He woke up in a palace. Not a mob boss palace, or Wall Street billionaire's swanky penthouse palace, but an actual palace-palace. The ceiling was high and steep, like that of a gothic cathedral. As he looked closer, the ceiling disappeared into the night sky, and the sky was filled with swirling galaxies and innumerable stars that lit up the gigantic hall before him. He swallowed hard.

Looking down at himself, he saw that his black pinstripe suit was gone, replaced with black and red robes that felt heavy and unwieldy. Something sat atop his head now, too, and when his nervous hands reached up to touch it, cool metal greeted his fingertips.

"Uneasy is the head that wears a crown, it seems." He nearly jumped out of his skin. From the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of curly red hair; heard her pleased titter of laughter.

"You," he said, accusatory.

"Me," she responded. She was leaning back against a maroon marble column, still in her shining black dress, hands behind her back. Teasing, always teasing: her voice, her face—goading him, like she wasn't afraid of him and held all the power. "You look good without a cancer stick in your mouth, by the way. Like your old self."

"What are you doing here?"

"Oh, a little of this, a little of that. You know."

He walked over to her, trying to be as menacing as he could without tripping over all the fabric that encased him. He planted his hand just above her head, wincing as he heard his ring-clad fingers clink together against the stone. As a rule, he didn't wear rings for the same reason he didn't wear chain necklaces: he found them gaudy, conjuring up the image of a used-car salesman. He may have been a gangster, but he did have standards, even if they didn't necessarily make sense to anyone else. "No, I don't know. So, why don't you enlighten me, sweetheart. Where am I?"

She shrugged, batting her long lashes. This close, he could smell her: lilac and something else he couldn't quite place. Something fruity, but not saccharine sweet or bitter. It was a good smell, whatever it was, an intoxicating smell, and he found himself losing the will to be angry with her. In fact, when he looked down at her and saw those big, green eyes gazing back up at him, something in his chest hurt. She looked older now, somehow. Wiser; like she had lived a thousand lifetimes, and she was judging him for his poor choices.

"I've done the best I can," he said suddenly. As if he had no control over it, his other hand reached forward and touched her cheek. She raised an eyebrow at him, curious. He didn't want her judging him, didn't want her to see whatever pathetic image of him she had created in her mind.

"Are you trying to convince me, or are you trying to convince yourself, Hades?"

He blinked, feeling the power of the name course through him, shaking him to his core. She still had her eyebrow raised, but now a small smile tugged at her lips. Without thinking, he leaned down and kissed her softly, and he could feel her fingers slowly start to thread into his hair. He pulled back from her, only just, and looked into her eyes again, searching for something.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"Funny," she said, kissing up his neck to his ear, "I've been wondering the same thing about you."

The palace faded away from them, and beneath his sandaled feet he felt the soft ground of an orchard. She was sitting against the tree now, the strap of her black dress falling off one shoulder. She gave him a look, the kind of look that said 'come here,' and he was hypnotized into kneeling next to her.

"What do you want?" he asked her, hooking his index finger around the strap. One little tug and she'd be naked and he'd—he'd—

He'd what?

"I want to feel you," she said, placing a hand on his chest. "It's...been a long time, my love. It won't be the same here, but it will be something." As she was saying all that, she pushed him onto his back and straddled his hips, and he gave no resistance. She was naked now, though he couldn't remember either one of them removing her dress. The strangest part, though, was that he was naked now too: his hard dick was pressed against her already-wet cunt, and his shaking hands were holding tightly onto her hips.

"I'm confused," he said, inwardly cringing at himself, because he rarely admitted when he didn't know what was happening around him; he rarely admitted that a situation was out of his control. He always had to seem self-assured and calm, even if he was scared out of his mind; lead by example, and the men would follow suit. "Am I dreaming?"

It felt real. The warmth of her skin underneath his hands, the wetness of her cunt sliding over him. It all felt very, very real.

She looked down at him, and for a second he thought he saw sadness in her eyes. Then she leaned forward and kissed his neck, and his eyes fluttered shut as she slid down on him.

