touch a star

The first thing that you notice is that he looks like trouble. He’s all hard edges and sharp lines, from the square of his jaw down to the croaking way he speaks as he seeks you out specifically to introduce himself— pointed, demanding, jagged. 

You’d be lying if you said you weren’t intimidated. 

Blue eyes flit around the shop. Accosting. Conceding. Hills, manning the cashier, is sent away by the time he approaches the counter. 

“Lovely shop,” he smiles. It’s deceivingly civil. “Simply lovely.”

“Thank you.” Your lips are upturned thin. Had he been any other average customer, you would have taken the time of the day to entertain him. But this was the man who sat at the head of the RedBulls, almost as large as the Italian Mafia, alongside his tyrant father, controlling an army of members across the Netherlands responsible for taking the lives of almost anyone they desired and getting away with it by presence alone.  “How may I help you?” 

“A little birdie told me an old friend of mine works here.” If your blood hadn’t already been frozen, it is now. 

“What’s his name?” 

“Daniel,” he says, easily, then adds, “Ricciardo. Tall. Australian. Tends to stick his big nose in places where it shouldn’t be.”

“We don’t have a Daniel here.” You make a show of clicking a pen and pulling out a spare napkin to write on. “If he’s a regular customer, I could put in a word for you.”

Max cocks his head. You try not to recede. He knows you’re lying. You’re stretching your luck here, protecting Danny. But you’d do whatever it takes to protect the life he’d wanted for so long. 

He scans you from the counter and down to the kitchen doors. “Would your staff say the same?”

His words are direct. But so are you. “Yes. You could search this place if you want, even, but you’d have to get a warrant.”

There’s a pause as Max takes you in. “I wouldn’t need one,” he chuckles. “And I think you know this. I think you know me.”

I know Mad Max, you hold back. I know you and the RedBulls indentured Danny and forced his hand to the trigger against hundreds. “Not enough to know what kind of coffee you take with your bread, unfortunately.”

He laughs. It sounds like roughstone. You want to reach for the burner phone that sits in your back pocket. Who would you contact anyway? Daniel is out of the question. Arthur? You’d put him in danger. Charles? Pierre? Would they bother? You stand in Consecrated grounds, after all— by default, you’re practically untouchable.

“I don’t like coffee.”

“Shame,” you say, trying to keep your customer-service voice still. “Would you like to try tea?”

He ignores you. “I heard there was a shooting in the area.”

That sharpens something in you. No harm should come to the Prema boys, so long as you stand. “Seems like you hear a lot from your little birds.”

“Well, in some ways I can say I’m a Prince. Just not the charming kind,” he hums, and you stand your ground as he inches closer over the counter. “Now answer my question.”

“You didn’t ask me anything, Sir.”

Max’s face twists. He makes a noise crossed between a huff and a scoff. “Don’t think th—”

The air practically shifts.

You’ve come to learn only one person has that effect.

Max doesn’t even turn over his shoulder. His gaze is still hawk-like on you. “Speak of the Monte-Carlo Devil.”

Some part of you feels relieved. You drown it out. The last time you had 2 gang members in your bakery, you’d been thrust into a world not meant for the likes of you. 

Charles doesn’t acknowledge you even as he orders his coffee. “Take your business elsewhere, Verstappen.” 

Max breaks into an unflinching smile. “So much for hospitality. You know, I came to see a familiar face, but he couldn’t make it today. I guess I have to settle for you.”

Charles’ gaze hardens ice-cold. “Daniel isn’t here. He left that life long ago.”

“Yes, unfortunately, thanks to you. But we of all people would know you can’t just step out this life once you’re in,” he turns to refer you with a nod, as if to remind you of how you’re not out of the woods with him yet, “I’m quite shocked the Brotherhood didn’t take him when they had the chance— Daniel’s a perfect shot in just about anything that shoots.”

“You should leave, Verstappen,” Charles bites, lightning-quick to pull the Dutchman’s attention from you. “Remember, you’re in Monaco.”

Max lets out a carefree laugh at the assertion. “Are you threatening me, on Consecrated grounds?”

“Depends. Are words all it takes to threaten you?”

Something passes between them. It’s almost familial. He’d shared the same look with Pierre, just more… hostile. 

Another customer rings into the shop, thankfully, and you slide Charles’ coffee across the counter. “On the house,” you say, stiff and with new found sharpness as you turn to Max. “Now if you’re not going to order anything, Sir, you’re holding the line. Merci.”

Max doesn’t flinch, but Charles can see the narrow of his eyes. The Monégasque reaches for his cup and settles into his seat. “Godspeed.”

The Dutchman huffs in assent. “I’ll see you at the Coronation then, Charles. Godspeed.”

Then he steps out to the Spring season, away from sight. 

And Charles stays.

He stays in his seat until the end of your shift. Until the afternoon sun had sunken and the breadrooms were stocked for tomorrow, and you were the last to close up shop. He’d stayed to make sure no one else had come to bother you, and paid his order with a tip he didn’t let you argue over.

“Why did you stay?” you ask, when you're ready to lock the doors.

“I wanted to keep an eye on you.”

“I don’t need protection," you insist.

He understands what you mean. “I know.”

“If anything, seeing you puts me on edge, sometimes.”

“Only sometimes? Should I take that as a compliment?”

You almost smile. Charles catches it. 

You stop at the threshold of your bakery doors. Funny how one step across of it can dictate the rules of your life. You think back on Daniel, the hardness in his eyes when he’d told you that all of it— horror stories of the Monté-Carlo Devil— were true.

Charles glances to your feet at the doors, then back to you. You’ve hesitated. “No one will hurt you.”

“Maybe not just anyone. But, I’ve heard stories about Verstappen.” I’ve heard stories about you.

Charles laughs. “Max Verstappen won’t kill you.”

“How come?”

“Because then no one will be around to bake bread, mon ange,” he says, and the way he’d called you that had come so smoothly to him— as if it’s the most simplest truth alive. “And the Dutch are very fond of their bread.”

He opens his palm in invitation for you to take it.

It takes him another second to realise that you won’t.

You breathe out. The air is chilly. 

“Goodnight, Charles.” 

He blinks, slowly. Then he lets his hand drift back down to his side and into his pocket. Charles had known you were scared— he hadn’t realised you might truly be scared of him too. If Daniel had warned you of him, well. He could hardly blame the man.

“Bonne nuit,” he smiles. You notice his dimples don’t dig in.

Pierre comes with a proposition the next time you see him, and you nearly drop a tray-load of choquettes when you hear it.

“I need a date.”

You’re stunned into place. “First of all, that’s not how you ask someone,” and you must have sounded sharp, or perhaps he’d simply never been put in his place so blatantly before, because his brows had shot up to his hairline, “Second of all, no. Third of all: is this to that coronation?”

“It is,” he says, completely ignoring your second statement. “It’s not assassin-exclusive, if that’s what you’re wondering. There are your kind,” he jokes with emphasis.

“My kind.”

“Yes. Businessmen and families and civilians.”

“With ties to the mafia,” you finish with a clink of your tray down the counter. The room lights alive with the smell of warm sugar and crust as you begin to stock the empty glass display by the cashier.

“Exactly what I said,” he agrees, as he reaches for a pastry. You swat his hand away. 

“No.”

“No to the date or no to the choquettes?”

Your disdain is evident. “Both. Why even pick me?”

“Would it be so wrong to treat a pretty lady like you?”

There’s dead silence. 

Pierre has some… stare on his face, like he’s just said the most suave thing known to man.

Christ.

