#tdrstart

Flanagan’s was crowded today, as per usual for the quaint and homey pub-turned-eatery frequented by the Irish mafia, but Alexander was well hidden and protected in a secluded booth on the second story of the institution. He’d ordered himself a pint of Guinness (on tap, of course) and an order of potato skins while he waited for his second to arrive. They had a whole hell of a lot to discuss, and Alex wanted to be sure Ray was on the same page as him.

“When Raymond comes in,” he signaled to Declan, who was standing charge nearby and observing the people milling in and out of the restaurant. “Make sure to bring him to me.”

Currently, he was lost in thought, studying a “family” tree for the Italians, starting with the don and working his way down. He murmured thoughtfully under his breath, jotting down a question mark and half-formulated thought next to the one incriminating name he had written down: Dante Vicario. This was impossible--there was no end to the amount of things he had to pore through to glean even the slightest inkling as to these mafia members’ whereabouts and intentions.

a flashback thread — @tanechkax

Personal time was a concept that was wholly unaccounted for in Alexander’s life; though he lived a wealthy and comfortably glamorous lifestyle, it was entangled within the intricacies and general mess of the mafia, making it next to impossible for the Bronx Prince to do much anything of note that was entirely unconnected to his life as a crime boss. When he went out, whether it be for a drink or dancing or a baseball game, he would get wrapped up in the politics of his job. And while working as the leading crime boss for the American-organized Irish mafia was something Alexander had fought and clawed tooth and nail to deserve, it was unsettling to realize that so much of his life was mandated by what he did and who he was.

Sometimes, it made him lose sight of who he was. And in the dark of the night, when he was his most pensive and vulnerable, he found himself wondering if his mother would have been disappointed in him for that behavior and mindset.

But...he couldn’t think of his mother these days. He refused to, unless it pertained to wreaking havoc and revenge on the bastards who had ruined her.

So. Personal time was off limits (to a degree, he supposed). But fucking around with his little pet--the Russian princess, as he often referred to her as in the privacy of the bedroom--was something he had handfuls of time for. Exploring every fucking inch of her body after an exhausting meeting or in-between dealing with impossible people who tried to refuse his most basic commands and requests became a passion of Alexander’s; something he relished in the quiet spaces between the nausea-inducing headaches that had become his life. She was his light in the dark, whatever that meant; the one thing to keep him steady and afloat in a world that threatened to crash over him at any given moment.

So, realistically speaking, it shouldn’t have been that weird that the two of them had snuck down to the kitchens after fooling around for the purpose of getting post-coital food. Right? Except, he’d never done that with a woman before...he’d never been this intimate with someone before.

But it was just food, right? It didn’t mean anything--it didn’t mean anything when he looked on her and his gaze lingered for a moment or two too long; it didn’t mean anything when he fucked her and thought that he could get used to the view of her for the rest of his life. None of it meant anything...right?

“Arielle? Don’t spend all evening getting ready, I promised your father we’d be at the benefit concert by seven at the latest, and it’s already close to six.”