Archive of Our Own

♦️

The night in the eastern part of the city was never truly quiet, but this block where the Sonnellino family casino was located had a well-maintained dignity. Pedestrians in long coats walked hurriedly, hats pulled low, and no one would stop at street corners for no reason.

This was Mafia territory.

She liked to appear punctually at nine o‘clock in the evening in the private box on the second floor of the casino. From there, through a whole pane of one-way glass, she could overlook the entire main hall.

The hum of the spinning wheel and the muffled sound of the dice rolling on the velvet cloth intermingled into a drowsy rhythm, with the crisp sound of chips colliding as the brightest note.

Tonight she was wearing her usual outfit: a black three-piece suit, the waistcoat buttoned meticulously to the third button, the white shirt cuffs showing just half an inch, secured with silver cufflinks.

The legs of the slightly baggy suit pants brushed lightly against the surface of the black high heels, each step carrying a calculated rhythm. The black coat was draped over the back of the chair, the soft tweed hat was taken off and placed on the corner of the table, revealing a head of neatly combed back long black hair.

“Boss, someone‘s here.”

It was the Consigliere who spoke. He stood in the doorway, tall and thin, wearing a well-cut black waistcoat.

Mafioso didn‘t turn around, her gaze still fixed on the main hall. She picked up the whiskey glass on the table, the amber liquid gently swaying in the glass.

“Let him come up.”

The Consigliere nodded slightly and retreated.

When the door was pushed open again, Mafioso smelled a whiff of cologne.

“Ms. Mafioso,” a gentle voice came from the doorway.

“I always thought the second floor was a forbidden area, but I didn‘t expect to have the honor of being invited up tonight. Could it be that someone wanted to trick me away from the gambling table and then use my absence to change the bearings of that roulette wheel?”

Mafioso turned around.

Chance was standing in the doorway, one hand on the doorframe, the other in the pocket of his suit pants. The black fedora on his head was slightly tilted back, revealing a lock of gray curly hair that fell across his forehead.

Those eyes behind the black sunglasses were currently examining the room with an almost innocent curiosity. His gaze finally landed on her, and the corners of his mouth curved into a perfect arc.

He was wearing a loose-fitting white shirt with two buttons undone at the collar, and his black tie hung loosely, as if he had deliberately loosened it after tying it. His black suit jacket was draped over his arm, and the cuffs were rolled up twice, revealing his well-defined forearms.

“Mr. Chance,”

Mafioso said with a smile. Her smile was the kind that didn‘t show any flaws, neither warm nor cold.

“Please sit down.”

Chance walked in, neither fast nor slow. He picked up a bottle of Bourbon whiskey as he passed the liquor cabinet, poured himself half a glass, and then sat down on the leather couch across from her. The whole process went smoothly, as if he were the owner of this private room.

“I heard you won one hundred and seventy-seven thousand dollars downstairs,” Mafia said, sitting back in his chair and crossing his legs. “Twenty-one points, fourteen straight games without losing.”

“Thirteen games,” chance corrected her, raising his glass in salute. “The fourteenth game was a draw. But I‘m not good at math, so I might have miscalculated.”

“You‘re very good at math,” Mafia said. “Good enough to remember every card you’ve played.”

Chance‘s smile didn‘t change in the slightest. He took a sip of wine, placed the glass on his knee, and leaned back in the sofa, stretching like a cat in the sun.

“Ms. Mafioso, are you complimenting me or interrogating me?”

“I‘m stating the facts.”

“The truth?” Chance tilted his head. “The truth is, I‘m a pretty lucky gambler, and you—you run a pretty lucky casino. In theory, we‘re business partners. I lose money to you, you provide the environment for me to lose money. It‘s fair.”

“But you won tonight.”

“It happens from time to time. Probability theory, the law of large numbers, everything is in God‘s hands.” He raised his wine glass, gestured toward the ceiling, then placed it on the sofa beside him, his body slightly leaning forward, his hands folded on his knees. “Unless... you think I‘m cheating?”

This sentence was said very softly, the tone even carrying a hint of a joke, but he didn‘t laugh.

Mafioso watched him for three seconds.

Three seconds later, she laughed out loud, raised her hand, pinched the cigarette case on the table between her index and middle fingers, opened it, and took out a cigarette, with elegant movements.

“If I thought you were cheating, you wouldn‘t be sitting here drinking right now, Mr. Chance.”

Chance‘s expression relaxed in that instant, and he leaned back on the sofa again, his smile becoming a little more genuine.

“Then why did you call me here?”

Mafioso didn‘t answer right away. She lit a cigarette and took a deep drag, the white smoke slowly overflowing from between her lips, spiraling upward under the light. She looked at Chance through the smoke, her gaze calm and focused, as if examining an expensive item she hadn‘t yet decided whether to buy.

“I want to ask you for a favor,” she finally said.

Chance raised an eyebrow.

“Help with what?”

“There‘s a table downstairs. I’m not very lucky tonight. The dealer has already lost six nights in a row. I think he might need to change hands, or change opponents.”

Chance listened quietly, then laughed. “You want me to go kill those con men?”

“I want you to help me find out if there‘s a problem with the dealer‘s technology, or if someone is messing around in my place.” Mafia said this in a flat tone. “You‘re the one who knows the gambling tables best on this street, chance. Your eyes work better than any surveillance camera.”

“I accept the compliment.” Chance stood up, put his glass on the table, and picked up his suit jacket from the armrest. “But I have one condition.”

Mafioso‘s smile froze for a moment. Although it was a very brief moment, chance caught it.

He had seen many changes in Mafioso‘s expression when someone made a condition, that subtle, almost imperceptible displeasure that usually presaged that the person making the condition would soon regret it.

But he wasn‘t the “usually” kind of person.

“What are the conditions?” Mafia asked, his voice still calm.

Chance stopped in front of her. Between them was an oak desk with whiskey, a cigarette case, and an open ledger.

He lowered his head and looked at her from above—an angle that few people dared to attempt, because those who looked down on Mafioso from above usually felt some indescribable unease under her smiling gaze.

But chance just bent over, one hand resting on the table surface, the other hand reaching out, gently picking up the cigarette she had placed on the edge of the ashtray with her index and middle fingers, putting it between her lips, and taking a drag.

When the smoke overflowed from his lips, his eyes never left hers.

“My condition is,” he said, putting the cigarette back in the ashtray, his fingers casually touching her knuckles before leaving.

“You‘ll have to buy me dinner. Not that kind of business dinner, but a real meal. You and me, two chairs, a table, a bottle of wine.”

Mafioso looked up at him. The social smile on her face had completely disappeared.

“Are you asking me out, Mr. chance?”

“I‘m asking if you’ll do me the honor of having a meal.” Chance straightened up, put his suit jacket on his shoulder, took two steps back, and opened the door. “How you interpret it is your business.”

He glanced back before walking out the door. Mafia was still sitting in the chair. She didn‘t smile, but she didn’t refuse either.

Chance gently closed the door, and from the corridor came the sound of his footsteps fading away and a faint whistle—it was the melody of some jazz song, Mafia couldn‘t identify which one, but she felt the melody was familiar.

She picked up the cigarette, put it between her lips, and took a drag.

There was a trace of unfamiliar cologne on the filter, different from hers.

Chance sat at the 21 o‘clock table on the first floor of the casino for a week.

He didn‘t throw away thousands like an ordinary gambler, nor was he taciturn like a professional gambler. He sat in seat number three, with five-thousand-dollar chips neatly stacked in front of him, betting no more than two hundred at a time, smiling when he won, shrugging when he lost, occasionally exchanging a few inconsequential remarks with the gambler next to him.

His manner was gentle, not like that of a casino frequenter, but more like that of a gentleman who happened to be passing by, who happened to have some spare money on hand, and who happened to want to pass the evening.

But the dealer didn‘t think so.

He worked in the casino for six years, going from dealer to dealer, not by luck but by a pair of rock-solid hands and a face that never showed any expression.

But over the past week, he had found that his proud composure was being shattered bit by bit by the man in the fedora in seat number three.

It wasn‘t because of how much money chance had won. In fact, he had only won less than eight thousand dollars in a week. For a gambling table with hundreds of thousands in and out, this little money wasn‘t even a splash.

What made him uneasy was luck‘s eyes.

Those gray-blue eyes behind the sunglasses never looked at him. To be precise, the frequency with which chance looked at him was no different from looking at anyone else.

A glance each time he dealt, a sweep each time he asked for a card, that was all. But he had an intuition that those eyes saw far more than he showed.

On the fifth day, chance encountered an interesting thing at the gambling table.

He got a good hand of cards—two flower cards, twenty points. The dealer‘s open card was a six. According to the basic twenty-one point strategy, this situation should have stopped the cards and waited for the dealer to reveal them. But chance didn‘t stop the cards. He smiled at the dealer and said, “One more card.”

The dealer‘s finger paused on the card boot for zero point several seconds. This pause was extremely brief, so brief that even the nearby gamblers didn‘t notice, but chance did.

He noticed that the dealer‘s index finger tapped lightly twice on the edge of his card boot, as if it were some subconscious habit, or some kind of signal.

Then he dealt a card.

It was an A.

Twenty-one o‘clock.

There was a small commotion at the gambling table. The gamblers next to him sighed with envy, but chance only raised his eyebrows slightly and gathered the chips he had won in front of him, his movements neither fast nor slow.

He didn‘t look at the dealer, but he knew the dealer was looking at him.

That night after the casino closed, chance didn‘t leave through the front door. He went around to the back alley, leaned against the iron railing of the fire escape, and lit a cigarette. The late autumn night wind was cold, blowing the hem of his shirt gently, and he had to button up his suit jacket.