The laugh that punches out of you is sudden as a snap, and you watch as his face drops. “Sorry! Sorry— just, wow, does that work on all the girls you’ve charmed?”

He narrows his eyes in realisation. “Arthur. What did he say about me?”

“Mainly that you’re a flirt. You didn’t answer my question.”

“Well,” he snorts, “Usually.”

You’re laughing again. There’s an air to you that Pierre finally recognises is what Charles had been so hung up about. “Just come with me. You’ve been working your ass off for years. Don’t you want to spend time out this bakery?”

“You told me the less I know the better.”

“It’s just a formal event, as far as you know.”

He’d hit the nail on the head at that one. Not that you’re complaining— running this bakery was like second nature to you, and you enjoyed your lifestyle— but a break is nice every once in awhile. “I can’t just leave my staff—”

“By the end of the night, Le Paradis will receive an anonymous donation that’s enough to send your staff home over the weekend for a much needed break.”

An unimpressed snort. “You can’t just pay your way to everything.”

“You’re considering, though.”

“Because I’m a business woman in a capitalist world,” you counter, wiping your hands across your apron. “Also, I hate that it sounds like you’re… buying me.”

Pierre visibly scrunches his nose at that. “Mon dieu, non,” he says, dead-serious. “No one is buying anyone. This is a negotiation, that’s all.”

“You can’t buy time.”

“I beg to differ; I just did.”

“I didn’t agree.”

“Then agree,” he cocks his head. “Think of it as a business deal, and not a date. I pay the loss you’d incur over the weekend, and in return you spend time out of this place.”

A break sounds delicious. Staff would appreciate it too. “I don’t… dance.”

“That’s the least of your concerns.”

“Fine. I don’t have a dress.”

“I expected that,” he shrugs, and smiles at the affronted look on your face. “It’s handled.”

“I’ll settle on triple,” you bargain.

Pierre rolls his eyes. “Triple.”

You slide the tray close to him as some semblance of a closed deal. With a wink, he reaches for a piece, and just before he exits the threshold of Le Paradis’ door, says, with alarming nonchalance, “I’ll pick you up after your shift!”

“When a— wait, what?”

You’re in Paris by 9pm.

Paris. The City of Light. In France. On the same, exact day.

What the fuck?

He’d asked you to be ready— and really, you thought you were, but Pierre is a bag of cats you could never quite predict— and the next thing you know you’re being whisked away from Monaco, served an overpriced champagne in a private jet to his name over the cities of France, with nothing on you except your phone, wallet, and a sugar-coated apron, before being driven through the bustling cobblestone streets of the fucking Avenue Montaigne, and passing the Arc de Triomphe along the way as if it was just another Friday for him. 

It probably is.

“Welcome, Madame,” someone says, and then, in higher regard, “Gasly. I hope I’m not in any trouble?”

Right. Pierre had sauntered you past wide-eyed Parisians and into what you could only guess was a highly prolific studio (“It’s not closed, mon amie. This business runs on a waiting list that reaches up to years, that’s why they’re staring. Now close your mouth, you’ll catch flies.”)— just before the both of you had entered the looming establishment, you’d spotted the familiar white of Edelweiss flowers potted by the marble portico entrance, bright against the night. 

The foyer feels open but private, with the doors facing south of the Avenue. Around you, Haute-couture dresses and damask-silk clothing are draped and displayed in elaborate fashion on faceless mannequins, surrounded by ivory veneer floors, red-beamed walls and modern wood partition screens.

Behind the counter, a traditional chinese ink painting takes up the entire wall, vast; alongside scripture, there depicts the low prowl of a striped tiger amongst brushstroke blades of grass on a hill, teeth bared and eyes glaring as you enter. It watches wherever you go.

“Zhou,” Pierre greets in return, “You hardly ever get into trouble.”

He’s a regal thing. Zhou steps over a veil of fabric he’s fiddling with to meet you halfway; he has high shoulders in his even higher-fashion patterned clothing, tailors tape coiled around his wrist, peering at you with a curious gaze. He’s no Verstappen, though— Zhou’s presence is unexpectedly welcoming. 

“You, however,” Pierre’s voice tightens, and for a moment you thought he’d been referring to you, but his sight had zeroed in on someone off to the right, exiting the changing room in a click of heels. “You are trouble itself.”

“Oh, don’t flirt,” she lilts. The woman is dressed in a floral sun-dress that ruffles at her heel-clasped ankles. “Pierre. Long time no see.”

“Not that fancy seeing you here, Lily. How is that prize on your head?”

“One million dollars and counting.” Pierre hears her laugh, because of course she does. Only Lily Muni He, head of one of the Triads, the leading Asian gangs of their syndicate that’s been controlling cartels, would find not fear at the prospect of being blacklisted to be hunted, but laugh at the face of it. “Think I’d hit four one day?”

“In your dreams, Ms. He.”

Their fond banter ends there. Lily has spotted you, now. “You must be the baker? I hope Pierre didn’t tarnish my reputation. I promise I’m nicer than what everyone makes me out to be. ”

Pierre goes out of his way to make a face, but doesn’t say anything. Despite her criminal connections, Lily is an honest worker (as honest as their industry gets, atleast), a better friend, and an even better businesswoman. He respected her leadership. Many do, and rightfully so. It’s no surprise no one has taken on the bounty. Only a fool would dare try.

You flounder as you introduce your name. “Yes, I’m.. new to all this, so no worries on impressions. Pierre left a terrible one and still I find myself here.”

“Here for a fitting before the coronation! You must be Pierre’s plus-one.” She’s clapping now, sleeves billowing in excitement as she spins on her heel to Zhou. They share a brief exchange in mandarin, before she looks back at you with kind eyes. “If you don’t mind, I’d love to help you out. I promise I won't bite.”

“I will not either, not unless I have to,” Zhou jokes. (Doesn’t feel like it, though. The burning glare of the painted tiger suddenly feels intentional.)

Pierre raises an eyebrow. “No one is biting anyone. And she’s not exactly my date, Lily.”

You blink in confusion. Before you can question him, however, he continues:

“Cavallino Rampante vous envoie ses salutations.”

The Prancing Horse sends its regards.

Lily seizes. Zhou’s eyes flit to you in surprise.

In the corner of the room, an incense burner coils sweet-scented wisps of Sandalwood into the quiet air.

“The Brotherhood,” Zhou assents, slowly piecing things together. There’s a thread of nerves in his voice. It’s been a while since the Leclerc’s have shown their face for functions like these. The last he’d seen Charles and his brothers, they’d been dressed in coal black, phantom-like and stone-faced amongst hordes of roses and hydrangeas. That had been Jules’ funeral, many years ago. 

“Wait, where are you going?” you start, voice unsteady, when you see Pierre step away with his phone back in hand. Lily is already ushering you into a fitting room while Zhou trails ahead. “Godspeed,” they say to Pierre.

“I will be back soon. Don’t step out of this establishment, and if you do, take Lily with you.” Pierre’s halfway out the frosted doors, nose into his phone and typing quickly. He looks uncharacteristically concerned. “I’m just going to have a coffee break with a friend.”

The doors shut, and you’re left alone in Paris.

“That was your excuse?” says Nyck De Vries, upon meeting up with Pierre for said mentioned coffee-break-with-a-friend. “If you were gonna lie atleast make it convincing.”

”I don’t lie. Are we not having coffee right now?”

“You could have at least said best friend.”

“Like I said, I don’t lie.”

The Dutchman ignores the jab. “Yeah, which is why they sent me to do espionage,” he huffs. Playing spy for the Edelweiss on the Silver Arrows had been hard enough, but then they’d roped in the RedBulls, and told him to keep an ear out for other gangs too. Which leads them to their main problem.

