OWNED BY THE BUTCHER

The Tip-Top Lounge was the kind of place where dreams didn’t just die; they rotted slowly, soaked in cheap whiskey and fermented regret until no one could remember what they had once been. It sat on a jagged corner of Chicago’s South Side where the streetlights worked only when they felt generous and the sirens never truly stopped. The neon sign outside, once a loud, shouting cherry red, now flickered like a failing heartbeat, casting sickly, rhythmic shadows across cracked pavement and stained brick. It pulsed unevenly, as if the building itself were struggling to stay alive. Inside, that same neon bathed the room in bruised reds and tired blues that made everyone look a little more broken than they already were. It was an unforgiving light, one that exposed every wrinkle of exhaustion and every hollow left behind by missed meals and missed chances. The regulars sat hunched over the bar and scattered tables, haunting the place like ghosts waiting for a train that would never arrive, clinging to cheap drinks and cheaper hope. Elara Vance wiped the sticky mahogany bar again, though she knew the effort was pointless. The wood had absorbed decades of spilled rotgut, salt-rimmed tears, and the grease of a thousand bad decisions. No amount of scrubbing could undo that history. The grime was part of the foundation now, woven into the grain itself. Much like her life, the bar was a relic of a time before the factories closed and hope packed its bags and moved somewhere kinder. Her knuckles whitened around the rag as she poured all her restless anxiety into the repetitive motion. Heat built beneath her skin from the friction, a dull burn she welcomed because it distracted her from thinking. Her jaw stayed clenched, teeth pressed together hard enough to ache, her patience worn thin from years of carrying more than her share of responsibility. The air in the Tip-Top was thick with the ghosts of cigarettes long outlawed, clinging to the water-stained ceiling like a permanent yellow fog. Desperation sat heavy in the room, perched on the shoulders of the men like a predatory bird. These were men who had spent rent money meant for their children on flickering slot machines in the corner. Men who swore tonight would finally be the night the universe paid them back for decades of silence and sweat. Men who never looked their failures in the eye, choosing instead to stare into the amber depths of a three-dollar pour. “Another one, Elara,” Mike muttered, sliding his empty glass toward her with the slow, unearned confidence of someone who thought persistence counted as charm. His skin looked like crumpled parchment, his eyes bloodshot and glassy, his breath a stale mix of peppermint and despair. She didn’t look at him. Her gaze stayed fixed on the front door, watching shadows move behind the frosted, salt-streaked glass. “Tab’s closed, Mike. Go home. I’m not letting you sleep on the pool table again.” He scoffed under his breath but didn’t push it. Elara had perfected that sharp, snarky edge over the years. In a place like the Tip-Top, indifference was armor. Without it, the environment would strip you down and eat you alive before midnight. Tonight, though, her edge felt dull. Heavy. Arthur hadn’t come home in three days. The thought sat in her chest like a lodged shard of glass, cutting deeper with every breath. Her father’s disappearances were nothing new Arthur Vance was a master of charm, creative excuses, and vanishing acts but even for him, seventy-two hours was too long. Elara had spent the days cycling through anger, panic, and now a hollow, bitter resignation. She knew what debts looked like. She’d been cleaning up after his messes since she was old enough to count change and fetch him a beer. She feared his luck had finally run out, and that this time there would be no mess left for her to clean just a body, or worse, nothing at all. The heavy front door creaked open on its rusted hinges. Normally, the sound was followed by the rush of city noise bus brakes, distant music, the chaos of Chicago bleeding into the bar. This time, the noise died in the doorway. Silence spilled in instead, thick and cold. Conversation didn’t fade; it vanished. Glasses froze midair. Even the cheerful electronic chiming of the slot machines gave one last lonely ping before falling silent, as if the machines themselves were afraid of being noticed. Elara felt it before she saw them that instinctive tightening in her gut, the animal certainty that something dangerous had entered the room. Two men in black tactical gear stood just inside the door, posture rigid, eyes scanning the lounge with clinical precision. They didn’t belong here. They looked like they belonged in war zones and locked rooms, not a dive bar held together by rot and routine. But they weren’t the reason the air felt stolen. The man between them was. He was tall easily six-foot-four and moved with slow, predatory confidence. His charcoal-grey suit was immaculate, tailored so precisely it looked poured onto his frame. The fabric alone probably cost more than the entire block the Tip-Top sat on. Dark hair was swept back from a face that had no business being that beautiful in a place this ugly: sharp, aristocratic cheekbones and a mouth carved cruel and elegant all at once. He looked like a diamond dropped into a gutter and somehow, he still owned the ground beneath him. “Elara Vance?” he asked. His voice was deep and smooth, a velvet growl that vibrated through the mahogany bar and slid straight under her skin. Her heart stuttered, then began to hammer against her ribs. “Depends,” she said, forcing her voice steady. “If you’re selling insurance, I’m busy.” A ripple of nervous laughter moved through the room. The man didn’t smile. He walked toward the bar, slow and deliberate. The crowd parted without thinking, bodies shifting instinctively out of his path. He stopped in front of her and placed his hands on the counter large, steady hands that had never known manual labor yet radiated undeniable strength. His eyes were grey. Not soft grey. Storm-grey. Cold, metallic, and unyielding. “I’m Dante Moretti.” The name hit her like a physical blow, knocking the air from her lungs. The Butcher. The billionaire. The shadow king of Chicago’s ports. “My father…” Her voice cracked. She swallowed hard. “Where is he?” Dante reached across the bar and brushed a stray copper lock of hair behind her ear. The touch was electric cold and burning at once. “Alive,” he said calmly. “But he made the mistake of betting something he didn’t own.” Her stomach dropped. “What did he do?” “He lost ten million dollars of my money,” Dante said, casually, as if discussing a misplaced receipt. “I don’t have that kind of money!” Panic clawed up her throat. “Take the bar. Take whatever he has left.” For the first time, something flickered across his face. Not a smile amusement. “I know exactly what you have,” he said quietly. “I know you work yourself raw just to keep the lights on. I know you’re the only reason that man hasn’t died in a gutter. And I know you’re the only thing he owns that still has value.” He leaned closer, until she could smell sandalwood, expensive cigars, and power. “The debt has been transferred. I don’t want the money, Elara. I want you.” Cold flooded her veins. “You’re k********g me.” “I’m collecting payment.” When he signaled to his men, the room held its breath. “You can come quietly,” he murmured, “or you can be carried. Either way, you’re leaving with me tonight.” Her eyes flicked toward the back. “I need my purse,” she lied. “Please.” Dante watched her. “Don’t be a cliché.” She ran anyway. She burst into the bathroom, lungs burning, barely locking the door before it shattered. She lunged for the window, scraping against rusted metal. She was halfway out when a massive hand clamped around her waist and dragged her back like she weighed nothing. She slammed into a hard, unyielding chest. “I told you,” Dante whispered against her ear. “I like the chase.” He pinned her to the wall, bodies crushed together in the cramped space, her heart thudding wildly against his ribs. “But I like the catch even more.” For a moment, they just breathed. “Ninety days,” he murmured, his grey eyes darkening. “By the time I’m done with you, Elara Vance, you’ll forget you ever had a life before me.”