The lights in the back alley were broken, and the only source of light was a faint yellow glow from a second-floor window, and the cigarette butt flickering on his fingertips. He couldn‘t see anything clearly in the darkness, but chance knew someone was waiting for him.

“You watched him for five days,” a voice came from the shadows. “What did you see?”

Chance didn‘t look back. He flicked his cigarette ash, which scattered in the wind like a swarm of tiny fireflies.

“Caporagime,” he said, “when you walk, your left foot sounds louder than your right foot. I suggest you see an orthopedist.”

The person in the shadows walked out. Caporagime wore a pair of sunglasses, a communicator hanging from his ear, and a black jacket. He stood next to Chance, his hands in his pockets, his gaze also falling in the direction of the alley entrance.

“The boss asked me to ask you.”

“Your boss won eight thousand at my place last night. Why didn‘t she come ask herself?”

“The boss has other arrangements tonight.”

“What arrangements?”

Caporagime didn‘t answer. chance turned his head to look at him, smiled, and stubbed out his cigarette on the iron railing, leaving a small grayish-black trace.

“The dealer‘s right index finger,” he said.

“What?”

“He taps his boot with his index finger before dealing. Not every time, only when there are less than twenty cards left in the boot. But in the last week, he started tapping when there are about forty cards left in the boot. I‘m thinking that maybe his tapping isn’t a habit, but a signal.”

Caporagime was silent for a moment.

“Who do you think he‘s signaling to?”

“I‘ll have to ask you about that.” Chance patted his shoulder and turned to walk toward the alley entrance. “You‘re in charge of security. You should know better than I do which angle of the surveillance camera above the gambling table has a blind spot.”

He took a few steps and stopped, turning around.

“By the way, tell your boss that she owes me a meal. Don‘t even think about quitting.”

Caporagime stood where he was, watching Chance‘s back disappear into the lights at the mouth of the alley. He took out his cell phone and dialed a number. The phone rang twice before being connected.

“Boss, he says the dealer‘s index finger tapping is signaling, and suggests we check the blind spots of the gambling table surveillance.”

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a moment, then Mafioso‘s voice came through, calm as dead water: “What else did he want?”

“Nothing. He just said... you owe him a meal.”

There was silence again. Then Caporagime heard a soft laugh somewhere between resignation and indulgence.

“Got it,” Mafia said and hung up.

Caporagime looked at the end of the call on the phone screen and stuffed the phone back into his pocket with an expressionless face. He silently made a decision in his heart: in the future, when chance came to the casino, he would absolutely not play cards with him.

It wasn‘t because chance was too great, but because he was too strange. In this world, people who dared to speak to Mafia in that tone were either dead or crazy.

And chance was obviously not dead, so Caporagime tended to think he was a madman of some degree.

But Mafioso didn‘t seem to mind this madman‘s existence. This matter was crazy enough in itself.

That meal was not eaten until a week later.

The place Mafioso chose was an Italian restaurant hidden at the end of a narrow alley. There was no sign, no door number, and even the door was an inconspicuous iron-gray wooden door that blended into the surrounding walls. After pushing through the door, it was a completely different world.

Crimson velvet curtains hung from the ceiling to the floor, the light of the crystal chandelier was softened into a warm halo by the frosted glass lampshades, the murals on the walls depicted pastoral landscapes of Sicily, the table was covered with starched white tablecloths, and silverware gleamed softly under the light.

There was only one table in the entire dining room.

When chance arrived, Mafioso was already seated at the table. She wasn‘t wearing a coat tonight, and her three-piece suit looked particularly appropriate in the warm lights of the restaurant, the silver cufflinks refracting fine light. Her fedora lay on the empty chair next to her, and her black hair looked softer than usual, with a few unruly wisps at the temples.

In front of her was a glass of red wine, already half-drunk.

“You‘re seven minutes late,” Mafia said, his gaze falling on him.

Chance stood in the doorway, not coming over immediately. He looked at her as if confirming that she was real, confirming that she was really sitting there, confirming that this scene wasn‘t some overly realistic dream of his.

Then he smiled, walked over, pulled out the chair opposite her, and sat down.

“Traffic jam.”

“You live three blocks away.”

“That could also be traffic jam.”

Mafioso didn‘t press further. She picked up the bottle on the table, poured him a glass of wine, and pushed it in front of him.

“Try this. Barolo, 2004. I think you‘ll like it.”

Chance picked up the wine glass and first looked at the color of the liquid—the pomegranate-red edge had already turned slightly orange, a sign of old age.

He brought the glass to the tip of his nose, took a deep breath, then took a small sip, letting the alcohol linger on his tongue for a few seconds before swallowing.

“Truffles, roses, and a little bit of tar,” he said. “The tannin has completely softened, but the structure is still there. You chose a bottle in its prime.”

“You know a lot about wine.”

“I know a little about everything.” He put down his glass, folded his hands on the table, and leaned forward slightly. “But you didn‘t call me here to drink.”

“How do you know?”

“Because you chose a bottle of 2004 Barolo. 2004 was a good year for Barolo, but not the best year. You could have chosen 2010, or 2016, but you didn‘t. You chose 2004 because—”

He paused, the curve of his mouth deepening a little.

“—because 2004 was the year you took over the family.”

Mafioso‘s fingers gently rotated on the stem of the wine glass. This movement was extremely subtle, and if it wasn‘t for chance constantly observing her, it would have been impossible to notice at all.

“You did your homework,” she said, her tone flat.

“I did a lot of homework,” chance admitted frankly.

“Your father retired in 2004 and left the family to you. At the time, no one was optimistic, because you were too young, and, forgive me for saying so—because you were a woman. But you spent a year proving yourself, dealing with those three opponents who tried to challenge you one by one. You bought their lawyers, bribed their accountants, controlled their financial chains, and then, at their most vulnerable moment, smiled and asked them to withdraw.”

When he said these words, his tone was gentle as if he were telling a bedtime story, but his eyes never left her face.

“Your intelligence network is wider than I imagined,” Mafia said.

“It‘s not called an intelligence network,” Chance corrected her. “It‘s called common sense. Everything you do is public. It’s just that most people don’t know how to put the pieces together. I‘m just someone who‘s good at jigsaw puzzles.”

The waiter appeared at that moment, pushing a small silver cart with two silver plate covers on it. He placed the plates in front of the two of them, lifted the lids, and revealed the risotto inside. The grains were full, the soup was rich, and the fragrance of Parmesan cheese spread out the moment the lids were lifted.

“Risotto,” the chef said, “used fresh broth, simmered for six hours.”

Chance glanced at the risotto, then at Mafia.

“You even investigated what I like to eat?”

“I‘m not investigating,” Mafia picked up his fork, “I just remember what you ordered last time at the casino restaurant.”

Chance was truly, completely stunned. He opened his mouth, but no words came out, then he lowered his head and used his fork to stir the rice on his plate, hiding some expression that shouldn‘t have appeared.

Mafioso didn‘t look at him. She elegantly took a bite of risotto, chewed, swallowed, and wiped the corners of her mouth with her napkin.

“The casino situation has been cleared up,” she said, changing the subject naturally and abruptly. “There is indeed a blind spot on the surveillance above the gambling table, directly above seat number three. He tells his partner sitting in seat number three the ratio of large and small cards in his boot by tapping the number of times. His partner adjusts the bet amount according to the signal, and after winning, divides fifty-fifty.”

Chance looked up, his expression returning to its usual composure. “So you caught him?”

“Last night. He admitted everything.”

“What about his accomplice?”

“He also admitted it last night.” Mafia put down his fork, picked up his wine glass, and looked at him over the rim. “Your observation is very accurate.”

“Thank you.”

“But what I‘m more curious about is why you didn‘t do it yourself. His cheating methods aren’t complicated. You could have completely exposed him on the spot at the gambling table, then demanded a generous reward from the casino. Many people would do that in this situation.”

Chance was silent for a moment, then put down his fork and looked at her seriously.

“Because that‘s not your style,” he said.

“If I expose him on the spot, you‘ll look very bad in the face—your casino has been cheated for six nights, and you haven‘t noticed a thing. This will embarrass you in front of your peers. And I don‘t want to see you embarrassed.”

After this sentence was said, the restaurant was silent for a long time.

Mafioso stared at him, that assessing gaze reappearing. She had seen many people say nice things to her—flattery, sycophancy, trepidation, ulterior motives—but there was nothing like that in chance‘s tone.

When he said “I don‘t want to see you embarrassed,” it was as if this was a matter of course, something that didn‘t need any explanation.

“You‘re strange,” Mafia finally said.

“I‘m often told that.”

“I‘m serious.” She put down her wine glass and folded her hands on the table, in exactly the same posture as he had just done.

“You clearly know who I am, know what my men do, know how I deal with opponents. You know more about me than most people. But your performance in front of me—”

She paused for a moment, as if considering her words.

“—like facing an ordinary person.”

Chance laughed, the sound clearly audible in the quiet restaurant.

“You‘re an ordinary person,” he said, “only your profession is more special.”

“My profession is Mafia boss.”

“Yes, your profession is mafia boss. But you‘re not the mafia boss person, you just happened to do the job of mafia boss.”

He picked up the wine glass and looked at the color of the liquid against the light.

“It‘s like I’m a gambler, but I’m not a gambler. I just happen to like to spend time at the gambling table.”

“Then who are you?” Mafia asked.

Chance put down his wine glass and looked at her, the curve of his mouth retracting a little, revealing a more real expression, not so perfect or so well-designed, but closer to his original appearance.