Nyck inhales, deep, then exhales. “He’s missing.”

Fuck. 

That’s Pierre’s instant thought. And then: how the fuck do you lose track of a killer like that? Before finally settling on something worthwhile: “Tell me the fucking RedBulls are aware.”

“Thankfully, yes,” Nyck answers, but it does little to dispel their dread. “Horner’s tried to keep it under wraps, says he’ll inform the Edelweiss only when absolutely necessary.”

It’s a logical move. The Redbulls wouldn’t have to answer to the Edelweiss if they catch their little fugitive in time before it’s revealed they’d basically mislaid one of the most deadliest assassins in history. Except Nyck has found out— because he’s the man for every job and penetratingly clever— and now so does Pierre. It’s quite possible there are other leaks already; information this fortuitous is hardly ever airtight in this line of work. 

“When did you learn this?”

“Two days ago. I reckon Redbull’s been sitting on it for months, though.” There’s a pause. “You think he’ll be coming after Schumacher?” 

“No,” says Pierre, confidently, alreadying fishing out his phone to sort out a meeting with a handful of Edelweiss representatives. “The Schumachers are like family to him. If anything, he’d come just to watch the Coronation.”

“Maybe. Or maybe he’ll use it as cover to go after somebody else.” 

Fuck, he thinks, again— though this time in the chilly Venetian air, when the day of the Coronation has finally rolled over, and he’s halfway up the ancient Italian steps of the Gran Teatro La Fenice, and he’d come face-to-face with his old friend. He hadn’t told Charles yet of what may transpire out of tonight’s events; he isn’t allowed to, is the right way to put it, but Pierre doesn’t like excuses.

He also hadn’t yet informed him that he’d brought you along to be Charles’ date, but Pierre has bigger fish to fry than a little tantrum— like making sure everybody comes out alive by the end of the night.

He hadn’t needed to introduce you, however. You sweep up just a few minutes behind, with Lily in tow. 

You’re first out of the Ferrari Roma— a statuesque creature draped in red satin, ears crowned with diamonds and lips painted rouge, stepping out in heels and looking like you’re something out of a God-sent vision when the golden hour hits you just right. Somehow, someway, despite being completely out of your element, you carry yourself steadily as if you belong, like you aren’t just a rabbit in disguise, standing amongst old-money-wolves in this high-society carnevale they call a lifestyle.

Charles watches, from where he stands, thinks, Jesus, Mary and all the Saints; no human should be allowed to be this beautiful, and then, when he’d finally gathered himself, turned to Pierre with a glance that roughly translated to: What the ever-loving hell is she doing here?

(To which Pierre had promptly ignored him, which in hindsight had been a good decision, because Charles isn’t quite sure how he would have handled any remark from that damned Frenchman/Wingman he calls a friend.)

He calls your name, offers his hand.

You blink up at him through long lashes. For a moment, he thinks you’ll deny him, again.

But then he feels your touch, feather-light, and it feels a lot like the paper-thin nature of trust. 

An indecipherable weight lifts from his shoulders as you take his hand, let him guide you up the stone stairs and into the foyer, tucked close to his side and standing tall as you weave through the curious, watchful gazes of aristocrats all the way up to the Sala Grande de Ballo. 

“They’ll stare, so just keep your chin up,” Lily had advised you days ago during your fitting, and when you’d asked why, Zhou had been the one to answer mid-measurement over your shoulders. “Because Charles is always alone.” 

“Well, what do I say?” you’d said, “If people talk to me.”

Lily, idly carding through the hangers of gowns, let’s out a laugh. “With him by your side, no one would dare come up to you.”

He tells you you're beautiful, when you both have drinks in hand. 

The compliment settles warmly in your cheeks. You hide behind a sip of champagne. “I must look like a tourist.” You’ve been unable to stop staring at the display of centuries-old art crawling across the ceilings. “I thought there was only a theatre, here.”

“I can bring you there if you’d like,” he cants his head to the exit, but you shake your head. 

Charles is handsome. The cut of his suit is fitting and severe, painting him in all kinds of angles that keep your eyes wandering from the top of his neatly-kempt hair down to the polished oxfords clicking against the tiled floor. The bright symbol of a prancing horse pinned to the lapel of his jacket matches his signet ring. 

“I have no idea why I’m even here, if I’m being honest.”

Neither do I, he doesn’t say. Normally he wouldn’t think too much of it, but Pierre had gone out of his way to tell him to Keep her close, Calamar, and in uncharacteristic fashion, glided past him before Charles could press the matter. “I’m glad you came,” he says instead, because it’s the truth, and truth comes easily to him. “Is Lily your partner-in-crime, now?”

The choice of words don’t get lost on you as you smile. “She’s an angel.”

“She once beheaded a man to prove a point.”

“He was being racist,” you add, remembering Lily’s personal recount of the story. (It had to do with her heritage being questioned, and undermining her abilities as a woman. Lily had fortunately spared the gore from you.) “So my point still stands. She took the time to help me prepare for… all of this.”

“Prepare is a funny word,” Charles says, and when you turn to him, confused, you find he has a glint in his eye. “Is the 9-millimetre strapped to your thigh one of Zhou’s latest designs, then?”

Your mouth opens, then closes. You must have thought he wouldn’t notice. It makes Charles smile, which makes you smile. “I– She,” your words catch, and you let out a sheepish laugh. “It was Lily’s idea to hide one. Occupational hazard, she said.”

He places a glass on a passing waiter’s tray, grabs another. “Do you know how to shoot?” From the corner of his eye, Nyck De Vries trails by the Yakuza representatives with a weary smile, and disappears off to a stairwell. Yuki Tsunoda is nowhere to be found. Charles thinks it won’t be the last he’ll see the Japanese clans.

“Danny taught me the basics,” you answer. That had been a short, Melbourne-campfire sometime in January— one of the rarer times when the Australian was willing to open up on the darker details of his duty tours. “He said that shooting was the easiest part.”

“And the difficult part?”

“Bringing yourself to do it.”

Charles hums. 

He finds himself antsy before the hour has even passed. Call it instinct.

Banter has carried into the evening, and the Prema! boys latch onto you like an elder sister the moment they’d spotted you in the crowd. There’s a lot less rough-housing now that they’re dressed in Italian suits, but the quips and yaps don’t end. It’s Ollie and Arthur who you seem most familiar with, though. Charles can see the anxiety roll away once you slip back into well-known territory as you converse, giving him another chance to admire you, and another to survey the ballroom. Pierre is still missing. Something doesn’t feel right.

“...nge in schedule, I heard.”

Charles blinks. “Change in the schedule?”

“Yeah,” says Dennis. He has a red bull insignia pinned to his jacket, “They’re rushing the coronation ahead. It’s why the food isn’t out yet. Dinner comes directly after.”

Strange. “Why?”

The boys shrug. Charles downs his champagne, pulls out his phone to send a text to Pierre.

But there’s still no sign of him 20 minutes later, even when the lights dim and the room falls silent to listen to Michael Schumacher’s speech in his accented English. 

Common circles had shifted every now and then across the expanse of the room— Arthur had given you a general rundown on the families and figureheads: That’s the Flying Finn, and The Iceman— not a talker, apparently— and that’s Christian Horner, best known for his money-laundering and fraud, and those are the billionaire Strulovitch-es, and those are the Wolff’s— you even spot Lily amongst the crowd; halter-necked in a modernised black Chinese cheongsam, drink in laced-gloved hands and flanked by lackeys you can only assume are from the Triad, too.