He could've come right then. Months without sex or masturbation and then he's suddenly inside a beautiful woman? Everything about the situation was overwhelming.

"Relax," he heard her whisper into his ear, breathy and aroused, like she was close to burning out too. "It's good that you're this responsive, even here," she said after a moment, nibbling gently on his earlobe. "It's progress." What? he wanted to ask her, but then she started to move, and any coherent sentences or thoughts he could've formed melted out of his brain. She kissed his nipples and he made a sound: a pathetic, out-of-control sound, and were he in any other state, he would've had the good decency to feel embarrassed. As it was, he just moaned, unable to hold any of the sad little cries in.

"That's it," she said, picking up the pace and putting her hands on his chest. He felt pinned down by her, which was a shame because he wanted to reach up and kiss her again. He liked kissing her; her lips were full, soft things, and he craved softness and affection more than he craved anything else in the world. She was strong, though—inhumanly strong, stronger than any man he'd ever fought—and she kept him pinned to the ground as she rode him with increasing urgency. His hands cupped her breasts and fondled her nipples, earning him a lovely sigh that he wanted to hear again. He traced his fingers down to where they were joined and began stroking that sensitive spot, watching her as her eyes rolled back. He touched her the same way again and she looked down at him for a moment before kissing him, hard, a lover's kiss, and he felt her exquisitely soft cunt tighten around his cock as she orgasmed and whispered 'Hades' into his ear.

He sat up in his bed, cursing. His underwear felt wet and...sticky. He groaned, kicking his legs over the side of the bed and heading to the bathroom, where he took a freezing cold shower, brushed his teeth, and put on a fresh pair of boxer briefs. Despite all that, the hangover headache was going strong, and he felt a little woozy, too.

He splashed some more water on his face, rubbed his bleary eyes, and checked the clock in the mirror: 0630. He estimated he stayed at the club until...0300, probably. So he'd only gotten a couple hours of sleep, if any. He looked at himself in the mirror, eyeing a scar in the middle of his chest that he hadn't seen before.

The black blade, from last night. The Grim Reaper. He seized the sink bowl, struggling to keep himself from falling. It was a dream. It had to have been a dream. But that scar was new, and right in the exact spot where that black dagger had pierced him in the chest.

"Oh good, Boss, you're awake. I was a little worried we might have to bring in a doc."

"Johnny," he said, catching his captain's eyes in the mirror. Christ, his whole body was shaking. Get a hold of yourself. "What happened last night?"

"Huh? Oh, noth—nothin' really, Boss. Eddie called me to pick you up, said you passed out at the bar not too long after you ordered the Death Shot, around midnight." Something was up. Johnny was acting weirdly cagey. Bouncing back and forth on his heels, like he was hiding something.

"The Death Shot, huh." Yeah, that made sense. Much more sense than the Grim Reaper showing up at his club and soaking up bullets like a sponge. But it didn't account for the scar in his chest, or the persistent gnawing at the back of his mind that something wasn't quite right. Every single scar he had came from something he experienced intimately; every single one. So a new one showing up, seemingly out of nowhere, disturbed him greatly.

"Yikes, that's a nasty cut on your chest, Boss. You get that in Iraq?"

"No," he replied, fingering the jagged tissue. It didn't hurt, exactly, but it didn't feel right, either. The mention of Iraq brought to his attention to the nagging, sharp pain in his leg he had pushed through to get to the bathroom. He sighed, opening the medicine cabinet, and felt his panic start to grow as he noticed his pain pills were missing.

"Johnny," he said, barely-controlled rage coloring his voice, "come in here."

"What's up, Boss?"

Striking like a cobra, he grabbed Johnny's thick neck and slammed him down to the floor. Johnny's eyes widened in panic, and Logan soaked in his fear, enjoying the terrified look on his captain's face.

"Where is my Vicodin, John-John?"

"I don't know, Boss!"

"You don't know. Are you sure about that? You want to bet your life on that? Johnny, Johnny, Johnny...I'll kill you." He squeezed his hands tighter around the captain's throat to prove his point. "It'll be slow. Painful. You'll feel the life draining out of you and won't have any control over it. So quit the bullshit and tell me now: where's my Vicodin?"