“I‘m still looking,” he said.

That night, they sat in the dining room for nearly four hours. After eating the risotto, they ate the main course, roast lamb with rosemary potatoes, then a simple tiramisu, and finally espresso and digestive alcohol.

They talked about a lot of things, but when they thought about it carefully, it seemed like they didn‘t talk about anything.

Chance told a few funny stories he had encountered at the casino. A drunk gambler had tried to build a castle with chips, but had stumbled over his own “building” and fallen into a roulette table. He had placed all his chips on “0,” and then that number had actually hit.

Mafioso talked about the summers she spent as a child in Sicily, about how the chef used an ordinary kitchen knife to cut tomatoes into perfect thin slices, each exactly the same thickness.

“He‘s an obsessive-compulsive person,” said chance.

“He‘s a perfectionist,” Mafia corrected him. “There‘s a difference.”

“What‘s the difference?”

“Compulsive is when you have to do something, and perfectionism is when you choose to do something.”

Chance thought about it and nodded. “That makes sense. What about you? Are you obsessive-compulsive or a perfectionist?”

Mafioso didn‘t answer. She picked up her coffee cup and took a sip, looking at him over the rim of the cup, the corners of her mouth slightly raised.

“What do you think?”

“I think you‘re both,” said chance. “Some things you have to do, some things you choose to do. But you don‘t like people to see the difference between the two.”

Mafioso put the coffee cup back on the saucer, making a crisp porcelain clinking sound. She neither admitted nor denied it, just picked up the soft felt hat next to her, put it on her head, and stood up.

“Time to go.”

Chance also stood up and picked up his suit jacket from the back of the chair. He walked to her side, and when she reached for her coat, he picked it up before she could, unfolded it, and gestured for her to put it on.

Mafioso glanced at him, but this time she didn‘t hesitate for long. She turned around, her back to him, and let him drape her coat over her shoulders.

Chance‘s hand lingered on her shoulder for less than two seconds, light as a falling leaf, then he released it, took a step back, and pulled open the dining room door.

The night wind blew in from the mouth of the alley, bringing with it coolness and the sound of jazz music coming from some distant bar.

Mafioso walked out of the restaurant, her high heels making crisp sounds on the stone pavement. Chance followed behind, half a step behind, neither far nor close.

When they reached the mouth of the alley, Mafioso stopped. “You said a lot tonight,” she said.

“I usually talk a lot.”

“You do a lot of things too.”

“Such as?”

“Like checking the casino for me, like saving my face, like”—she looked down at her coat—“taking my clothes.”

Chance shrugged and put his hands in his pockets.

“That‘s what a gentleman should do.”

“You‘re not a gentleman,” Mafia said, his tone firm. “You’re a gambler.”

“Can‘t a gambler be a gentleman?”

Mafioso didn‘t answer. She stood under the streetlamp, the light falling from above, casting a shadow on the brim of her hat, hiding half her face. But chance could see that she was smiling.

“I‘ve already paid you back,” Mafioso said. “I don’t need to buy you dinner again.”

“What if I want to treat you to dinner?”

The distant melody of jazz floated in the night wind, a slow saxophone song, languid and lingering.

“That‘s your business,” Mafia finally said, then turned and walked down the street. The sound of high heels gradually faded away in the night sky, finally disappearing around the corner.

Chance stood where he was, watching her back disappear around the corner. He took a cigarette out of his pocket, lit it, and took a deep drag, the smoke curling up under the streetlight.

He looked down at the hand he had just touched her shoulder, then laughed.

“It‘s over,” he said to himself.

♥️

Mafioso‘s four henchmen all called her differently.

The Consigliere called her “Mafioso,” the Caporagime called her “Boss,” the Soldier called her “Boss,” and the Contractee called her “Madam.”

There was one thing they never discussed face-to-face, but everyone knew perfectly well:

There‘s been something wrong with Mafioso lately.

The change began after the appearance of chance.

The first to notice was the Consigliere. He noticed that Mafioso became more distracted during his weekly meetings. It wasn‘t absentminded distraction, but a brief distraction.

She would suddenly fall silent in the middle of a conversation, her gaze falling on some insignificant object on the table, lingering for two or three seconds, then nonchalantly continuing the topic she had just been discussing.

If asked what she was looking at, she would say “thinking about something,” but the Consigliere had known her for twenty years, and he knew what her expression looked like when she was “thinking about something,” and this wasn‘t it.

Then it was Caporagime. He noticed that Mafioso had begun to take the initiative to ask about chance‘s whereabouts, privately, more casually.
“Is he here today?” “Which table is he at?” “How much did he win?”

These questions were not strange in themselves. Mafia would have basic attention to all high-frequency gamblers, but what was strange was that the tone when she asked these questions was too casual, so casual that it seemed like she was deliberately hiding something.

What Soldier noticed was more subtle. One time when he was patrolling the casino lobby, he saw Chance coming out of the bathroom, just in time to meet Mafioso coming down from the second floor at the stairwell. The two men stood facing each other, less than three steps apart.

Chance smiled and said something. Mafioso didn‘t smile, but she didn’t leave either. They talked for about two minutes—Soldier stood far away and couldn‘t hear clearly, but he saw Mafioso‘s hand.

Her hand hung at her side, her fingers gently twisting the corner of her coat, once, then again, as if caressing a soft piece of fabric.

Mafioso never showed nervousness in front of anyone. Her hands never made meaningless movements. But she had been twisting the corner of her dress for those two minutes.

Contractee didn‘t notice anything, because he spent all his time on the numbers. But when he was organizing the casino‘s accounts, he discovered an anomaly. Chance‘s credit limit at the casino had been quietly increased three times in the past month, each increase without going through the normal approval process, but directly from Mafia‘s own authorization.

The presence of chance in the casino was growing stronger and stronger, as if it had naturally grown out of the casino‘s daily operations, like a tree growing out of a crack in a rock. No one had sown it, no one had watered it, but it was there, and it was growing stronger and stronger.

He had a good relationship with the casino staff, not the kind of deliberate flattery, but a genuine, aimless friendliness.

He would remember the name of each dealer, tip the dealer after winning money, and smile when he lost money, saying, “My luck isn‘t on my side today.”

He didn‘t lose his temper at the gambling table, didn’t say nasty things to the dealer, didn’t throw chips because of a bad hand. In his view, each game at the gambling table was independent, the win or loss of the previous game had nothing to do with the next game, and anger and frustration only made decisions worse.

“The biggest enemy at the table isn‘t the dealer, it’s yourself,” he once said to a young gambler next to him. The young man had just lost five games in a row, his face ashen, his fingers gripping the edges of his chips until his knuckles turned white. “If you can‘t control your emotions, then you shouldn’t be sitting here.”

“That‘s easy for you to say,” the young man said irritably. “Of course you can say that when you win money.”

Chance wasn‘t angry. He just smiled, gathered the chips in front of him, counted out seven hundred dollars, and pushed them in front of the young man.

“Take it, consider it your principal. Give it back to me if you win, and it‘s mine if you lose.”

The young man was stunned. “You... you‘re serious?”

“I never joke about money,” chance said. “Take it.”

The young man later won, not because chance brought him good luck with the seven hundred dollars, but because those seven hundred dollars freed him from the anxiety of “I must make a profit” and allowed him to regain his composure.

The story spread around the casino. The way he gave the money—casual, natural, without any condescending charity. He wasn‘t showing generosity, he was just doing what he thought should be done.

“He‘s buying people‘s hearts,” Caporagime stood in front of Mafia, his expression serious. “He‘s building his own network in the casino, and the staff, regulars, and even some ordinary gamblers have a favorable impression of him. If he has other purposes—”

“He has no other purpose,” Mafia interrupted him.

Caporagime closed his mouth. He didn‘t refute, but the expression on his face clearly showed that he didn’t agree.

“What do you think he‘s doing?” Mafia asked.

“I think he‘s approaching you,” Caporagime said, his tone blunt to the point of rudeness. “And I think you‘re allowing him to do so.”

The room fell silent. The Consigliere stood in the corner, the notebook in his hand closed. He didn‘t write, just quietly observed the changes in Mafia‘s expression.

Mafioso‘s expression didn‘t change. She leaned back in her chair, her fingers tapping lightly on the armrest, her gaze falling on the street scenery outside the window—the leaves of the sycamore trees had already begun to turn yellow, some of them spinning in the wind and falling.

“Do you think he‘s pursuing me?” she asked, her voice as flat as if discussing a contract clause.

No one answered. The Consigliere looked down at the notebook in his hand, the Caporagime stared expressionlessly at the wall, and the Soldier stood in the doorway, motionless, as if he hadn‘t heard the question.

“I asked you a question,” Mafia said, his voice still flat, but with a hint of inevitability in his tone. “Do you think he‘s pursuing me?”

Consigliere was the first to speak. “I think he‘s expressing his interest in an unconventional way. As for whether it‘s ‘pursuing’... the definition of this word is too vague.”

“Caporagime?”

“I think he‘s too bold,” Caporagime said. “Whatever his goal is, he‘s too bold.”

“Soldier?”

Soldier was silent for a few seconds, then said in his usual emotionless voice, “I think if he had malicious intent, he would have had a hundred chances to do it. He didn‘t. So either he doesn’t have malicious intent, or his patience is far beyond ordinary.”

“Contract?”

Contractee flipped open the folder in his hand. “According to the data, his total casino profits over the past month were $202,000, the average stay time for each visit was three hours and forty minutes, the frequency of his beverage orders was an average one drink every forty minutes, the beverage he chose—”

“I don‘t want the data,” Mafia said.