“The coronation is simple,” you remember her say, clipping on her mother-of-pearl earrings, “It only ever happens when someone steps down from Cardinal position. It’s a short affair, really. A speech, then they’ll pin an Edelweiss flower to your chest, and pass on an heirloom as a symbol to carry the legacy. 

By the end of tonight, Michael’s son will be crowned as new Cardinal, and he’ll run most of Edelweiss along with the others. Sweet guy. If you ever get the chance to meet him, I think you’ll like him.”

There’s a round of applause as said next-in-line, Mick Schumacher, walks onstage. You’re not surprised he looks like royalty incarnate; a bow-tied suited prince in honey-gold hair and noble, patrician features that radiate old wealth in a way most of the families here didn’t.

He speaks with a lesser accent than his father, but Charles isn’t paying attention. Something is growing deep in his chest. It feels like an animal pacing in its cage, waiting, waiting, waiting. He just can’t tell what for.

When a shadow passes somewhere on the second-floor, Charles is quick to spot it. It’s the price one pays in a world like his. It’s only later that he’ll realise, however, that the silhouette had been Pierre.

“Coronation is ongoing,” Pierre’s voice trills into Nyck’s earpiece. The Cardinals had been less than enthused when they had first brought up the prospect of moving the Coronation date entirely. As usual, they’d entrusted their lives to the rules of Consecrated Grounds. “North and East wings are quiet. Yours?”

There’s a pause on the other end. Nyck should be rounding the corner back to the corridor overlooking the stage, by now. “Nothing on my end. Maybe we’re overthinking th—”

There’s a thud. Then, radio silence.  

Pierre’s breaking into a sprint before he even knows it. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Nyck?!” he repeats, recklessly shoving past the crowd around him. He presses against the balustrades, trying to peer towards the West wing. He’s nowhere to be seen. “Nyck, fucking talk to me.”

Onstage, the spotlights hover above the Schumacher’s. They’re clueless; everyone is. The ex-Cardinal smiles, all-teeth and crinkled eyes, as he speaks to his son quietly.

“I’m proud of you.”

Michael pins the ivory white Edelweiss insignia ontop his son’s heart. 

There’s a pinprick red looming above his own, though, like the eye of a demon staring back at Mick.

It’s a laser sight.

Mick barely gets a horrified papa! out his mouth before a shot fires—

—and Michael Schumacher collapses in a spray of blood.

It all goes to shit in less than two minutes.

Because of course it does.

With Consecration now violated, and in a room full of an organised crime syndicate, no less— 

Everything is fair game.

The crowd scatters in screams. Security detail rush the stage as the other Cardinals rush for cover. 

And then. And then. The room echoes like a clap of thunder. 

At the centre of the ballroom, Pierre has barrelled straight through a cocktail table from the second floor balustrades overhead. 

You scream. The world descends into madness. Half the Prema! boys flank you, instinctively. 

Get her out of here! Charles hisses between the chaos, spurred into action as he unbuttons his blazer. He produces a pistol from his shoulder holsters, before he turns to you. Charles looks like a different man altogether, now. “Stick with Arthur. I’ll come back for you.”

“Charles—” you start, frantic, fingers catching the end of his sleeve. Something in him haywires at the despair in your voice. If he could, he’d stay.

“I’ll come back for you,” he says, again, with the kind of conviction that could save a soul. “I promise.”

And then he’s slipping into the panicked crowd. “Pierre!” he calls, when he catches a glimpse of the Frenchman stumbling up. “What happened? Y—”

“Up!” Pierre jerks his head, one arm on his own left shoulder. It’s popped out of place, but it’s nothing he couldn’t handle. “Go!”

Above them, the eerie, serene look of a stranger in a Venetian Volto mask, stares, unblinking. The mask is gilded in gold and half-decorated in motley-pattern, a streak of fresh blood across the wide-cheeked, sly grin of its white face. Charles aims dead-on, but the figure dodges out of sight. 

He’s quick to follow. Pierre will be fine. They’ve survived much worse.

Someone beside him crumples to a heap. The world lights alive in muzzle flashes. He doesn’t have time to mind. Beside him, Lily turns down a separate hallway. 

She could trust no one, now. The price for her head has never felt heavier. She just manages to duck away into an empty corridor leading to… God knows, letting out a string of curses as she avoids a bullet by the hair and scrambles to shake her heels off. 

This entire thing has been pre-planned, surely. She could only hope th— Someone’s following her. Fuck.

Bounty-hunters, probably. She’s had plenty throughout her reign. Now would be a perfect chance for their kind to begin picking off whoever’s on the open hit-list like flies. No doubt that must have been why the ballroom had transformed into a battlefield the moment Pierre had crashed to the floor. She turns into a dead-end; no choice but to press herself against the corner wall. It seems she’d have to get her hands dirty, afterall. Lily would’ve peeled the evening gloves off her arms if she could, but she didn’t have the time. 

She unholsters her pistol, slides the magazine out to check it's loaded, before snapping it back with a click and bending to pick up her heels. Lily can manage firing a weapon in one-hand, anyway.

The sound of footfalls grow, and grow, until—

  THWACK—!

She drives the back-end of her heels home as they round the corner.

The bounty-hunter flies to the floor with a yelp. A gun clatters. Lily almost laughs. How amateur. Then she takes him in, properly this time, standing above him splayed on his back with his arms up in defense. 

He’s got a button-nose and red-tipped hair. Cute, admittedly. Perhaps if he isn’t her killer, she’d find him cuter.

“Hi,” he says, after a moment. He’s English, it seems, but doesn’t look like it. “You’re… beautiful.”

Lily scoffs, pulls the safety of her pistol with a click. “You’re gonna have to try harder than that. Tell me where the closest exit is.”

There’s blood in his teeth when he smiles. She'd gotten him good. “Sorry, uh, can’t do that, I’m afraid.”

Her eyes narrow. “You are awfully polite for someone who wants my head on a platter, Mister..?”

“Albon. Alex Albon. Huge fan of you, by the way,” he manages, and Lily rolls her eyes at the Bond reference. 

An ill-timed move, in hindsight, because suddenly white-hot pain flares up her left knee, and she’s crumbling face-first into the tiles as he turns the tables against her. He’s alarmingly strong. Alex slams a shoe down to her elbow and she screams, fingers burning from where he kicks her handgun away. “Sorry!” he apologises.

Something clicks around her wrists.

“Cuffs? How charming,” she seethes, “Have some dignity.”

“This is as dignified as I can get, Ms. He.” He hauls the Triad leader up with ease, her shoulders searing in protest as he presses the barrel-end of his gun to her back and shoves her forward to move. It’s almost too easy.

“Okay, wait, wait, wait!” she hobbles, pointing one foot out to the side. “...Those are custom-made.”

Alex blinks to the heels. They’re suede, with the familiar tiger-prowl logo imprinted on its outsole. Zhou’s, he realises, and huffs out. “Fine, go.”

He loosens his grip as she bends on the knees— but then she’s springing back up before he can even register his mistake. The crown of her head connects with his nose at full speed. Alex’s vision tunnels, the wind knocking out from his lungs, and before he knows it, he’s teetering backwards, and the hope of his million-dollar prize (two, actually, if you bring her alive) slips away. 

Lily practically swings onto him, long-legged and swift, and then she’s on his shoulders, and then they’re both hurtling back to the ground. She’s choking him out with her.. Thighs? Arms? He can’t tell, too busy scrambling for purchase on the cold floor for something, anything, to fight back with— but the world is darkening around him, and the blood is rushing to his head, and the last thing he hears before he fades is Lily’s crooning voice. 

“Godspeed, rookie.”

