DREAMLESS.

INES MORENO. daughter, sister, friend, mentor, business woman.

meme reply from here.

🌩️ LIGHTNING - are they scared of lightning? | ines isn’t scared of lightning although she has a distaste for it because it (specifically in combination with overall bad weather) tends to slow down business. on a personal note she does enjoy watching it.

fog clouds the streets of new orleans, effectively hiding any and all those who are already up and walking at so early an hour.

ines herself is on her feet as well and seeing to the bookkeeping that she has dodged for the last few days; hoping she can get some things done before heading to an appointment to inspect a shipment at the docks. these days it’s rare to find a moment to herself and unfortunately for her, the repose isn’t bound to last for too long.

lorenzo vincelli has announced his intention to drop by today, having apparently been too preoccupied with other things throughout the week in order to make room for a visit at a better date. ines knows very well she has no room to argue there—the youngest of the vincelli bunch is unrelenting when it comes to disrupting operations at every given turn, and she has taken to flat out ignoring most of what he says so as to not come to blows with the rest of his family.

it’s pointless one way or another; there’s little to be done but bend to their will.

or at least appear to do so.

her brow furrows, deep lines of worry etched into her forehead. ines is more familiar with handling things more roughly—the refinement of handling an instrument is foreign territory to the woman but where there is a will, there is a way and she intends on making the most out of this opportunity.

 “i have the rest of the day to myself.” ines shifts her weight on the stool and cracks her knuckles. “i’m ready to try out something new!”

it takes another moment for the shoe to drop and for insecurity to start creeping in. ines isn’t particularly skilled with music if past experiences are anything to go by and at this rate, it’s only ivy’s patience and her own wishes that keep her tethered to the idea of mastering an instrument. she looks at ivy, beseeching them for answers, for reassurance before exhaling a long breath. “i can do this, right?”

meme reply from here.

she shrugs one shoulder. the answer is obvious to ines; it requires almost no thought.

yet her response comes in the form of the quill scratching against paper until her fingertips are stained black by the ink. now that the evening is drawing to a close and the bulk of the work has been handled, she exhales loudly and leans back in her chair. her neck and shoulders are stiff and she’s sure she’ll feel the effect of having to hunch over ledgers and controlling orders even tomorrow morning.

“go back to where?” she queries at long last, gaze withdrawn and focused on some obscure point in the distance. erik is a familiar face, but he isn’t necessarily a welcome one—such would ring true for just about any member of the family. ines’ association with them isn’t by choice and their presence is a constant reminder of her lack of independence; the unspoken know your place both a warning and a threat.

she has no cause to complain, though, and perhaps that’s what makes matters altogether more infuriating. the vincellis have been nothing, if not accommodating, aside from perhaps lorenzo in his constant quest to ruin the business. vera, on the other hand, seems to value her input and yet ines continues to chafe against the restraints imposed on her. she knows it’s a one-sided fight at best, a sabotage of her own plans for the future at worst. she doesn’t imagine the vincellis take kindly to people taking what they consider to be theirs and running.

the woman nods once, suddenly remembering the question that hangs in the air between them. it seems punctuated with something else that she can’t quite place; or maybe she simply doesn’t want to dig deeper into it for now. she doesn’t know what’s going through erik’s mind as he says this, and with what intentions he has come here and part of her is reluctant to find out.

oh, what a load of bunk, she thinks to herself, because the universe really had a way of outdoing its own bouts of entropy. as if it wasn’t enough that those shots had cut through the serenity of her night, talia was now having to deal with…this? and what was this, exactly? she couldn’t understand how trouble had run right into her arms by virtue of chance— and if she happily spent most of her nights at an illegal establishment, it was as close as she wanted to get to nola’s criminal underbelly. this wasn’t any of her business; far from it.

self-preservation should have been the guiding light for her next course of action, but it had never been so easy. talia wishes it could be and still she’s taken by that intrinsic need to help, looking around the familiar buildings to see if she could locate her own amongst the brick landscape. in this moment, she should be selfish, leaving ines to the red hots that are following her, but she can’t— not when she’s falling apart right before talia’s eyes ( well, talia would help even if the woman was fully composed; such is the consequence of caring ).

talia knows that she’ll come to regret this. her hands reach to grab the hands on her shoulders and she’s pulling ines away from the eye of the storm, “follow me, okay? we have’ta breeze.” with the words, she wishes she could have just left the women there, “a-and you need to breathe, don’t talk just breathe!” it worries her then, how easily she can slip back into this role of ‘caretaker’ when she’s tried so desperately to leave it behind. this isn’t who she wants to be but she’s still dragging the dame towards her small apartment.