Contractee closed the folder. “Oh. Then I have nothing more to say.”

Mafioso looked at her four men and smiled, with a hint of helplessness and a hint of tenderness.

“You don‘t have to worry about me,” she said. “I know what I’m doing.”

The Consigliere thought: Do you really know?
But he didn‘t say it aloud.

On the last Friday in October, chance did something at the casino that surprised everyone.

He walked into the casino, nodded to the security guard at the door, exchanged a few words with the bartender at the bar, and stood by the roulette table on the first floor for a while. He watched an old lady place a chip on “17”—her lucky number—and then watched the small white ball spin around the roulette wheel a few times before finally falling into the “17” square.

The old lady almost jumped up from her chair with joy. Chance smiled and clapped, then turned and walked toward the stairs.

He went up to the second floor.

The second floor was a restricted area, as every gambler who entered the casino knew. There was no railing at the stairwell, no warning signs, or even any obvious barriers, but everyone consciously moved within the first-floor area, because they all knew that the invisible boundary was more insurmountable than any iron railing.

Chance stepped onto the first step.

The entire first floor seemed to quiet down the moment he stepped onto the steps. It wasn‘t really quiet, but his perception became particularly acute at that moment.

He could hear the sound of chips clinking, the sound of the roulette turning, the laughter and sighs of the gamblers, but these sounds all receded into the background, like the background of a painting, vague and distant.

He went up to the second floor.

The corridor was carpeted in deep red, and on the walls hung several oil paintings—all of them scenes of southern Italy, the Amalfi Coast, the ancient Greek theatre at Taormina, and the fields of Sicily. At the end of the corridor was a dark wooden door, half-open, from which warm light leaked out.

Chance walked up to the door and raised his hand to knock three times.

“Come in,” Mafioso‘s voice came from inside.

He pushed the door open and entered.

Mafioso sat behind her desk, a few documents spread out in front of her, a pen in her hand. She wasn‘t wearing a hat tonight, her black hair neatly combed back. Her suit jacket was draped over the back of her chair, and she was wearing only a vest and a shirt, the sleeves of the shirt rolled up, revealing slender but firm wrists.

She looked up and saw it was him. The pen in her hand paused for a moment over the documents.

“How did you get up here?”

“Coming up,” said chance, closing the door and leaning against the doorframe, hands in his pockets. “Your men didn‘t stop me. Maybe they didn’t think they could stop me, or maybe they thought you wouldn‘t mind.”

“You think I wouldn‘t mind?”

“I thought if you minded, you‘d have someone stop me on the first floor. You didn‘t, so I came up.”

Mafioso put down his pen, leaned back in his chair, and folded his hands in front of him. Her expression was unreadable. “What are you doing here?” she asked.

“To ask you a question.”

“What question?”

Chance left the doorframe and walked to her desk, resting his hands on the surface and leaning forward, closing the distance between them to less than two feet. His gray-blue eyes watched her through a layer of glasses, his gaze focused and serious, the kind of seriousness that came with pushing all the chips on the gambling table.

“Would you like to dance with me?”

Mafioso blinked.

This was a move she rarely made. Continuous blinking was an act of vulnerability, it meant that at some moment you had lost control of the situation and needed to blink to readjust yourself. But she did blink, and more than once.

“What did you say?”

“Dance,” said chance. “I know you have a lounge on the second floor with a sound system. I also know you don‘t have any meetings or plans tonight—I asked the Consigliere, and he told me.”

“Consigliere told you?”

“He didn‘t want to talk at first, but I bought him a cup of coffee and we started talking. He‘s a very interesting person, you know? He knows more about wine than most wine merchants.”

Mafioso‘s fingers tapped lightly on the table twice. She only made this gesture when she was truly surprised, and she wasn‘t even aware of it herself.

“You treat my consultant to coffee, extort information about my itinerary, then barge into my office and ask me to dance?”

“That‘s a very accurate summary,” said chance, straightening up and holding out a hand, palm up. “So, what‘s your answer?”

Mafioso looked at his outstretched hand. That hand was very clean, the nails neatly trimmed, the fingers long but strong, the palm with a thin layer of calluses, made by long periods of shuffling and cutting cards.

She raised her head and looked into his eyes.

“Do you know that no one has ever dared to do this to me?”

“I know.”

“Do you know that if I call out now, Caporagime will appear here within ten seconds, and your situation will become very bad?”

“I know.”

“Then why are you still doing this?”

Chance didn‘t take his hand back. His smile had faded a bit, revealing an unreserved honesty.

“Because I want to dance with you,” he said. “Is that reason enough?”

Mafioso stared at him for a long time. His fingers, which were as long as chance, began to feel the slight vibration in the air. He rarely experienced this kind of tension at the gambling table.

Mafioso stood up. She didn‘t take his hand, at least not immediately.

She walked around the desk to stand in front of him, the distance between the two of them close enough that he could smell her perfume.

She glanced down at his still outstretched hand, then looked up into his eyes.

“Your hand must be sore,” she said.

“A little.”

The corners of her mouth curved in a distinct arc, and the light reflected in her eyes was like the reflection of candlelight on water.

Then she put her hand on it.

Her fingers were cold, but her palm was warm. Her pressure was light, so light that Chance could barely feel the weight, but it was definitely the touch of a hand, a real hand in his palm.

Chance‘s fingers closed, gently gripping her hand. He didn‘t force it, just just closed it. He led her toward the lounge.

The lounge was at the other end of the corridor, not large, but comfortably furnished. A few dark leather sofas, a low coffee table, an old-fashioned vinyl record player, and bookshelves on the walls filled with records and a few books about the history of the Italian mafia.

Chance stood in front of the bookshelf for a while, running his fingers over the covers of those records, finally pulling one out.

Frank Sinatra‘s “Nothing But the Best”.

He put the record on the turntable, adjusted the needle, then turned around.

Mafioso stood in the middle of the room, her hands hanging at her sides, watching him do all this. Her expression was particularly soft at that moment. Music began to play. It was a slow jazz song, with piano and bass violin melodies intertwined, and the sound of the saxophone flowing in the middle, languid and gentle.

Chance walked in front of her and extended his hand again.

This time, Mafioso didn‘t hesitate. She placed her left hand on his shoulder, her right hand clasping his left hand. His right hand gently landed on the side of her waist, just right between her waistline and ribs, his palm exerting almost no pressure, just lightly touching.

They began to move.

Chance‘s dance steps were unexpectedly good. His sense of rhythm was precise, each step stepping on the beat, the way he guided was gentle but not forceful, he wasn‘t “leading” her to dance, but “inviting” her to move with him.

His center of gravity was steady, his stride moderate, and when he turned a corner, he would slightly tighten his fingers, giving her a clear but not abrupt signal.

Mafioso hadn‘t danced in a long time.

When was the last time she had danced? Maybe three years ago, maybe five years ago, maybe longer. She couldn‘t remember. She only remembered that she had danced once—before taking over the family, when she was still young.

Her body was more honest than her memory. Her steps naturally matched his rhythm, her body rotating, shifting, and returning to position under his guidance, the movements so fluid that even she was surprised by herself.

She looked down at their feet, the distance between his leather shoes and her high heels always maintained just the right gap, neither too close nor too far.

“What are you looking at?” Chance‘s voice came, with a hint of a smile.

“Make sure you didn‘t step on my foot.”

“I never step on people‘s feet when I dance.”

“You never lose at the gambling table either.”

“That‘s different.”

They danced quietly for a while. The music changed, still very slow jazz, this one softer than the previous one, the piano notes falling like raindrops on the surface of the water, stirring up circles and circles of ripples.

“Why do you dance?” Mafia asked. Her voice was a little lower than usual, perhaps because of the night, perhaps because of the music, perhaps because of the distance between them being too close.

“I learned it when I was a child,” said chance. “My mother thought a man should know how to dance. She said that only those who learn how to dance can learn how to keep a proper distance from others.”

“Your mother is very smart.”

“She‘s an elementary school teacher. She taught for thirty years.”

“Is she still around?”

“Not anymore. She left five years ago.”

Mafia‘s fingers tightened slightly on his shoulder. The movement was infinitesimal, but chance felt it.

“Sorry,” she said.

“Don‘t apologize.” Chance‘s voice was calm, as calm as if he were telling a story that had nothing to do with him. “She left peacefully, without pain. I was by her side.”

They fell silent again. The music flowed through the room, the night outside the window cast a deep blue shadow on the glass, and the light from the streetlamp seeped through the gaps in the curtains, drawing a thin, long golden stripe on the carpet.

“Why are you being so good to me?” Mafia suddenly asked.

The question came without warning. Chance‘s footsteps stopped for less than half a beat, and then he continued to spin her around as if nothing had happened.

But Mafioso knew she had hit a target. She could feel his fingers on her waist tighten slightly at that moment, as he struggled to control emotions that shouldn‘t overflow.

“Because I think you deserve to be treated well,” chance said.

This answer was too direct. So direct that Mafia didn‘t know how to respond for a moment. She was used to roundabout conversations, negotiations with hidden angles, and communication methods that conveyed information with smiles and silences, but Chance‘s blunt honesty made her lose all her countermeasures.

“You don‘t know me,” she said.

“I‘m trying to understand.”

“The part you understand isn‘t all true either.”

“Then let me see the real part.”

“The real part might disappoint you.”

“That‘s my business.”

While this conversation was going on, their dance steps hadn‘t stopped. The music was still playing, and they were still spinning.

Mafioso looked at his face. There was a shallow scar on his chin, barely visible unless you looked closely, but in the dim light of the lounge, that scar cast a small patch of shadow.

