his glass and everyone else followed suit. Over the rim of his glass, Nikos eyes grazed over the six men and saw that at least half of them didn’t look as ifthey had done it by force, which was a good thing. More now than ever, he needed allies.
“I must admit that I am now reassured that our American brotherhood will be in good hands,” Theo, who ran his drugs through New Jersey, said with a sly smirk. Tension engulfed the table as eyes shifted back and forth between their neighbors. Antonis’s eyes were as hard as diamonds, not liking the implications at all from Theo’s words. Although everyone knew that Giannis Drakos had plans to pass over everything that belonged to him to his three sons, that didn’t mean that any man wanted to pass over the power they had amassed, and Nikos could see now that his uncle felt that way too.
Sophoklis’s face flushed red with a combination of anger and hard liquor as he nearly leaped out of his seat. “HEY! You—”
“Once passed down, of course,” Theo added, cheekily, temporarily stopping Sophoklis’s impending rant. Sophoklis looked like he still wanted to rage, his teeth clenched and nose screwed, but he plopped down heavily in his seat instead.
“Thank you,” Nikos said, stopping the glaring war that was happening between the seven men who sat at the table. He waved Wendy over again, knowing that in a situation like this, men geared up with pride and rage, needed alcohol to relax them.
He was well aware of the division within their group. Well aware that there were people who had pledged their loyalty to him after he defeated Ricardo, and he knew that there were many more people who were firmly on Antonis’s side. The situation was delicate, and despite what he felt right now for his uncle, he had to treat it as such.
“But I still have much to learn from you all. That is the reason why my father sent me here,” Nikos acknowledged. “Whateverthe future may be will be up to the lessons of this business that I learn from you, and if my father sees me as worthy of stepping up to the task.”
“Yamas,” Sophoklis said, seemingly satisfied with his humble words.
“Yamas,” Theo said, seemingly satisfied with his words that also promised that there was a future ahead. Nikos knew how delicate this situation was, and though he had plans to ensure that he had a future with Honey, he knew he couldn’t do something at this very moment because it would affect his father and destroy the American brotherhood, further causing division would only break them and make them susceptible to their enemies.
Glasses clinked again, but this time, Antonis did not participate in it. His frown was deep and heavy, shoulders wound tight with the tension that was easing from everyone else’s shoulders. But the frown disappeared when the applause came as Brittany left the stage.
The DJ tapped the microphone, grabbing everyone’s attention as the neon green lights changed to white, showcasing that a new performer was coming on stage, and as Nikos glanced at his watch, he knew exactly who that person would be. “Coming out on the stage next is a woman I know all of you have missed. Welcome back, the one and only, Honey!”
Claps erupted as men rushed closer to the stage to see Honey, who hadn’t touched the stage in over a month. It was a part of the reason why it was so packed tonight. Fliers had gone out, announcing Honey’s return, and many had come this very night just to see her.
“I wonder who this stripper is,” Sophoklis said, excitedly turning his attention to the stage, and Antonis grinned like aman ready to show off the brand-new car he brought while Nikos found that he could not muster up the strength to move any inch of his face as Honey stepped out from behind the curtain and onto the stage, the very stage that he thought he would never see her perform on again.
The music dropped, and Honey elegantly walked across the stage, swaying her hips to RnB music, with her brown eyes dazzling under the light. As always, she was as beautiful as ever, wearing a white waist skirt with thick slits on the side that reminded him of the female characters in fighting games with a see-through bra to match. She looked angelic with diamonds that acted like mascara under her eyes. They were a sharp, devious contrast to the way her hips were rolling as she bent over, and the men behind her peered over with hopes of seeing more.
She was beautiful, and yet, he found that he could not relish in her beauty the way he had all those times before watching her dance. Before, he could enjoy the show as much as the rest of the men here, who whistled and ogled Honey with fantasies of having a private dance with her. Now, he could only simmer with broiling anger.
As she danced, he felt weak and powerless. A month ago, he thought he would never have to see Honey perform on that stage again, certain of it, actually. He was going to make sure that Honey could pursue her dreams as a chef so he would never have to see men ogle her ever again, but because of his uncle, that couldn’t be, and now Nikos was filled with a desire to pull his gun out and shoot his uncle so he could take Honey off the stage. But he knew that wasn’t possible.