In the distance, sirens blare and police tires squeal. 

It’s nearly a crowd crush, downstairs. “Shoes off, please, I don’t want you to break an ankle,” says Arthur, still in that charming tone of his despite the growing chaos around him. You stumble as you slip them off, and let out a gasp when you watch him toss it over the stairwell railings. “He’ll buy you 10 more!” Ollie laughs, of all things, ushering you closer downstairs. They seem to relish in the midst of madness. “Arth—”

A bullet whizzes past you. It’s close enough you feel the breeze of it by your cheek. Paul yanks you further down the stairs in a rush of Estonian swears as you scream.

“Who the fuck is shooting?!” Dino snaps, flinching as the marble wall by his head bursts. You let out a yelp. “Fucking Yakuza,” Arthur growls, one hand tight around your wrist as he guides you behind him onto the landing. The last time he’d dealt with any of their clans, he’d been fourteen, watching the culmination of his brother’s Monte-Carlo Devil rep begin from the aftermath that was Suzuka. Now here they are, settling business by trying to take Arthur’s head off, and yours too.

“They’ve got balls to come after you,” Ollie huffs. “Ears, darling.”

You cover your ears, though you know it’d do little. 

Someone collapses, in the distance. 

Ollie is a perfect shot. 

“Eye for an eye, eh?” 

They continue to clear each other out one by one. They’re tactical, swift. They don’t look like teenagers anymore.

Behind the painful ringing, you can vaguely make out the frenzy of Japanese orders being flung around. One flight of stairs left to go, then a sharp right towards the foyer, then you’re out the door. You try to even out your breath, ignore the hammer of your heartbeat at your fingertips like the rest of the boys. You’ve never seen them all collectively like this, eyes alert, weapons drawn and ready to fire. They look frighteningly composed— in their element, almost. The Prema!boys are more a pack of wolves, if anything. 

“Thought Tsunoda was good with the Italians?” Dennis hisses, sparing a peek over the other end of the foyer. It’s an even match, as far as he can tell. “Isn’t he buddies with Pierre?”

Frederik shakes his head. “I doubt this is Tsunoda’s work. He runs his own clan.”

“Everybody shut the hell up,” someone says. It’s Arthur. “Take her, Ollie,” he orders, and you find he sounds hauntingly like Charles, this way. “They want me more than they want her.”

“Don’t be a fuckin’ hero,” you chide, and for a moment it feels like they’re being idiots back at the bakery again— but your voice is wavering. You could never hide your worry, not when it came to them.

“Stay low,” he continues, before turning to face you. “And when I say run, I—”

His eyes widen. 

Your heart drops.

Behind you, Paul is yelling for you to move, move, they’re ambushing from behind us!

“—RUN!” 

You bolt. Ollie practically wrenches you off the landing and down the final flight of stairs. You nearly trip over your dress at the last few steps, one hand on your skirt and the other wound tight in his iron-grip as he keeps you to his side, away from the flurry of gunfire. The walls explode in bullet holes as you both careen around the corner of the foyer; it’s a final stretch out the exit. You can see the flash of reds and blues, the sound of distant militia. Salvation.

And then—

His grip vanishes.

You gasp. “Ollie!” 

He hurtles to the ground like a bag of bricks, shoulder shot clean through. 

“Don’t!” he barks, before you can even react— even hesitate. “Leave me! Go!”

Your feet stutter. It takes the sound of more firing to startle you back into action, and suddenly you’re running, running, running, down the steps of the theatre entrance and out to the street.

Hallways and floors litter with bullet-casings and smoke bombs. Soldiers have begun filing in, but they don’t don the Italian flag on their crests— these are private-hires. Mercenaries. If Schumacher had been their target, this is overkill.

People scramble amidst the fog, bumping shoulders and scattering as they scream their way towards exits. The room empties out relatively quickly, with the Silver Arrows choosing to remain behind, unsurprisingly. Somewhere between the smoke and its shadows, it’s Hamilton, Russell, and Rosberg, now, bouncing off each other in fluid performance as they take down gunman after gunman in rapid succession.

Pierre puts whoever comes to his path out of action just as effortlessly.

He’s blade-deep into the throat of one of the soldiers, and somewhere off in the distance, Kimi is dragging a hissing Lorenzo behind the bar after getting snagged by a bullet to the thigh. The Finnish man had the time to saunter over with a bottle of alcohol in hand as if the world around him wasn't just descending into chaos, before triaging the eldest Leclerc with alarming ease. 

“Bullet is still in,” the Iceman shrugs, letting Lorenzo snatch a swig from his bottle with a grimace, “You’ll live.”

More gunfire resounds, and whiskey bottles atop the shelves burst apart. “What a waste,” Kimi drones. He’s lighting a cigarette, of all things. Lorenzo couldn’t be more aghast. 

Somewhere upstairs, Nyck has a hand on his sidearm well before he’s swept from under his feet. 

The masked man— this Jester lookalike— is lithe, and spry but not quick enough. Nyck levels his weapon as soon as he’d landed hard on his back, firing a barely-there shot too close for comfort. The Jester shouts off with a flinch, startled from the echo ripping through eardrums. 

Male, Nyck profiles, stumbling back up. His vision is swimming— he’d been slammed hard enough to concuss. And not used to firearms, either. 

“Who the fuck are you?” the Dutchman hisses. His skull is searing alight in pain, and he can feel the slow itch of blood trickling down the side of his head as he blinks hard. He’s slowing, and it’s noticeable. The Jester doesn’t give, takes the obvious chance with a roundhouse-kick that has the Dutchman rearing back. His heel connects with his wrist with a force strong enough that Nyck’s trigger finger fires off, again, and the ceiling cornice explodes with dust.

“Nyck!”

It’s a brief moment of distraction.

“Charles, no—!”

He doesn’t finish his sentence. Nyck feels the barrel-end of a pistol pressed to the side of his own temple, and his body seizes, arms raised.

“Charles, shoot him,” Nyck orders, without hesitation. He could care less if he went down as a hostage. As long as Schumacher’s killer is coming down with him. “Do it.”

Fuck. “Listen.” Charles starts, readjusts his grip on his weapon. “No one else has to die today.”

The Jester just tilts his head, silent, and digs his gun harder into Nyck. There is no other way around this, he implies. The Dutchman sucks in a breath, feels the strain in his neck as he resists. Charles wavers, mind going a millions miles a minute. 

It’s too risky with their distance to tackle, and it wouldn’t do to duel like gunslingers and bet on who’s a quicker shot; Nyck would be brain-dead by the time Charles’ bullet travels fast enough to hit their assailant. 

“Stop fucking thinking, Charles!” he snaps. “Take me down with him.”

“You’ll be fine, Nyck,” he answers, calm. Then he slides his finger away from the trigger of his Beretta, raises his hands, slow and steady. “He’ll let you go.” 

“No, he fucking won’t."

“Yes he will,” he replies. “Just don’t do anything stupid.”

The Jester doesn’t speak, just jerks his head to signal for Charles to drop his handgun. The Monegasque follows, resolute, and tosses it back down the stairwell he’d appeared from. No turning back now. This is a bad gamble, but he’ll take the slimmest of chances if he has to. Lesser evils. “Now let him go.”

A pause. For a harrowing moment, Charles thinks he’d played his hand wrong. In some ways, he technically did.

The Jester fires, and then he’s gone in a blur of white and gold and black, out of reach.

“NO!”

The Dutchman crumples into himself, and Charles leaps forward to catch him as he does. “Fuck!” he scrambles, grabbing Nyck to sit him up. There’s no time to chase after the Jester; it would’ve been a suicide mission to do so unarmed, anyway. They can count themselves lucky; Nyck had been shot through his side instead. 