—

talia shouldn’t have been the first person to turn to. as a matter of fact, she shouldn’t have been on the list of people to turn to at all. ines can’t recall anything about the girl other than her inclination for all kinds of drinks and a vigor on the dancefloor that most others would kill for to call theirs. it’s hard to draw the eyes of new orlean’s nightly crowd but talia has managed to do what few will ever do and that’s a success in and of itself. far be it from ines to claim otherwise; however, that certainly doesn’t render her the most responsible adult that ines has known in her life. but beggars don’t get to be choosers and right now, talia’s stuttered instructions and the panicked scanning of their surroundings are the best thing that ines can focus on in order to calm her own erratic breathing.

stammering out an affirmative response of her own, ines just about manages to exhale the first lungful of fresh air in what feels like a full eternity before her feet get moving, carrying her to wherever talia has decided they should disappear to for the time being. although her coughs and wheezing aren’t exactly subtle and would be enough for anyone’s curiosity to be piqued, it’s also hard to misinterpret it as anything other than what it is. if worst comes to the worst, she can pretend to be an ailing woman with talia masquerading as her caretaker—whatever keeps them safe.

Mabel didn’t know to think twice, so she didn’t. When Ines said she had a plan, Mabel believed it. She was ready to follow blindly, even if she was confused as to why she should overthink anything. She’d been overthinking her whole life, as far as she knew. Imagining too much on her mother’s tales of New Orleans, yet nothing as horrific as a gunshot in the street. Her mother’s stories, her own overthinking, hadn’t prepared her for this.

The question about her late shift is enough to throw Mabel’s concentration, for just a little while. “A, um, groom and his friends, um, made a bit of a mess,” she explains. “Took a while,” she adds, as she looks down at her hands, trying to focus on the imperfections as she follows Ines at a quick pace. Her nails were still as she’d last filed them to a close oval, but her cuticles and fingertips were ravaged by cleaning products and scrubbing. “I made extra, staying late,” she justifies, to herself and to Ines. Life in the city was expensive, far more so than Mabel’s mother ever let on. But Mabel’s mother never had to scrub floors, only walk on them. Nothing of her mother’s stories had included so much financial consideration as Mabel’s own day to day life.

—

“i hope they weren’t too unkind,” she says, not unsympathetic to what mabel’s evening must have looked like prior to the mess on the streets. clients are always a little difficult to deal with when their demands turn out to go beyond any reason; it’s laughable, really, that she of all people should remark on it given what she does. so ines chooses against it and bites her tongue; she’s not holier than thou and has no desire to pretend otherwise. her expression softens at the justification, a bit of the ice-cold heart wrapped around her heart melting. “you don’t have to offer me any explanation, mabel. i’m sure you have your reasons but if you ever require any assistance…” she trails off, allowing her silence to be interpreted in whatever way the younger wishes. better that way than to cajole her left and right.

“we have to be quiet.” which is easier said than done. ines can’t help but flinch just the slightest bit at the crunching sound of their footsteps on the gravelly path; she’s hoped this would be a smarter route to take than the main streets but if anything, it’s a dead giveaway to their presence. it’s difficult enough not to draw any unwanted attention this evening and the knowledge has unease coiling in her stomach. what if they have to run? stopping in her movements, she turns to scan the younger girl with a skeptical look when another thought crosses her mind. “did you eat at all?”