His lips were slightly pursed, and he was seriously leading her to dance.

“What happened to your chin?” she asked.

“I fell when I was little.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Six stitches, no anesthesia. It hurts like hell.”

“Why wasn‘t there any anesthesia?”

“Because my family says that once it hurts, you remember it. In the future, you won‘t fall on the same stone a second time.”

“And did you remember?”

“No,” Chance laughed. “I fell on that rock twice after that.”

Mafioso laughed too. Her shoulders trembled slightly, and the fingers resting on his shoulders tightened slightly from the laughter. Her nails left a small warm patch on his shoulder through the fabric of his shirt.

Chance watched her smile with a complicated look in his eyes. There was no desire, no conquest, and neither was it the usual appreciation that men often have when looking at women.

It was more like confirming, confirming that she was real, confirming that she was here, confirming that her smile at this moment belonged to him, even if it was only brief, fleeting.

The music stopped.

The needle made a slight rustling sound at the end of the record, then automatically lifted and returned to its stand. A brief silence fell in the lounge, leaving only the distant sound of car engines outside the window and the mingled breathing of two people.

They stopped walking, but neither of them let go.

Chance‘s right hand was still on the side of her waist, Mafioso‘s left hand was still on his shoulder, and their other hand was still clasped together. The two stood facing each other, so close that the brim of her hat almost touched his forehead—but Mafioso wasn‘t wearing a hat tonight, so there was nothing to hide.

“Chance,” she said his name.

“Hmm?”

She opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but ultimately didn‘t say anything. She just let go of his hand and took a step back, putting distance between the two of them.

“It‘s too late,” she said, her voice returning to its usual calmness and composure, as if the woman who had laughed earlier had never existed. “You should go.”

Chance didn‘t ask any more questions. He just nodded, bent down, and removed the record from the turntable. He carefully put it back in its sleeve and returned it to its original place on the bookshelf. He straightened his tie and then walked toward the door.

Mafioso stood in the middle of the lounge, her hands in the pockets of her vest, watching him. The light shone from behind her, framing her outline with a golden border, making her silhouette look somewhat unreal, like an old, faded photograph.

“Good night, Mafioso,” chance said.

“Good night.”

He stepped out the door and gently closed it behind him.

The corridor was quiet, only his footsteps making a slight rustling sound on the deep red carpet. When he reached the stairwell, he found Caporagime leaning against the wall, arms crossed over her chest, looking at him expressionlessly.

“How long have you been standing here?” chance asked.

“Long enough,” Caporagime said.

“What did you hear?”

“I didn‘t hear anything. Soundproofing is good.”

Chance laughed and patted his shoulder. “That‘s good. Good night, Caporagime.”

He went down the stairs and passed through the casino on the first floor. At two in the morning, the casino was still brightly lit, but there were much fewer gamblers, and only a few tables were still operating. He walked out the door, and the night wind blew in his face.

He stood at the door and looked up at the second-floor window. The curtains were drawn, but warm light shone from inside.

He smiled, pulled down the brim of his hat, turned around and walked into the night.

♠️

All good things have an end. It‘s just that most people don’t want to believe that the end is right in front of them while the good things are still around.

On a rainy night in November, everything changed.

That evening, the casino hosted a special card game—a Poker tournament for charitable fundraising, which invited the city’s celebrities and wealthy people to participate.

This was not just a gambling game, but a social event, a window to showcase the Mafioso family‘s respectability and influence. The mayor would be present, the police chief would be present, and several important business figures would also be present.

For Mafioso, the significance of this night went far beyond winning or losing at the gambling table.

Chance was also on the invitation list.

When he arrived at the casino, he was wearing a well-cut black suit with red striped trim on the pockets and cuffs, a white shirt, and a neatly knotted black tie. His fedora was adorned with two cards, as well as his classic sunglasses and headphones, and his expression was much more serious than usual, showing his respect for the occasion.

Mafioso greeted the guests in the second-floor box. The three-piece suit was black, with a gold pocket watch chain on the vest and diamond-studded cufflinks on the shirt cuffs. A small gold brooch in the shape of a rose was pinned to the brim of the fedora.

When chance saw that brooch, his gaze lingered longer than usual.

“You‘re beautiful tonight,” he said, standing in front of her, his voice so low that only the two of them could hear.

Mafioso raised her chin slightly, the shadow of her hat brim hiding half her face, but she smiled.

“Save your compliments for your opponents at the card table, Mr. Chance.”

“I don‘t need to compliment my opponents. I just need to win their money.”

They smiled at each other, then chance turned and walked down the stairs, joining the card table.

The rules of the tournament were unlimited Texas Hold 'em bets, blind bets starting from $1,000, doubling every twenty minutes. There were twelve participants, each with $50,000 starting chips. Chance was assigned to table number three, and at his table were the mayor, a real estate developer, a hotel chain heiress, and a middle-aged man Chance didn‘t know—wearing an ill-fitting suit, several gold rings on his fingers, and when he sat down, intentionally or unintentionally revealing the expensive Patek Philippe watch on his wrist.

The moment chance noticed that man, his intuition rang out, just like the feeling he had when he saw someone switch cards with small movements at the gambling table.

He didn‘t make a sound. He just sat down quietly and tidied up his chips.

The first two hours of the game were uneventful. Chance played patiently, not rushing to attack, but taking the time to observe each opponent‘s habits and patterns. He noticed the mayor tapping the table lightly with the ring finger of his left hand when he got a good card; the real estate developer deliberately increasing the speed of his bets when he was bluffing; the heiress turning the chips over and over in her hand when she hesitated.

The middle-aged man with the gold ring had no habits.

Or rather, his “habits” were deliberately created. When he had a good hand, he would make a certain expression, slightly frown, pretend to hesitate, and then place a bet.

When the cards were bad, he would make another expression: feigning ease, smiling and chatting with the person next to him, then discarding the cards. But these expressions were too precise, too symmetrical, too much like the reactions a person who had learned to act would make on stage according to a script.

Chance mentally labeled this man as an actor.

In the third hour, the situation began to become delicate.

Chance got a good hand—A pocket, the best starting card in Texas poker. He placed a small bet, testing the reactions of the others. The mayor and developer both dropped their cards, the heiress followed suit, and the middle-aged man increased his bet—a substantial increase, almost a quarter of his chips.

Chance‘s intuition rang out again.

He didn‘t immediately counterattack. He just followed suit, saving his decision for after the turn of the cards.

The flip came out: A, K, 7, different colors.

Chance got three aces. This was almost an invincible card, unless the opponent got a straight or a straight, but from the current card face, both possibilities were very low.

He placed his bet, the female heiress abandoned her cards, the middle-aged man thought for a long time, and then placed all his bets.

Chance watched the man‘s action of pushing the chips, watched his deliberately made expression, as if saying “I have no choice but to take a gamble”

Then chance made a decision that surprised everyone.

He gave up his cards.

The entire gambling table fell silent. Even the dealer next to him was stunned for a moment. Giving up cards when he had three aces was almost an incredible choice in Texas poker. The spectators next to him made whispering sounds. The mayor looked at him with an incredible gaze, and the developer shook his head.

A hint of alarm flashed across the middle-aged man‘s face. Chance didn‘t explain. He just pushed the cards to the dealer, leaned back in his chair, and took a sip of the whiskey in front of him.

He noticed that in the second-floor box, Mafia was standing behind the one-way glass, watching him. Although the glass was one-way, he couldn‘t see inside, but he knew she was there. He could feel her gaze.

The game continued.

Another half hour later, chance finally confirmed the middle-aged man‘s secret. He wasn‘t playing cards alone. Somewhere above the gambling table, there was a hidden camera.

Chance caught an extremely tiny red dot in an accidental glance up, flashing through the crystal refraction of the chandelier.

The camera was facing the middle-aged man‘s card face, and a miniature headset was hidden in his ear. Someone was transmitting real-time information about the other players‘ cards to him.

This is not an ordinary cheater. This is a carefully planned scam. And the target of this scam is not chance, but Mafia.

Cheating at charity tournaments, once exposed, would ruin the reputation of the entire casino in an instant. The prestige and trust that the Mafia family had operated for years would collapse in one night.

More importantly, there were the mayor, police chief, and business leaders present—these people were all networks that Mafia had spent a lot of time and money to build. If they were deceived in Mafia‘s casino, the consequences would be more than just reputation damage.

Chance made a decision at that moment. He chose the most dangerous path.

The last game. Chance and the middle-aged man fought one-on-one. The public cards issued Q, J, 10, 9, 8, all in different colors -- this meant that a sequence appeared on the table, which could be formed by any player with a K or 7 in hand.

The middle-aged man placed a large bet. His expression was one of deliberate confidence—the corners of his mouth turned up, his eyes contemptuous, as if saying “I know your cards aren‘t as good as mine.”

Chance looked into his eyes and was silent for a long time.

Then he smiled and pushed all his chips to the center of the table.

“All bets.”

The entire casino fell silent at that moment. Everyone held their breath. The twelve participants, dealers, spectators, waiters, and even the security guards at the door couldn‘t help but stand on tiptoe to look in the direction of the card tables.

The middle-aged man looked at the chip pushed out by chance, and the smile at the corner of his mouth stiffened for a moment. His fingers rubbed the edge of the chip for a moment, not acting, but real nervousness.

“You follow?” the dealer asked.

The middle-aged man hesitated. His gaze swept over Chance‘s face, trying to find a flaw in that eternally smiling face. But he couldn‘t find one. Chance‘s smile was like a perfect mirror, reflecting only what he wanted others to see.