Lesser evils of the job. It’s pointless to search for the  Jester. For now, Nyck is priority.

(“Told you he’d let you go,” Charles says, somewhere inbetween Nyck’s incoherent Dutch swearing.

But that was later, when the havoc had mellowed out to clear, and they’d fought their way out the theatre and re-convened at one of Lorenzo’s safehouses. A handful of the prema boys are here, but everyone idles in varying states of exhaustion; bloodied and on edge.)

Hidden in the crypt of a Venetian church, Charles calls for Arthur first, but doesn’t settle even after he’s ensured everyone’s okay. Safehouses are never consecrated because it’d put them on Edelweiss records, and they’ve also quite literally learned that having a building-full of assassins is the last thing to safety, much less a room.

But, you. You.

His heart slams to a halt.

Where are you?

If Ollie could pale even further from his bloodloss, he would. “She got out unharmed. I told her to run and she did. I… don't know where she is.”

“We don’t,” says Arthur. He’d given him an order, and Ollie had paid the price for it. He isn’t about to let him take all the blame. “But we have everyone in our pockets looking for her. We’ll find her.”

“Attendez, attendez, attendez—”

Wait, wait, wait.

The room tenses. Ollie picks nervously at a children’s plaster wrapped around his fingers.

“You lost her?” Charles snaps towards the prema boys. Arthur shifts to the forefront of them. He isn’t afraid of his brother. “You had one job, Arthur. If she’s—”

“You are going to argue with me about this?” Arthur scoffs. His arms uncross and he waves a pistol to Pierre. Nyck hopes the safety of it is on. “Who’s amazing idea was it to bring her to the fucking gala?”

Charles slows himself considerably. Takes a breath. Arthur is right, but they need to focus on finding you, not worthlessly arguing about who’s to blame.

“Why did you bring her, mate?” The boys watch carefully as Arthur talks, steps forward to where Pierre stands at attention. It’s rare to see this Leclerc aggravated to this extent. “I’m just saying it’s convenient, no?” 

“What are you implying?” (He would have bitten back harder, but today’s assassination is a fair enough reason for knives to begin sharpening.) Pierre can stand for a lot of things, but to have his loyalty questioned is another. 

“You work close with the Edelweiss. You must have known something.”

“You’re right, I did know something. And I know I shouldn't have brought her. But it was too late.” They’re long past apologies, so Pierre doesn’t say it.

Lorenzo shifts in his seat with warning,“Arthur, arrête.” Arthur cares deeply about you, and he understands the rage— but the young boy has a pistol and a close enough distance that he definitely wouldn’t miss. 

“I should shoot you,” Arthur says. 

They’re face to face, now.

“I won’t stop you.”

(Charles won’t stop him either— that much he knows, so Pierre just braces for the inevitable punch.)

A beat.

Pierre gets a pistol-whip instead, and the taste of blood-metal in his mouth. 

Fair enough, he grimaces, struggling to find his footing after the strike. “Well. Can we get back to the fucking topic, now?” He rolls his jaw. It would only bruise. Arthur, as brash as he is, had the sense to hold back. 

“Charles, would you like to have a turn? Anyone?” Nyck huffs from across the room. He’s shirtless, sitting back on a dusty loveseat with his entire stomach rolled in gauze. A bit of colour has returned to his face. “No? Okay. Then let’s finally start. Does anyone have any idea what the fuck just went down?”

Someone pipes. “Assassination attempt.” 

“Attempt?” Paul scoffs. “The entire building was being gunned down.”

“The mercenaries were distractions, surely,” Lorenzo states. The eldest Leclerc has his leg propped up on a table— his pantleg is a deep crimson. (Last he remembers, Kimi had sailed off on a gondola with 2 bottles of stolen spirits in hand and not a scratch on his body sometime after he’d helped Lorenzo.)

“Ex-military men,” Arthur points out, hands on his hips. “Maybe Daniel had been the one?”

“Woah, Daniel’s back?” Dennis blinks.

Charles runs a hand down his face. Blood is rushing in his ears, and he tries to steady himself. He couldn’t think straight knowing you’re out there, probably terrified out of your wits. You can handle yourself, ofcourse— but you shouldn't have had to in the first place. They’d been the one who brought you into this mess. What if you’d been taken? What if you never even got out? What if—

He hopes your burner phone is with you.

The adrenaline is still riding out of him in waves as he paces around the room. He’s rolled his sleeves up, foregoing his blazer on an armrest, and props his palms to a desk edge. Charles drops his head, thinking, before disagreeing. “Ricciardo said it himself he’s done with this life. We gave him an out. It isn’t like him to waste it— much less to kill a Cardinal.”

“Times have changed, clearly,” Pierre comments.

There’s a pause as the youngest Leclerc concedes. “He could’ve been forced by the RedBulls, no?”

“Doesn’t change anything.”

Arthur frowns. “Why not?”

“Because Daniel Ricciardo wouldn’t have missed.”

It’s a fact. The Australian’s marksmanship is beyond this world. Schumacher, however, hadn’t suffered a headshot the Australian’s been known for.

“You said you knew something, Pierre,” Ollie says from the table. “What did the Edelweiss tell you?”

“Nothing that would help us right now.”

“Bullshit,” Dennis scoffs. “We were almost massacred today and you’re expecting us to let you keep your secrets?”

Pierre looks off to the stone walls by Nyck. They’ve had to keep his cards close, especially now— until Charles slides into his peripherals. 

“Tell us.” 

Something creeps across his skin. It’s been a long, long time since he’d heard that tone. It’s clear he isn’t asking. 

Nyck, from his seat, just nods, as if giving in. “Redbull lost contact of someone dangerous—”

“We’re all dangerous.”

“He’s dangerous enough that the Cardinals are afraid of him.”

Under the early morning sun, you note that it’s a reflection of the flowers Pierre had brought along to be potted. “You weren’t lying when you said you people were civil ,” you say, confused, flipping the card back and forth. “The… Edelweiss?”

Pierre hums. “You asked who governs us. The Edelweiss are the people who do. If anyone violates any rules, these are the top dogs they’ll be running from.” 

The dots of wool-white petals that now cluster your storefront stand out against the shade as you bent to observe them. “For an underground society I was expecting something more… uglier,” you say over your shoulder. 

“Well, don’t let looks deceive, because we’re as ugly as they come.” 

For the sake of conversation, you don’t comment. 

Something buzzes in both of your pockets then. He doesn’t flinch. “That would be the official confirmation.”

It’s the burner phone Charles had given you the day you’d dealt with him. The green screen lights up in a series of numbers– coordinates, you figure, of your establishment– followed by a digital font of ‘...CONSECRATED TO NEUTRAL GROUNDS.’

Pierre is smiling, shark-like, when you look back at him. “Welcome to the Circus, mon amie .”

Arthur Leclerc returns the week later with a cast in his arm, flowers in the other, and a crooked smile with a mouthful of apologies. 

“I’m sorry,” he’d rambled, watching you pot the pink carnations into a spare bucket you’d dug out the kitchen. “It’s not fair. I brought this mess to you, and I know how the… discovery of my, lifestyle, can be. If I can take it back, I would.”

“Don’t take it back now,” you’d half-joked, ducking back into the bakery with him. “My business might crumble again without you.”