Mabel almost doesn’t recognize her name at first. It’s coming up too short, too different. Mabelandry. Even her mother said it, especially in moments like these when her daughter was scared by a loud noise in the night. She’s just Mabel now, desperate to soak in the warmth of someone’s hands on her shoulders, but still shaking too much to feel it fully. The side to side shaking slows, and then it’s up and down. She’s nodding her head along to Ines’s words, and slowly rising up onto her toes and then letting her heels back down. She tries to attach her breath to the movement of her heels. Up, in, down, out, up, in, down, out.

She takes Ines’s hands, and accidentally squeezes when she hears the question. She’s not hurt, but the mere thought she could be makes her drop her heels and go still. “No,” she finally replies, realizing her silence is not an obvious answer. “Was I that close?” All she heard was the gunfire, but she heard her father shoot predators from far, far away before. The noise was so loud it travelled quite a ways, but that was on the quiet, empty space of their farm. 

—

mabel’s affirmation that she’s unhurt is like balm for ines and the restlessness which has infected her thoughts and taken to guide all her actions since the first gunshot went off. bitter altercations are not entirely unheard of in this part of town, what with this district’s proximity to both the police station as well as the docks but rarely are the vincellis behind commotion of this kind.

in a strange way, the most harm they’ve done unto this community is taking what does not belong to them although ines supposes that isn’t far from taking a life. the thought makes her shudder, her hands squeezing mabel’s in a bid to convey her concern to the younger while steadying herself. “don’t overthink it, we need to get you to safety. come on, i know where we can go.”

“Why thank you,” He knew she was being sarcastic but he’d take the compliment anyways. “Can you not tell that I’m busy?” He pointed his head towards the ground where his gun was. His ego needed her to know that he was in fact not running and was fighting as well. He never backed away, he needed to prove to the Vincelli’s that he was virtually one of them and fought like they were his family. “Shouldn’t you be running?” Didn’t she know that a stray bullet could be coming at any time? He’d wear a bullet with honour if it hit him. “Bullets hurt.”

—

carmine mancuso is a headache in every sense of the word and from what little ines has seen so far, a perfect fit for the brute force of the vincelli army. she could have spent her life perfectly happy remaining in the dark about whatever activities he’s drawn into on behalf of new orlean’s ruling crime family but he seems to revel in that. it makes ines feel strangely self-aware of her place in the hierarchy, and the drama it has introduced to her life.

“Who goes there?” It’s a simple enough question, but one of those that have such dark connotations so essentially interwoven through them that they become something else entirely. A threat. A warning. I see you. Can you feel me watching? The streets are more silent now than they were at first, and this silence feels temporary, as if tethering on the edge of a gunshot, or a scream. It leaves the tips of his fingers numb with anticipation, his step light and slow, it stretches between them like a hungry thing.

He wouldn’t shoot anything unarmed in the back, much less a person. But she doesn’t know that. No one does. It’s a sort of safety-net - if they think you’re monstrous enough to do it, a possibility will be enough. And Erik was always good at playing monster. So he does that now, his steps just loud enough to let her know he’s approaching, slow enough to make it seem like a game. He’s trying to discern what he can in the half-darkness, but she’s just a figure against the backdrop of a terrified city, vague and insubstantial. That is, until she says the name and Erik stops. It’s deadly silent now. 

“Ines.”, he takes the name and tries it out. There’s a moment of silence before he adds, not uncertainly, “Moreno.” He lowers the gun then, and when he starts towards her his steps are hurried, and he wonders what that might sound like to her. He doubts it’s anything good, so he says preemptively, “I’m not going to hurt you.” It’s debatable at best whether those words offer any comfort, but it is all Erik has to offer tonight. Flimsy reassurances. “Really, I should’ve figured. You recognized my voice far too quickly. Why else hesitate to give up your name?” Not that it mattered, he thinks but keeps to himself, he probably could’ve figured it out even if she’d said another name entirely. The same streets had raised them both, though they went about paying back the debt in two very different ways. Stopping now beside Ines he looks down at her, brows furrowed, before turning his gaze back towards the dark corners of the street. “Whatever’s out there is far worse than I am, at least for you. So I hope you’ll answer when I ask again - what the hell are you doing here alone? Where’s Ulysse?”