“I‘m with you,” the middle-aged man finally said, pushing out his chips.

“Show card.”

chance turned out his trump card.

K and 7.

A straight card. The largest straight card. There is no possibility of a matching card on the table, and no possibility of a calabash. This is the best card type that can theoretically be formed.

The middle-aged man‘s expression changed. That deliberately maintained composure shattered in an instant, revealing the panic and anger underneath. He flipped out his trump cards—Q and J, two pairs. Under normal circumstances, these were already very good cards, but in front of the chance Sunja, they were nothing.

“You—!” The middle-aged man stood up abruptly, his chair falling back with a harsh crash. His face was flushed red, his finger pointing at chance, his lips trembling. “You cheated!”

The entire casino fell silent again.

Chance was still smiling. He took off his sunglasses, placed them on the table, and looked at the middle-aged man with a calm, almost indifferent gaze.

“I cheated?” His voice wasn‘t loud, but in the quiet casino, each word was as clear as if engraved on glass. “You cheated with hidden cameras and headphones, and now you’re accusing me in return?”

The middle-aged man‘s face went from red to white. “You... you’re lying! What evidence do you have?”

“The evidence is in your right ear,” said chance. “That mini-headset, the model should be a Sony ER-100, one of the smallest wireless headsets on the market. Your partner is in a van outside the casino, transmitting to you through the camera information about the other players‘ cards.”

The middle-aged man‘s hand began to tremble. He subconsciously reached out to touch his right ear, then suddenly realized what he was doing and put his hand down.

But he had already been exposed.

Caporagime had appeared by the card table without anyone knowing when, his movements so fast that almost no one could see clearly.

One hand pressed down on the middle-aged man‘s shoulder, while the other hand removed a tiny, almost invisible headset from his right ear and held it up to the light.

The silver earpiece reflected a dazzling light under the light.

A burst of noisy discussion erupted in the casino. The mayor‘s face was ashen, the police chief‘s expression became serious, the developer and the female heiress looked at each other. All eyes were focused on that middle-aged man, and on chance.

The middle-aged man struggled a few times under Caporagime‘s hand, but Caporagime‘s hand was like an iron clamp, not moving at all. He turned his head, looking in the direction of the casino entrance—there stood two men in black coats, the middle-aged man‘s accomplices, but they saw that the situation was already irreversible, and were quietly retreating.

Soldier didn‘t know when he had gotten behind them.

“Don‘t move,” Soldier said.

The two men immediately stopped walking.

Things seemed to have been resolved. The cheaters were exposed, the casino‘s reputation was maintained, and Mafia‘s reputation was preserved. Everything was developing in a good direction.

But chance knew that the storm had only just begun.

Because at the moment he pushed all the chips, he knew he would win. He would not only win this game, but he would win the entire championship. And the championship prize was a million dollars in cash, as well as a diamond-encrusted badge of honor, symbolizing the highest honor in the Sonnellino family casino.

One million dollars.

For a gambler, this was a huge sum of money. But for Mafioso, this million dollars‘ significance far exceeded the money itself. The prize money for the charity tournament was guaranteed by the casino. If someone won this money, and it was winning a cheater—even if chance himself hadn‘t cheated, this would spread in the gambling circle, becoming an unsettling precedent.

More importantly, in the process of exposing the cheater, chance displayed insight and judgment far beyond what an ordinary gambler should have. This in itself was not the problem, the problem was the way he displayed these abilities, letting everyone present know one thing: this gambler called chance knew more about what happened at the gambling table than the casino itself.

This was a threat to Mafia.

Chance knew all of this. The moment he pushed all the chips up, he had already foreseen all the consequences. But he still pushed up.

Because he couldn‘t watch that middle-aged man win. Because he couldn’t let Mafia’s casino be humiliated in front of so many important people, because he wanted to protect her.

Even if the price of protecting her was losing her.

After the championship ended, chance received the million-dollar check and the diamond-encrusted badge on the podium. He smiled and waved at the camera, shook hands with the mayor, and hugged the heiress, acting like a standard winner—modest, proper, neither condescending nor arrogant.

But deep in his heart, he knew that tonight‘s victory might be the endgame between him and Mafia.

He raised his head and looked toward the second-floor box.

He couldn‘t see anything behind the one-way glass, but he knew that Mafia was standing there. He nodded slightly in that direction.

Then he turned and walked out of the casino‘s main door.

The news that chance had won the championship spread throughout the gambling circles of the city the next morning.

News spreads in many ways. Some hear it in bars, some hear it at card tables, some read it in newspapers. But regardless of the channels, when everyone tells the story, they all add the same detail:

The gambler abandoned his cards when he got three aces.

This detail gives the entire story a layer of legendary color. In the gambling circle, the story of the three discarded aces is like the fish that gets bigger and bigger in the fisherman‘s mouth, each time it is told, it adds some dramatic elements.

Some say that Chance stared at his opponent for a full minute before discarding his cards. Some say that he predicted his opponent‘s trump card at the same time he discarded his cards. Some say that he smiled at the dealer after discarding his cards and said, “This hand is not suitable for me.”

But all the versions shared a common core: chance saw through the cheater.

And that cheater, and his accomplice, after being taken away by Caporagime and Soldier, never appeared in anyone‘s sight again. No one knew where they had gone, and no one dared to ask.

But what really complicated this matter was not the chance of winning money, but the way he won it.

The next morning, Consigliere placed a detailed report on Mafia‘s desk. The report analyzed the entire process of the tournament, including the recording of each hand, the analysis of each player‘s behavior, and the logic of chance‘s decision to discard cards at that decisive moment and then bet all.

The final paragraph of the report read as follows:

“Chance‘s abilities in the championship far exceed the scope of an ordinary gambler. His knowledge of cheating methods, his grasp of opponent psychology, and his overall control over the game show that he has the ability to cause systemic losses in the casino. Although he has not shown any malicious intent at the moment, his very existence has become a risk. Appropriate measures are recommended to restrict his activities in the casino.”

Mafioso finished reading the report, placed it on the table, and remained silent for a long time.

“What do you think?” she asked the Consigliere.

Consigliere stood in front of her, his hands folded in front of him, his expression calm as water.

“What‘s written in the report is all facts,” he said. “But what‘s outside the facts isn’t written in the report.”

“What things outside the facts?”

“Why did he do it?”

“Wasn‘t it just to win money?”

“If he was just trying to win money, he could have easily followed up when he got the three aces, won that game, and then continued playing. If he had won that game, he could have gotten at least half of that man‘s chips, and he wouldn’t have needed to wait until the last game to bet all of them. But he chose to abandon the cards, he gave up an almost certain chance to win, because he didn‘t want to expose that man’s cheating methods too early. He wanted to save all the evidence until the last moment, so that everyone would see the truth at the same time.”

The Consigliere paused for a moment, then continued:

“He didn‘t do it to win money. He did it to expose that man in front of everyone. He did it so that the mayor, the police chief, and everyone present could see with their own eyes that someone was trying to cheat in Mafioso‘s casino, and Mafioso‘s casino doesn‘t tolerate such behavior.”

“He was protecting the casino‘s reputation.”

“He‘s protecting your reputation.”

The room fell silent. Mafia‘s fingers tapped lightly on the table surface—that subconscious movement had reappeared, but she herself didn‘t seem to be aware of it.

“What‘s wrong with that?” she asked.

“The problem is,” the Consigliere said, “the way he protected your reputation, letting everyone see that he discovered the cheaters before you did. In a mafia family casino, this kind of thing shouldn‘t happen. Discovering cheaters and dealing with cheaters is the family‘s business, not the gamblers‘.”

“You think he crossed the line?”

“I think he‘s protecting you in his own way. But his way—no matter how well-intentioned—will create the impression that the Mafia casino needs a gambler to maintain order. Once that impression is formed, it‘s hard to remove.”

Mafioso didn‘t speak. She picked up the cigarette case on the table, took out one, lit it, and took a deep drag. The smoke curled up under the light, obscuring her expression.

“There‘s one more thing,” the Consigliere said, hesitating for a moment. “There are already rumors out there.”

“What rumors?”

“Some people say... the reason chance can freely enter and leave the casino is because he has some special relationship with you. Some say you‘re covering for him, some say he‘s your—”

He didn‘t finish his sentence. He didn’t need to finish it. Mafia knew what he was going to say.

“My what?”

“...A lover.”

Mafioso‘s finger paused on the casino for a moment. “Who spread this rumor?”

“Not clear yet. But I‘m looking into it.”

“Tell me when you find out.”

“Yes.”

The Consigliere turned and walked toward the door. As he pulled it open, Mafia‘s voice came from behind him:

“Consigliere.”

He stopped, without turning around.

“Do you think... he did it on purpose?”

The Consigliere was silent for a moment.

“I think he did it on purpose,” he said. “But I‘m not sure what he did on purpose. Was it to win money? To protect you? Or was it for... something else?”

He walked out of the room, closing the door softly behind him.

♣️

The storm reached its peak on the third day.

An unknown gambler publicly claimed in another casino that he had been cheated of $ 100,000 by chance at a thousand. He said that chance had used some kind of trick to switch cards at the card table, and that he had seen it with his own eyes. He said he had proof, a video secretly recorded with a phone.

This video spread throughout the gambling circle within a few hours.

The video‘s image quality was poor, and the angle was also very skewed, but it was indeed possible to see Chance sitting at the gambling table. His hand made a quick movement at a certain moment—so fast that it was almost impossible to see clearly at normal speed, but after slow-motion, it indeed looked like he was changing cards.