It’s true. Le Paradis had begun its slow climb following your “mystery meet-cute incident,” as put eloquently by none other than Lando Norris, elbow-deep in the kitchen’s spiral mixer one early weekend. He’s the youngest of your new day shifters, doe-eyed and a quirk to his lips that seemed to attract the morning crowd. You let the comment slide, though— The Brotherhood’s involvement with your bakery had managed to slip past and only become somewhat of a rumour among staff, and you’d given them the chance to leave if they wished.

“I hope they didn’t scare you that night,” Arthur says, sliding into an open seat. “I know my brother is…”

Handsome , you think, instinctively. “Terrifying. Especially Pierre.”

His nose scrunches. “Pierre is a flirt.” Then, with more gentle honesty, “Mean too, but loyal. Pierre has been friends with my brother for as long as I can remember. If he’s behaving like an ass, it’s just his way of protecting people. Don’t mind it.”

“As for my brother,” he continues, tracing his red plaster cast. It’s been vandalised with inappropriate doodles and signatures you’re sure had come from the Prema boys. “He has his moments. But he’s good. Above all else, he’s good .”

You forget about the conversation until another week later, when the shop is brimming with life and the new apprentices bump shoulder-to-shoulder in the remodelled kitchens. Lando scrambles with the shops’ sudden stream of customers at the front counter for days after you’d hired a patissier and introduced a newly-written spring menu, and makes it his purpose to hound the chefs after every shift he has over the french jargon that come with the pastries.

“—honestly find it incredible how long you’ve— ‘scuse me, sorry — survived here in Monaco without a lick of French,” you hear someone say between the thrum of the ovens. It’s Daniel Ricciardo, brushing by fellow apprentices as he ambles over to rinse his hands over the sink. The laugh that bubbles out of you is sudden as you reach for the sieve. “You’re barely fluent yourself .”

“Yeah, but my charm makes up for it, so,” Daniel answers, quick-witted yet lovely— always — and you’re glad for the banter, it feels like you’re making up for lost time since he’d left for work all those years ago.

There had been a time you’d been afraid that he’d harden over the years he’ll spend travelling, but then he had arrived at your doorstep some years later, bright and shining, a personalised 2018 Cabernet Sauvignon in hand, and it was like seeing the sun again— because it was , when it comes to Daniel of all people— and everything had fallen perfectly back into place just as it used to when you were teenagers. 

“Hold on, I thought Chef and Danny grew up together?” chimes Amelie, Le Paradis’ resident barista, from her spot at the staff meal table. “And Lando, what’re you doing back here?”

He has the grace to look sheepish as he shuffles to sit across her. “The newbie’s out front— don’t give me that look, Ame— It’s a slow day today. Besides, we’re closing soon to prep for afternoon service. Is that rice?”

“Bibingka ,” interjects pastry-chef Riel in fluent Filipino, who was the same person responsible for coming up with the seasonal menus, before pinching off a piece from Amelie’s lunchbox.  “It’s glutinous rice; And also, yes, but Danny left for.. What was it again, Chef? Military?”

One of the prep-cooks gawk. “You’re a military man?” 

“Well, I prefer decorated war-hero, but sure,” he jokes, drying his palms against his apron, and had it been anyone else but you, they wouldn’t have noticed the sudden tension in his hands— the same way no one had noticed the old scars he’d hidden under the myriad of tattoos and haunts that he’d brought along with him in his years of unnamed tours of duty. (Danny doesn’t talk about it, so you never ask. He’s glad.) 

“Alright, back to work,” you instruct, if only to move the conversation elsewhere. “Riel, check on the madeleines for me, would you? Thanks— and Lando, back to the cashier, please. I don’t want us getting robbed in broad daylight.”

“I hardly believe the old lady would get that far in her Vespa,” he remarks off-handedly, “Besides, no one would rob a Mafioso.”

“Lando Norris ,” you hiss, just as the kitchen doors swing close behind him and someone cries, “Boss is a mafioso?!” 

To which you’d huffed out a curt: “For the last time, no, I’m not.”

Enter Charles Leclerc with his impeccable timing.

Now, he’s not exactly sure what divine force had possessed him to come here, really. He could have easily found company by visiting Arthur at the academy, or sailed off the shores of Port Hercule with Lorenzo or Pierre. He’d had a rough day, to say the least; What with the other gangs beginning to creep back into Italy and France for talks , by which usually means: informal chit-chat and gossip on the upcoming Edelweiss Coronation over expensive champagne, all while they held semi-metaphorical pistols aimed at each other underneath the table, and skirted around the real topic of territory feuds and business settlements like a pack of wolves. 

He had complained to Pierre, as usual, of the masquerading and filtering of words he’d had to do. In their society, truth and honesty are few and far inbetween.

Huh. Honesty .

Perhaps that’s the divine force that carried him to you. 

A one-woman army who seems to have no qualms in baring her teeth and exposing her throat to the Devil of Monté Carlo, of all people. Someone who speaks their mind, despite their fear.

The shop door is stopped open by a bucket of droopy pink flowers when he gets there, in favour of the spring breeze, he supposes, to carry the scent of sugar and bread down the street just where he’d parked. When he enters, his eyes are quick to search for you, though they land on a boy who looked to be just a few years off Arthur, and greet him instead.

“Is the owner in?” Charles asks, and when he names you for good measure, there’d been a pause too quick for him to study.

“Yeah,” the boy says, shrugging, and disappears into the back. Charles couldn’t think much of it, though. The doors had swung, and he caught a glimpse of you inside, metal bowl sidled at your hip, waving a sieve pointedly at someone across the room— and his thoughts had dissolved into the air.

It takes a few minutes until you appear. Charles patiently watches you shoo off another worker at the other end of the counter in brief conversation before making your way towards him, eyes narrowing. “What are you doing here?”

The abrasiveness is fitting, considering it’s not just the two of you now. No, now you have your people to protect too, and Charles is certainly bright enough to understand his unannounced visit would be an invitation to get your claws out. “Well,” he says, “What do your customers come here for?”

You humour him. “Bread, usually. And rest.” Then, Charles watches you bump through the counter door with a squeak and begin closing up service, much to his amusement, and move around to cover the loaves displayed at the windows with linen cloth, acting as if you didn’t have a mob boss standing in wait just a few paces away.

“Then what else could I possibly be here for other than bread and rest?”

“Trouble,” comes your quick reply, and you’re half-glad you can’t witness his reaction to your answer. You have your hand against the doorframe as you toe the bucket of carnations away and turn the opening-times sign outwards. “Usually,” you mumble as a final afterthought, peering out the door before clicking it shut.

“You know,” he starts, conceding you with a tilt to his head, like he was piecing together a puzzle he couldn’t quite solve. “Usually, not a lot of people are comfortable with turning their back towards me. Neither are they so… honest.”

When you turn to look at him, properly now, he’s settled back into a seat facing the shopdoor, legs crossed wide where his ankle rests on his left knee. He has a look on his face you can’t quite decipher. Curiosity, perhaps. The burn of his gaze feels like a permanent brand on your skin. It’s intimidating.

“Not to your face, I’m sure,” you say, before reeling back with, “Monsieur.”

“Please, Charles is fine,” he says, after you box a fresh batch of creme-filled choux pastries and set it to the table. It’s Arthur’s favourite. You take your seat across him, where you can see past the frontcounter and to the kitchen doors.

“Charles.” His name rolls off your tongue like honey, tastes sweeter than you’d wanted it to. “Rough day?”

“That obvious?”

“Terribly,” you say, even though he doesn’t look a hair out of place, and you’re sure he knows it too. He’s forgone his suit jacket, and left his white button-down tucked loose with neatly folded sleeves. Charles looks strikingly different under the afternoon sun. The light catches the blue-green of his eyes, and he looks… at ease. Content, almost. You try not to stare.