—

ines didn’t mean to wander off but she has lost track of where her feet have been carrying her over the past hour, her thoughts all-consumed by one pressing matter only: where is her brother?

frustration and unease are pulling at her in equal measures, threatening to unknot her usual façade in favor of something more raw; something that has absolutely no business being revealed in what must be the messiest evening this city has seen since giovanni vincelli decided to put a bullet in his father’s advisor.

she shouldn’t have gone out again. this is the third person she’s come across whose affiliation with the vincellis makes him dangerous to be around and to be seen with and even though some small voice in the back of her mind laughs at this—better a vincelli than those who would stand against them—it rings hollow in the face of her concerns. “yes. it’s ines,” she snaps, feeling the familiar sense of dread settle in the pit of her stomach at his next words.

“how chivalrous of you,” comes the icy response; that is, the only one she could think of. gratitude isn’t a currency so easily given when it comes to the vincellis and the realization makes her even less inclined to offer it up in exchange for safety. still, the way her name rolls off his tongue so easily makes her flinch when she glances up to meet erik’s gaze, narrowing her eyes as she witnesses him come closer. he’s a familiar face by any means although ines sometimes wonders why that is. there’s little that effectively connects them beyond the home they share; any onlooker would be able to tell the difference in their lifestyles from stealing a simple glance at them.

he, with a gun and an expression as grim as nightfall, while ines struggles to fight her own temper to avoid saying something more grievously offending.

erik ashford hasn’t done her any personal harm and deep down, ines knows she would have an easier time disliking him and everything he stands for if he had. “that’s a strange time to be mulling on my decision,” she frowns before inhaling a sharp breath, only to turn away from erik with a mumbled curse. “maybe i just don’t trust a vincelli man.”

her feet refuse to move; the anxiety of the day has caught up to her at last, making her legs feel like jelly. under different circumstances this feeling would have reminded her of a long day spent with eli sorting through their orders and the thought alone is enough to warrant a warm feeling to envelop her.

✧ 

you could always always trust some goons to ruin a fun night out; they had all of the weekend to wave around their pieces but it just had to be today, and it was so typical to try and keep gals from having a good time after they’d gotten all dolled up. even so a spat was a spat, and she’d been taken with the crowd as they all but scattered into the streets outside. talia thinks she’s lucky to have come out of that little stampede unscathed, but now she was wondering how to get from point a to point b without walking through the line of fire. 

nights like these could really make a gal change her ways, she thinks, but the thought nearly throws her into a fit of laughter ( wrong place, wrong time, talia ). you couldn’t really pry this lifestyle from her cold, dead, hands but a night like this was just horsefeathers! she really had to get out of there and fast, but it felt like she was wondering a little too aimlessly for her own good. she’d had to stop to clear her thoughts and decide on one direction to move in.

the shriek that tears its way from her throat is quickly muffled by her own hand— of all the things to do, drawing attention to themselves was probably not the smartest one. but she’d been caught off guard! the street was full of red hots and her first thought had been that one of them tried grabbing her…but no it’s, ines? “ok, ok, i do have one question though,” she’s trying to sound as coherent as possible as she lowers her hand, “where— which way?”

—

her first impulse is to put her hand on talia’s mouth and to smother whatever exclamation she’s about to make, but the younger girl is quick on her feet and immediately restrains any reaction of hers that she was about to have. in the meantime, ines tries to even out her ragged breathing in a bid to explain and to keep her chest from feeling like it’s going to burst—the bad air does her no favor, making every intake of breath feel like a bunch of needles piercing into her lungs. gunpowder coats the inside of her mouth and it has her stomach twisting uneasily but somehow, miraculously, she manages to find the strength to deliver a clarification: “whe—wherever is safe. someone’s following me!”

it’s nearly impossible for ines to support her own weight at this point as she continues to wheeze and gasp while struggling to keep as quiet as possible. she doesn’t remember the last time her breathing was so labored, and some not so small part of her wishes her head wouldn’t spin so fast to lessen the urge to throw up.