He eased his grip slightly, allowing Johnny enough air to breathe and speak, but only just.

"Your sister!" Johnny wheezed.

Logan blinked, shook his head. "Sofie? "

"She came here last night, Boss," Johnny rasped, coughing. "Saw you blacked out and puking into the toilet, and demanded that we throw out your drugs. Said she knew you were going to overdose or mix up the wrong shit on the wrong day, and there'd be hell to pay if we let you die. And you—you know how much of a scary bitch your sister is. But she's trying to help you, Boss."

"Help me?" He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Sofie had been in his penthouse, and the guys just let her in like she was allowed to fucking be there.

"Yeah, Boss. Everyone can see you're popping those pills like candy now, and if you're not doin' that, you're smokin' somethin' fierce. She don't want you to get addicted, and neither do the boys."

"You idiots." He released his captain and stood back up, massaging his throbbing temples. Fuck, he needed a cigarette. And Vicodin: the pain in his hip and leg was becoming unbearable. "I'm not addicted to anything except nicotine. I need those pills because I have fucking nerve damage, you moron."

Cautiously, Johnny stood, rubbed his throat. "We know that, Boss. But you didn't see yourself last night. It was...bad."

Logan limped over to his bed, opened the bottle of whiskey on his nightstand, and poured himself a glass. "Johnny," he called, taking a swig, letting the liquor burn through him.

Johnny came out of the bathroom, looking a little shook up, but no worse for wear. Scared, but not too scared. Good. One of the reasons Logan had managed to rise to power so quickly was because thugs and criminals just...liked him. He was stable: not a cokehead, not obsessed with girls. Even-keeled most of the time, at least insofar as far as a mafioso went. That's how he managed to stay one step ahead of the DA and her little piggies, too; he kept his cool, and he wasn't...impulsive . Well, except for just now. But could he be blamed for that? He shook his head, fiddling with his lighter. He needed certain things to get through the day, all right. No Vicodin meant a burning leg, which meant he couldn't focus for shit, which meant he'd get sloppy. "You better unfuck this mess right now," Logan said, rolling his shoulders.

"Boss?"

"I don't care if you have to rob a pharmacy in broad daylight—get me my damn Vicodin."

"Of course, Boss. You want us to uh...do anything about Sofie?"

What, like kill her? He had standards, dammit. He wasn't about to commit fratricide—and besides, she was talented at cooking books and laundering his cash flow. She always kept him several steps ahead of Cassandra Porter, and that meant the Feds were still keeping their noses out of things too. No trail for the pigs to follow meant that their bark was far, far worse than their bite, and he intended to keep it that way.

"No. Just get me my pills and I'll talk to her." The cigarette cravings were driving him up the wall now, and he resented how dependent on them he'd become.

"Right away, Boss—"

"Johny, one more thing."

"Yeah, Boss?"

"Get me some nicotine patches too."

"Sure thing, Boss."

Johnny stood there an irritating number of seconds, like he wanted to say something else, and Logan felt his anger get the best of him. "Well, what are you waiting for?" he asked his captain, seething. The vein in his forehead pulsed painfully. "Get the fuck out and do your damn job."

"S-sorry, Boss, right away—"

"Out!" And like that, Johnny skittered out of the room, like a cockroach. Logan ran his hand through his wet hair, exhaling loudly, and still severely on edge. He eyed the clock on his nightstand: 0700. She'd be awake by now, heading to her office. He chewed on the inside of his cheek, mulling over whether or not he should call her now or show up to her office unannounced, with his entourage of armed thugs, like an asshole. The increasingly painful burning sensation in his leg decided for him. He grabbed a burner phone from his nightstand, dialed her number. She picked up almost immediately.

"Good morning, this is Sofia Black."

"Sofiiiiiiaaaaa," he said, coating his voice with malice. "Much as I love you, you know how I don't appreciate your unannounced, ah, visits."