“Could say the same for you.” 

That shoots a sudden, violent awareness of the state you must be in. Powdered sugar on your fingertips, strands sweeping loose from the usual tuck behind your ear, and a grease-stained apron to top it all off with. “I work hard,” you hum, trying to tamp down the barb of insecurity as you rub the dust of white off the corner of your nails.

“Are you implying I don’t?” he says.

“No, but you sure as hell have it easier than I do.”

For a moment, the whole bakery is suspended in a hush, frozen in glacial stillness; Nothing but the wind chimes pealing muffled outdoors, and the faint chatter coming from the bread rooms. You wonder if you’ve taken a step too far.

And then it’s broken with a quiet, huff of laughter. Charles smiles for the first time that day; the genuine kind, where it dimples deep into his cheeks, and he has to turn away to collect himself. 

Christ, it sends your heart stumbling.

It’s hard to imagine that this is the Monté Carlo Devil. This is the head of Monaco’s most feared gangs to exist. That he battles with troubles and sought company like anybody else had strangely enough been overlooked by your… fear? Expectation? Whatever it is— the idea had seemed alien to you. It almost feels wrong to see, like you’ve peeked through the curtains of the stage play too early. Sitting here, radiant in the 2pm sun, Charles Leclerc suddenly looks so… human. 

“Business is business,” he hums, and though the thread of laughter has faded in his voice, it still rings clear as day in your head. “You know how it can be.”

“I think our definitions of business are vastly different.”

He tilts his head in challenge, gaze shard-sharp. “Is it? We both wake up to earn a living and do it by getting our hands dirty. I’d say you and I are more similar than most.”

“Well, I enjoy my work here—”

“Who says I didn’t?”

There’s an implication there that sends a chill down your spine. The remark at the back of your throat dies down as quickly as it had come. It’s just as easy to forget that Charles is a crimeboss as much as it’s easy to forget he’s just a man. “Agree to disagree, then.”

His eyebrows raise.

You follow suit. 

“You don’t seem the type to back down from a fight.”

“Sometimes I can compromise,” you counter. “Besides, I’d hardly call this—” Charles watches you gesture between the both of you, “—a fight.”

“And what would you call it then?” 

“It’s…” you trail off, searching for the right word. “Banter, debate. A conversation between…”

Between... what, exactly? Business owners? Acquaintances? You’re hardly strangers nor friends— this is the second, proper time you’ve met Charles, and yet you find it’s the word that’s perched on the tip of your tongue, even if it isn’t fitting for whatever this fleeting interaction is you’re sharing with him.

Friends. With the Devil himself. And worse, according to local legend.

The conversation is cut short before you can even answer, however. With the wide swing of the kitchen doors, comes the quick slip of impassiveness back onto Charles— and the room simmers in tension again when everyone’s gazes meet.

You pause. Eyes dart between Charles, and–

“Daniel,” he says, a hint of surprise.

What the hell?

The Australian blinks. “…Well, long time no see, Charlie.”

And so you learn that your bakery apprentice Daniel Ricciardo, is also, in fact, a hitman.

“Are you fucking insane?!”

“Oh, no, no, no, don’t turn this on me, Danny!” you snap, once you’ve reached out of earshot from the pastry kitchens. “You told me you were in the military—”

“What’re you doing with Charles Leclerc!” 

“—so how the hell are you connected with the Mafia?”

“How the hell is a baker?” he hisses, fingers pinching the high bridge of his nose into a deep-set frown. He’s practically worn a hole down the back-alley of the shop as he paces. “You— Listen. Listen to me.”

“This is stupid, so stupid, Danny. How long have you been lying to me?”

“Woah, hey!” he stops you short with a pointed hand, “I have never lied to you.” 

“Never,” he repeats. “And I’m not about to start now. It’s just—”

He runs a hand down his face. The faded scars on his knuckles and arms have never been this much of a point of interest to you until now; had he worked for the mafia too? Or another gang? You think on the 2 spots of white scar tissue you’d caught once on his side— the entry and exit wound of a bullet— and wonder, maybe, if it had been Charles or Pierre, that had shot him.

“I was in the military,” he explains, “And when… when you get good, calls are made. Then they move you around. They put me under some, security detail, and it was.. it was for specific people, and they make you protect them, and..”

Kill for them. He doesn’t say. You connect the dots yourself.

“You said you were on some sabbatical .”

“I am!” he insists, when he hears the disbelief in your voice. “I… I found an out, and I—“ a pause. “I hid for as long as I could until I knew it was safe. Fuck, and now— now, you? With the Italian fucking Mafia? They’ve got a whole syndicate! They run in a society!”

“It was an accident,” you begin, white hot flame licking at your words. “Christ, I didn’t choose to meet them.”

He snaps your name so quickly you jerk away. “You think I chose back then?!”

“You know that’s not what I meant, Danny.”

Something distant clatters in the kitchen. It does little to distract the both of you from the heat of your argument. 

“I lost friends getting out. I don’t want to—” he wavers, and lets out a frustrated sigh. “These people… especially Charles, he’s always ten steps, hell— a lap ahead in everything he does. Every word he says, every act he pulls, has its reasons. He’s got strings attached to every goddamn crime and force out there that’s enough to stage a fucking puppet show out of anyone he wishes. What makes you think meeting him of all people was an accident?

“Those stories you hear? They don’t call him that for nothing. They come from somewhere. It’s reputation. Calling him the Monté Carlo Devil is exactly who he is— He earned that title because he single-handedly ended an entire bloodline from Suzuka after someone crossed him. He murdered families. Innocents. Yeah, Charles is charming, and kind, and plays nicer than the others, but so can the fuckin’ Devil.” 

Then, finally, “He isn’t good, alright? He isn’t.”

Arthur’s words suddenly taste like ash on your tongue. ‘— he’s good. Above all else, he’s good.’

It shouldn’t have been that damning to you. You’ve heard iterations of the stories yourself, but hearing it from Danny has you spiralling back from… wherever it is your head had gone. Charles had charmed you with the promise of good faith. He’d weaselled his way into your life in a matter of weeks, and now you’re neck-deep, terrified again, just like what had happened with Danny. Sooner or later you might be drowning in blood just like he did, too. 

“I’m not trying to scare you, okay? But when you meet people out there, when you’ve seen what I’ve seen— what they do? They’re heartless. People can turn on you in an instant. And all it takes is a bullet .”

There’s a crack in his voice he shakes off. It slows you down considerably as you watch him sit down on the curb to collect himself. “Sorry,” he speaks after awhile, “Didn’t mean t’ shout.”

“I know.” Quarrels like these never lasted between you two anyways. “I’m sorry, too.” You settle down beside him and take his hand in yours. He would have picked right through his callouses if you hadn’t. “What were their names?”

It takes a minute for him to answer. “Their call-signs were Val, and K-Mag. They were the quietest, most stubborn, hard-headed assholes I’ve ever met.” There’s a laugh somewhere between. “K-Mag was considered the squad Viking. And Val had a pet reindeer at one point. Yeah. They were good people.”

Were. 

“And yours?”

“It was Honey Badger,” Danny snorts. "Long story." He dips his head into a laugh, and now you’re smiling too. “Hey, does this mean I’m fired?”

“God, no. I’ll need a James Bond on my side.” 

“Nah, I’m way cooler than him,” he says, then casts a serious glance your way. You're distant. “You know I’ll never let anything happen to you, right? What is it?”

“When you said they moved you around, that you didn’t have a choice. Was it with..?”

“No,” Danny shakes his head. “I was indentured. It’s Charles who got me out. I owe him.”