Mabel thought the worst part of her night would be summoning the patience to heat some soup on the stove when she got back to the rooming house. It was too late for her to go all the way home, thumb through a cookbook (it was never a quick or easy decision what to make), and try to get everything needed before the shops closed. Her feet hurt from a long shift, and her fingertips were still pruny from so much scrubbing. She wanted to minimize her time in the communal kitchen, and hopefully get a chance to read that magazine she’d had by her bed for over a week now. She was already daydreaming of the quiet when the hum of the evening street crowd was cut through with something awful.

The sound was unfamiliar. But the reaction was something even she could not be confused by: panic, chaos, and frantic action as some rushed away from the noise and some rushed toward it. She was so startled, she couldn’t even recall now exactly which corner the noise seemed to have traveled around. The startled crowd looked like chickens unable to find a way out of a coop. Their clucking told her more than their movements. Gun, shooting, shot, bullets. She’d heard her daddy shoot an old rifle at predators that tried to come for the farm animals, but it didn’t sound like what she’d just heard. Usually all she heard on the farm was the echo of the shot.

Her shoulders started to shake first, then her whole body as she let the crowd pull her, hopefully, away from the scene of the crime. People start to slow, to find missing friends and family in the crowd, or maybe just to catch their breath. Mabel tries to steady her heartbeat as she comes to a stop under a barbershop sign. She’s too busy staring at the ground now to notice who’s coming and going by her, until she hears a familiar voice. “I-I worked late,” she explains, quick and apologetic, like a child caught eating candy before dinner. She’s been told before she shouldn’t be out too late on her own, but it’s not up to her when the work day is done.

—

objectively speaking, ines knows it would have been better to stay away. better to keep inside the safe house that vera sent her to, and let things blow by before daring to step out once more. unlike a cat, she doesn’t have nine lives left to spare and her own position as a supplier to the vincelli’s crime empire isn’t murky enough to let her get away scot-free. if anything, all men and women look the same when they’re fighting for those who aren’t on your side.

ines would prefer not to be involved in this conflict at all, but she’s got no choice.

“mabel,” she says once more, hands coming up around the girl’s shoulders to gently shake her out of her thoughts. ines understands the terror that she sees painted on her features, the confusion of not knowing and understanding what’s going on, and part of her wishes she could do or say something to ease her out of that anxiety. but there’s no way to make this sound any less gruesome and no way to sugarcoat the fact that right at this moment in time, men and women affiliated with two rival gangs are shooting up the street—and each other in the process as well.

she can’t shield her from this. the only thing she can do is be there to see mabel through the worst of it.

“mabel, look at me,” she implores, urgency coloring her tone. “we’ll get you out of here but first you have to breathe. you’re gonna drive yourself into a frenzy if you dwell on your thoughts. i want you to listen to my voice, okay?”

ines thinks she is woefully unprepared to deal with this in an appropriate manner but seeing the state the younger woman is in tugs at her heartstrings. there’s no way she’s going to leave her by herself, regardless of the consequences.

Ines Moreno is not her ally, and Ines Moreno is not her enemy.

These are two facts Vera knows, and perhaps that is all she needs to. She cannot trust Ines, not in the long run, but for now, their goals are aligned, and that is enough to make Vera come to a halt before her, holding out one gloved hand to help her rise to her feet. She isn’t sure of the extent of her injury (and Vera is no doctor, so her opinion on all matters medical is not to be taken as gospel truth). 

“Let me help you up,” she ignores the question for now, instead, focussing on bringing the other woman to her feet. In truth, she did not even know Moreno had a brother to begin with, but Ines does not need to know that. 