But anyone who truly understands the business knows that the “changer of cards” in that video was actually just a natural movement of chance when arranging chips, distorted by poor image quality and deliberate slow motion into some kind of plausible “evidence.”

But most people in the gambling circle are not “really knowledgeable people.” They just like to watch the excitement, like to hear the stories, like to see a successful person being pulled off the horse.

Rumors spread like wildfire. By the fourth day, almost the entire city‘s gambling circles were discussing one thing: chance was a con man who cheated at the casino and won that million dollars.

And Mafioso‘s casino was the “co-conspirator” of this scam.

Mafia saw the video on the evening of the fourth day.

“This is fake,” Caporagime said firmly, standing in front of her. “The angle, the quality of the picture, anyone who knows a little about technology can tell it was edited. Chance didn‘t change the cards. His hand was just arranging the chips.”

“I know,” Mafia said.

“Then why did you—”

“Because it‘s not important.”

Caporagime closed his mouth.

“It‘s not the facts that matter,” Mafia said, his voice as calm as if he were reading a sentence. “It‘s what people believe. Now people believe that chance cheated in my casino, and I didn‘t stop him. What does that mean?”

She paused for a moment, her gaze sweeping from the Caporagime‘s face to the Consigliere‘s, and finally to the faces of the Soldier and the Contractee.

“It means that people will think my casino is unsafe, that my rules can be broken, that my authority can be challenged. It means that the trust and respectability I spent ten years building was destroyed in one night with a fake video.”

“That video wasn‘t sent by chance,” the Consigliere said. “I checked the IP address. The source is an anonymous server connected to that middle-aged man who cheated in the tournament. This whole thing is a setup. Someone deliberately arranged for that man to cheat in the tournament, deliberately let chance expose him, deliberately captured this video and spread it. Their target isn‘t chance. It‘s you.”

“I know,” Mafia said. “But chance gave them a chance.”

After this sentence was said, a long silence fell in the room.

“He‘s too smart,” Mafioso continued, with something rarely seen in his voice: fatigue.

“His intelligence allowed him to see through the cheater in the championship, his intelligence allowed him to choose to expose the other party in front of everyone, his intelligence allowed him to win that million dollars. But it was precisely his too obvious, undisguised intelligence that gave others an opportunity to take advantage.”

She stood up and walked to the window. The night outside was very dark.

“I need to redeem my reputation,” she said. “I need to let everyone know that Mafia casinos don‘t tolerate any form of cheating—whether the people who cheat are foreign gamblers, or—”

She didn‘t finish her sentence, but everyone understood the word she didn’t say.

The same person she had once indulged.

The Consigliere sighed inwardly. He had already seen the end. Not because he could predict the future, but because he knew Mafia too well.

He knew when she would make what kind of decision, just as she knew when to add stakes and when to discard cards at the gambling table.

“What do you want us to do?” Soldier asked. His voice was as flat as ever, but his hand was already in his coat pocket, where he usually kept his weapon.

Mafioso was silent for a long time. The night outside the window became deeper in her silence, and the yellow light of the streetlamp cast a warm shadow on the side of her face, but her expression was cold.

“Find chance,” she finally said. “Get that million dollars back. If he resists—”

She paused.

“—you know what to do.”

She chose the option she had to choose, but deep inside her, there was a very, very small voice saying:

This is not what I want.

But the voice was too small, so small that she could barely hear it herself.

Chance learned at dawn on the fifth day that Mafia had issued a kill order.

It was told to him by someone he didn‘t expect.

Contractee.

At three in the morning, chance was awakened in his apartment by a rapid knock on the door. He instinctively reached under his pillow for a pistol.

Although he acted unhurriedly in the casino, he wasn‘t a fool. He knew that in this business, he might need to protect himself at any time.

He walked to the door and looked out through the peephole.

Contractee stood in the hallway, wearing a wrinkled shirt, his tie askew, and an expression of anxiety he had never seen before.

Chance opened the door.

“You only have five minutes,” Contractee said as he came in and closed the door, speaking as quickly as if he were reading an urgent report. “The lady signed a recall order for you four hours ago. The target is a million dollars, if you cooperate, just the money, no action. If you don‘t cooperate—”

“I know,” Chance said. His voice was calm. He put the revolver on the coffee table, went to the kitchen, and poured himself a glass of water. “Who did she send?”

“All of them. Caporagime has people blocking all possible exits, Soldier is in charge of execution, Consigliere is in charge of intelligence. I—”

Contractee paused for a moment, pushing up his glasses.

“Why are you telling me this?” chance asked.

Contractee was silent for a few seconds. Then he said something that chance didn‘t expect:

“Because the decision you made in the championship was right. You shouldn‘t be hunted down for doing the right thing.”

Chance looked at him, was silent for a moment, then smiled with gratitude.

“Thank you, Contractee. But you took a big risk.”

“I know.”

“You‘re not afraid of Mafioso finding out?”

“I don‘t plan on letting her find out.” Contractee took a USB drive out of his pocket and placed it on the coffee table.

“Here‘s the analysis report of that video, proving that it was edited. And the real identity of that middle-aged man—he‘s a member of a family in the east, specializing in infiltrating and sabotaging rival casinos. The whole thing was a ploy, aimed at Mafia‘s reputation.”

Chance looked at the USB drive but didn‘t reach for it.

“Why don‘t you show this to Mafia?”

“Because there‘s no point in showing it to her now,” Contractee said, looking tired. “She knows it‘s fake. She knows the whole thing was a setup. But she still gave the kill order.”

“Why?”

“Because she no longer cares about facts. She cares about reputation. And your existence—whether you‘ve done anything wrong or not—has become a variable she can’t ignore.”

Contractee stood up and walked to the door.

“You make her look weak, chance. In our world, weakness is unforgivable.”

He pulled open the door and glanced back before walking out.

“Run, chance. Run as far as you can. Don‘t let her find you.”

The door closed.

Chance sat in the living room, holding a glass of water in his hand, his gaze falling on the revolver and USB drive on the coffee table. He stood up and went into the bedroom, took out a travel bag from the wardrobe, and began packing his things.

He didn‘t bring much with him. A few changes of clothes, that black fedora, black sunglasses, headphones, a spare knife, and... He hesitated for a moment.

The record.

When he put the record in his travel bag, his fingers lingered on the cover for a long time.

“You make me look weak,”

He softly repeated Contractee‘s words, the corners of his mouth curving in a bitter arc.

“Mafioso, you know, in this world, the only thing that can make you look weak is your own choice. Not me.”

He pulled the travel bag tight, slung it over his shoulder, and walked to the door. He took one last look at this apartment where he had lived for three years.

It wasn‘t big, but it was comfortably furnished. There were a few paintings he liked on the wall, half-read books on the bookshelf, and the coffee cup he had used yesterday was still on the kitchen counter.

He closed the door.

The days of flight were much harder than chance had imagined.

He thought he would get used to this kind of life. He was, after all, a gambler, a man accustomed to living in uncertainty.

But uncertainty at the gambling table and uncertainty in flight are two completely different things. At the gambling table, the most you lose are chips; in flight, what you may lose is your life.

He left the city and walked south along the coastline. He didn‘t dare stay in hotels, didn’t dare use credit cards, didn’t dare stay anywhere for more than two days. He didn‘t live on much cash on his person, probably only a few thousand dollars, because most of the money was in the bank, and he didn‘t dare go to withdraw it.

He went to the casinos of several small towns, participated in some small card games under false names, won some money, but couldn‘t win too much. He learned to keep a low profile, learned to make himself inconspicuous, learned to hide himself in the crowd.

But what he was most unaccustomed to was not the wandering life, but the constant loneliness.

At the gambling table, he used to enjoy solitude. Solitude meant that no one could see through your thoughts, no one could predict your next move, no one could become your weakness.

But now, loneliness had become a weight, pressing down on his chest, making it difficult to breathe every time he woke up late at night.

He missed Mafia.

This thought surfaced clearly for the first time on the third day of his escape, and then, like a seed, it took root in his consciousness, sprouted, and could not be uprooted no matter how hard he tried.

He missed the way she sat behind her desk reading documents, missed the way her eyes narrowed slightly when she drank whiskey, missed the warmth of her fingers on his shoulder when she danced, missed the way her shoulders trembled slightly when she laughed.

He missed that night, in the lounge, when they spun to the music, her body moving under his guidance, their breaths intertwining in the narrow space.

He closed his eyes, and the images played through his mind like a movie, every detail as clear as if it had just happened. The silver cufflinks on the cuffs of her shirt, the pocket watch chain on her vest, the gold rose brooch on the brim of her hat, the trail of smoke curling upward between her fingers under the light.

He opened his eyes and found himself lying on a bed in a cheap motel, with water stains on the ceiling, wallpaper sticking up in the corners, and the sound of traffic on the highway outside the window.

He picked up the fedora from the bedside table and pulled it over his face. The inside of the hat had a faint leather smell, somewhat similar to the scent on Mafioso. Maybe it was just his imagination, maybe not.

“Mafioso,” he said softly in the darkness, “you know, you‘re the biggest bet of my life. And I might already have lost.”

Mafioso‘s men found the chance on the twelfth day of his escape.

That day he was playing cards in a small town bar.

It was a very small card game, with only five people participating, and the highest stakes were only a few hundred dollars. He was wearing an ordinary gray jacket, with the brim of his hat pulled very low, looking like an ordinary, slightly wealthy passerby.

When he felt that something was wrong, the game had only started for ten minutes.

A small patch of skin on the back of his neck suddenly became cold, as if someone had pressed it with an ice cube. His finger paused on the chip for less than a millisecond, then continued his movement, as if nothing had happened.

