Chapter 9 - The Reckoning
The ballroom erupted into chaos.
Captains pulled their weapons, aiming them not at Vance, but directly at Dominic Sable on the stage.
"You poisoned the boss?" a senior captain named Frank shouted, his heavy revolver pointed at Sable’s chest. "You broke the Code of the First District?"
"He's dead! He's supposed to be dead!" Sable shrieked, backing away toward the rear stage exit, pulling his own pistol from his waistband. "Shoot him! Someone shoot him!"
None of Sable’s guards moved.
They looked at Gabriel Vance—standing alive, calm, and absolute at the back of the room—and then looked at Sable, who was sweating through his white suit, trembling like a trapped rat.
Vance walked down the center aisle, the forty mob bosses parting before him in absolute, terrified deference.
He stepped onto the stage.
Sable raised his gun with shaking hands, aiming it at Vance’s chest. "Stay back, Gabriel! I'll kill you! I swear to God I'll kill you!"
Vance didn't stop walking. He walked straight up to the barrel of Sable’s gun, pressing his own chest directly against the black steel nozzle.
"Shoot then, Dominic," Vance whispered, his voice carrying clearly to every corner of the silent ballroom. "Show them what kind of king you are."
Sable’s finger trembled on the trigger. He looked into Vance’s amber eyes—eyes that held no fear, no hesitation, and no mercy—and realized that he had never been Vance's rival. He had only been his shadow.
Sable's hand collapsed. The gun clattered onto the hardwood floor.
Sable fell to his knees, his hands covering his face, sobbing in pathetic, absolute defeat.
Vance didn't shoot him. He turned to the senior captain, Frank.
"Take him to the basement," Vance ordered softly. "Let the council decide his sentence."
Four heavy enforcers stepped forward, dragging Sable off the stage as he screamed for mercy.
Vance turned back to the room. The forty captains stood in silent, absolute submission, bowing their heads to the undisputed ruler of the North District.
Vance looked past them, his eyes finding Leah Moreno standing near the rear entrance.
She looked back at him, her dark eyes steady, her posture proud and unyielding—a plus-size server who had entered the hotel as invisible dirt, and who had just rewritten the future of the city's underworld.
Vance walked down the stage stairs, stepping past his lieutenants, and walked straight to Leah.
May you like
He reached out, took her hand, and bowed his head respectfully before her in front of every boss in the city.
"Thank you, Miss Moreno," Vance said softly.