Once on her feet, Vera brushes down Ines’ clothing, flicking off dirt with remarkable tenderness for a woman as hard as she. “Shootout.” The response is brief, and simple. “I’m winning.” Attention turns to Ines’ face, searching her features for signs she may be about to tumble to the ground again. “There’s a safehouse down the street. We keep weapons there. You can hide until it blows over, and if I see your brother, I’ll send him to you. Can you walk?“

—

she observes her closely through dark eyes, watches to see and wait whether or not she’ll catch a spark of irritation flashing across the other woman’s features. ines expects a barrage of commands and harsh words but instead she is met with a surprising gentleness in both tone and movement that she has not accounted for.

vera vincelli commands respect where she goes, but ines knows little about who she is beyond the title and her family’s name. it strikes her then that the mafioso's actions seem kind in nature—almost maternal, and it presents a stark contrast to the conduct of one enzo vincelli. even the mere thought of the latter’s name is enough to have ines fight with the urge to grimace.

“thanks,” she mumbles both half-heartedly and hesitantly when she’s back on her feet and the dust has been brushed off her clothes as best as can be done under the circumstances. “a safehouse?” she echoes, cringing at how dumb it sounds to her. the offer is tempting; ines doesn’t have any interest in getting shot down by someone and as things stand, perhaps she does need protection more than she’s willing to realize.

she doesn't look away, but she wonders if vera can see her resolve start to falter.

Summer was a rather romantic thing in New Orleans. 

At least, that was Leona’s opinion. She loved the way that the heat acted as a molasses for people, forcing them to slow their tempo. Everyone was drawling through their daily activities, the heat making even lifting a cigarette to one’s mouth something of a show — the slow lift of an arm, the steady drag as their lungs eased out the smoke. Leona never partook of course, knowing that the vices she had accumulated over the years were more than enough. There was no need for her to add to St. Peter’s marks against her. She had to get through those pearly gates somehow. 

With her hands clasped behind her back, she rocked from her heels to the balls of her feet — surveying the scene about her. Cops milled about her, and she tried her damnedest not to catch their eye and scurry away. Instead, each time she did, she smiled at their briefly — a warm quirk of her lips, before glancing away. Hopefully they’d assume she’s here to catch her lover, offer them a lunch and a quick kiss on the cheek. 

So when someone offered her a reprieve from her anxious surveillance, she couldn’t help but look a bit relieved. Of course none other would come to her rescue save for Ines — always at the right place and the right time. A person of good fortune. God help her, she couldn’t help but be a little jealous.

“Ines,” she trilled excitedly, unable to smother the light of warmth that gleamed in her eyes. “Thank the good God above! What’re you doing here?” Clasping the other’s hand she stepped closer. “Aren’t your nerves absolutely howling?”

ines lifts her chin to hold the other woman’s gaze as she gets closer, and she gets both more annoyed and irritable in comparison. she stands firm anyway, feet squared, half-expecting the other to drop a quick remark before going on her merry way, but alas—that would have been hoping for too much, it seems. “you aren’t supposed to be here,” she says instead while allowing leona to reach for her hand and utter a greeting that seems both too sincere to be false, yet too easy to be taken seriously. still, something in ines wants to soften at the abruptness of her touch. unfortunately, old habits die hard and she far too quick to steel herself against it when she retracts her hand with a cough.

the last time they spoke, ines only managed a few words between them before leona gave her the slip, thanks to a fellow student of hers barging in and making a scene about something she doesn’t even recall. ever since joining the bootlegging scene and becoming a rival, ines thinks she’s been forced into a position of continuously having to chase leona. she’s unsure if leona has noticed and if yes, she’s done a good job of hiding her feelings on the matter.

this isn’t how ines pictured how her day would end: with the butt of a rifle firmly pressed into her back and one of rogers’ men ushering her down the street. they’re approaching a corner, and there’s just the barest second where the man—ines doesn’t recall having seen him around this part of the town before, but she suspects she might be wrong about a lot of things these days—is occupied with checking the streets for any opposing forces, where his eyes aren’t on her.

so she turns and runs. it isn’t the most subtle option, and it shouldn’t have worked. all he would have needed to do is call out for one of his brother-in-arms and she’d have the whole retinue on her heels, or a bullet in her back. he doesn’t, though: he chases after her himself. and either ines is impressively fast or he’s impressively slow—at least, insofar as he’s managed to remain in what’s supposed to be the elite fighting force of the city in spite of it—but before long she has lost him.