"Oh, you're awake. Good. Listen, I know you're probably throwing a tantrum right now over your pills, but I'm busy today. Talk to Johnny about it."

"I almost killed Johnny over what you pulled."

An annoyed sigh on the other end. "Don't blame me for your bad choices, Logan. Look, I really have to go."

"Sofie—"

She hung up on him without another word. "Be seeing you, Sofie," he muttered, seething. Annoyed and frustrated, he pulled his planner out of his nightstand, eyeing what he had on tap for the day. As it was, his current schedule did not serve to lighten his already dark mood.

He'd been the city's major kingpin for about a year now, but peace was tenuous and there was always some other group trying to muscle its way into having a larger piece of the pie. One such group was the Moreno family, headed by Juan Jose "Toothfairy" Moreno, a Guatemalan drug lord with a penchant for knives and collecting the teeth of any unfortunate bastard that pissed him off. And well: Logan had irrevocably pissed off Toothfairy by filling in the power vacuum left behind in the city's underworld, after a certain Piccini clan got wiped off the face of the Earth. Logan suspected that Toothfairy saw him as an upstart. Regardless, he had to meet with the guy to discuss some terms and conditions, because Logan was a boss now, and JJ Moreno would just have to deal with it, or be dealt with.

That meeting was set for noon at Union Square. Public, in case Moreno got any funny ideas, since needlessly scaring civilians with a gunfight was never a good practice, even for the most bloodthirsty of his colleagues.

Rubbing his thigh and leaning back against his pillow, he turned on the television, and who could it be but Cassandra Porter on the screen, front and center. She was talking about corruption again, and how she would weed it out; blah, blah, blah—he'd heard it all before. Still, he studied her face, the confident ridge of her brow, the graceful way in which she carried herself. "Now I see where Stella gets it from," Logan said, finishing his glass of bourbon.

His gaze shifted to the discarded pinstripe jacket on his bed. Cautiously, he pulled out the piece of paper she had stuffed into his pocket, stared at the number she gave him: 212-830-2214. He picked up the burner, dialed in the number slowly and purposefully, like he was a man walking on the way to his own execution.

The phone rang for several beats before he heard a soft, confused, "Hello?"

That was her. Her voice was higher pitched, since she wasn't consciously trying to sound sultry, and she sounded sleepy, like the call had woken her up, but it was definitely her. His mouth went dry, because suddenly the dream came rushing back to him, and he had no idea what to say, or why he was being such a creep and calling her—and at 0730 in the goddamn morning, no less.

"Hello? Is someone on the other end? Hello—" He hung up, clutching his chest because his heart was hammering like crazy and it fucking hurt.

"You're always such a lovesick puppy with her, it's great." The Grim Reaper was sitting at the edge of Logan's bed now, inspecting his nails, like he had always been there. Like he was supposed to be there. He was dressed in black skinny jeans and wore a Dir En Grey band t-shirt; his silver hair was fashionably, if exaggeratedly, spiked. He could've been a high schooler, but with the face paint it was difficult to tell. Where he wasn't painted, his skin was ghostly pale, almost to the point of being translucent. "What, you're not going to freak out on me today, start shooting up everything?"

Logan blinked, absentmindedly rubbed his burning thigh. "I've come to the conclusion that you're a hallucination," he said, raising the volume on the television. "It won't do me any good to shoot you."

"M'kay. And that nice big gash in your chest, that's a hallucination too?"

"Sure. Or I got it in a fight and just don't remember."

"So you've just straight up chosen denial this time. Interesting. By the way, you got any food? Shadow-walking always makes me hungry."

"Does it look like we're in a kitchen to you?"

"Your fridge is empty except for some eggs, and I don't like eggs—they make me gassy. I thought maybe you would have some snacks stashed in here—"

"FITFO, kid."

"Eh? What's that mean?"

"Figure it the fuck out."

"Finnnnne, Mr. Grumpy Pants," the Grim Reaper said, cracking a wide grin. He disappeared into thin air, like he was never there, and Logan groaned, looking up at his ceiling. I'm finally losing it, he thought. He always had the worst luck with timing.