He raised his head and pretended to look casually around the bar.

At the end of the bar, near the door, sat a man in a black leather jacket. The man had a glass of beer in front of him, but his attention wasn‘t on the drink.

Every few seconds, his gaze would sweep in the direction of the card table. The frequency was too regular, so regular that it didn‘t seem like he was observing, more like he was monitoring.

Chance recognized him. It wasn‘t Caporagime, nor was it Soldier, but one of Caporagime‘s subordinates. Chance had seen him in the casino a few times, and remembered him as a silent but extremely agile young man.

He found me, thought chance. At least a week earlier than he expected.

He didn‘t panic. Panic is the most fatal mistake at the gambling table, and it‘s the same in flight. He finished this game calmly.

He won, not much, about four hundred dollars, then stood up, smiled at the others at the card table and said, “Good luck tonight, but I should go,” and walked to the bar.

When he passed the young man in the leather jacket, his pace didn’t change at all, and his gaze didn’t pause at all. He walked to the other end of the bar, ordered a glass of Bourbon whiskey, and slowly drank it.

His brain was working at high speed. The bar had two exits, the front door and the back door. The back door led to an alley that connected the main street and a residential area.

Outside the main gate was a two-lane road, opposite which was a gas station. If he went through the main gate, he would need to cross the road, reach the gas station, then enter a drainage ditch from behind the gas station, following the drainage ditch to the edge of the town.

If he went through the back door, he would need to run about two hundred meters through the alleys, then turn left into the residential area, losing his pursuers in those winding alleys.

He chose the back door.

He put down his glass, left twenty dollars on the bar, and then walked unhurriedly toward the back door. His steps were unhurried, as if he were going to the bathroom, not fleeing.

The moment he pushed open the back door, he accelerated.

The night wind hit him in the face, bringing with it the chill and the stench of dirt. His leather shoes made a hurried sound on the stone pavement, and the echoes collided between the alley‘s walls, magnifying into a chaotic noise.

He didn‘t look back, but he could hear sounds coming from behind him. The sound of the back door of the bar being pushed open, then footsteps.

He turned left, entering the residential area. The alley became narrower, with faded walls and closed wooden doors on both sides, and a crisscross of clotheslines and wires overhead. His breathing began to become rapid, and there was a burning sensation in his lungs. He wasn‘t an inactive person, but he wasn’t one who was used to sprinting at full speed either.

He turned right, then left, then right again. The layout of the alley was like a maze, and he walked through it for about five minutes, until the footsteps behind him grew fainter and finally disappeared.

He stopped, leaned against a wall, and panted heavily. Sweat dripped down his forehead and into his eyes, stinging them so much that he couldn‘t open them. He took off his sunglasses, wiped his face with the hem of his shirt, and then put them back on.

He didn‘t have time to rest. He knew that the young man wouldn’t have come alone. If Caporagime had sent people, he would have at least sent three to four people, spread out in different positions, forming an encirclement. The young man just now had only discovered his location first, the others should be on their way.

He needed to leave this town, now.

He continued along the alley, trying to make his footsteps as light as possible. He passed through the residential area and reached the edge of town, where there were a field and a highway. There were few cars on the highway, only one passing every few minutes. He stood by the roadside, gave a thumbs-up, and tried to hitch a ride.

The first car didn‘t stop. Neither did the second. The third was a small vegetable truck, driven by a gray-haired old man. He glanced at him and hit the brakes.

“Where to?” the old man asked.

“Up ahead, the farther the better.”

The old man looked him over and nodded. “Get in.”

Chance climbed into the passenger seat. There was a smell of earth and vegetables in the van, and the warm wind blew strongly, causing a slight tingling sensation on his dry skin. He leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes.

“Are you being chased?” the old man asked, his tone flat.

“Sort of.”

“Debt from gambling?”

Chance opened his eyes and glanced at the old man. “How do you know?”

“Your fingers,” the old man said. “You have calluses between the index and middle fingers of your right hand, from long use of cards.”

Chance smiled. After twelve days of fleeing, there was finally something that could make him truly laugh.

“You‘re very observant.”

“I‘ve lived for sixty years. I’ve seen enough people and things.” The old man changed gear, and the truck jolted on the road.

“But I‘ll tell you one thing, young man. No matter how much money you owe, running isn‘t the way. You can run for a while, but not for a lifetime. Someday, you‘ll have to stop and face those who are chasing you.”

“What if the people chasing me don‘t want me to face them, they just want me to disappear?”

The old man was silent for a moment.

“Then run,” he said, “run until they can‘t catch up.”

Chance didn‘t say anything more. He looked out the window at the fields and trees rapidly receding, the gray-blue sky casting a dull light on the windshield. He remembered Mafia‘s smile.

He closed his eyes and said to her in his mind:

You know, Mafioso, the people you sent after me almost caught me. But I‘ll keep running, not because I‘m afraid of you, but because I don’t want you to do something you’ll regret later.

I know you‘ll regret it. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but one day, when you‘re sitting in that office, drinking whiskey, you’ll think of me. You‘ll think of the man who asked you to dance, the man who exposed cheaters for you in your casino, the man you had to order to kill.

You‘ll regret it.

And I don‘t want you to regret it.

So I‘m going to keep running. Running far away, so far away that you won‘t have to think about me anymore.

Chance and Mafioso met again on the forty-third day of his escape.

It was an accident.

He was in a casino in a seaside town, a much smaller casino, cheaply decorated, with harsh lights and the voices of the gamblers loud and vulgar. He had been there for three days, playing a small Poker tournament under an assumed name, winning twelve thousand dollars, and was preparing to leave.

When he reached the door, it was pushed open.

Mafioso stood in the doorway.

She was wearing that black coat, and the brim of her soft tweed hat was pulled very low, hiding half her face, but he recognized her at once.

Behind her stood Caporagime and Soldier.

Chance‘s footsteps stopped. His right hand subconsciously reached for the pocket where he kept the gun, but his fingers stopped before touching the cold metal.

He looked at Mafia.

Mafioso was looking at him too.

The noise in the casino seemed to retreat into the distance at that moment, becoming a vague background noise.

The distance between them was less than ten steps, but between these ten steps lay forty-three days and nights of flight, a million-dollar grudge, and a rift that could never be closed.

“chance,” Mafioso said. Her voice was calm, as calm as if she were calling an old friend‘s name.

“Mafioso,” chance said, his voice also very calm. The corners of his mouth even lifted slightly. That signature, gentle, slightly provocative smile. “You finally came in person.”

“You‘re not running anymore?”

“I‘m tired.”

Mafioso was silent for a moment. Then she made a move that everyone didn‘t expect. She took off her hat.

Her hair was a little longer than the last time I saw her, scattered across her forehead, with a few strands slightly bent under the pressure of the hat. Without the protection of the hat brim, her entire face was exposed to the glaring lights of the casino, with faint shadows under her eyes.

“Can we talk?” she asked.

Chance looked at her, silent for a few seconds.

“About what?”

“About everything.”

Caporagime took a step forward, but Mafia raised his hand, stopping him.

“Wait outside,” she said.

“Boss—”

“Wait.”

Caporagime glanced at chance, then he turned and walked out of the casino‘s door. Soldier followed behind, and when he passed by chance, his footsteps didn‘t pause at all.

The people in the casino began to notice the movement over here. A few gamblers stopped playing cards in their hands and looked curiously in the direction of the door. A waiter stood there holding a tray, not knowing whether to continue forward or retreat.

Mafioso glanced at his surroundings and frowned slightly. He knew she wasn‘t used to talking about things in this noisy, vulgar environment.

She belonged to the second-floor box of the casino, to the crimson curtains and crystal chandeliers, to the jazz music and old-fashioned vinyl record players.

“Let‘s go out and talk,” chance said, pushing open the door.

The night wind blew in from the sea, carrying a salty smell and the sound of distant waves. They stood on the steps of the casino‘s entrance, the street lamps casting two elongated shadows at their feet.

Caporagime and Soldier stood at a distance, with their backs to them, giving them enough space.

“How did you find me?” chance asked.

“That badge you won in the championship,” Mafia said, “there‘s a tracker inside.”

Chance was stunned. He looked down at his chest—the diamond-encrusted badge he had never taken off, not because he had forgotten, but because... he wasn‘t sure why he hadn’t taken it off.

Maybe it was some kind of memory, maybe some kind of reluctance, maybe some childish romantic thought he didn‘t want to admit.

“From the first day?”

“Since the first day.”

Chance was silent for a while, then smiled in relief.

“You always knew where I was.”

“Always knew.”

“Then why did you only come now?”

Mafioso didn‘t answer immediately. She lowered her head and looked at the toes of her shoes. The black toes reflected a faint light under the streetlamp. Her fingers were gently twisting something in the pocket of her coat. Maybe it was the gold rose brooch, maybe it was nothing.

“Because I‘m hesitating,” she finally said.

“Doubting what?”

“I‘m hesitating whether to come or not.”

“But you still came.”

“Because—” She raised her head and looked into his eyes. The streetlight refracted a warm yellow in her pupils, completely different from her usual gaze that was like the reflection of ice. “Because Contractee showed me that USB drive.”

Chance‘s eyebrows lifted slightly.

“You read it?”

“I read it. The analysis report, the identity of that man, the whole story. I read it all.”

“And then?”

“Then I knew I was wrong.”

When this sentence came out of Mafia‘s mouth, chance couldn‘t describe his feelings. Because he knew how proud Mafia was, knew how difficult it was for her to admit her mistakes.

She wasn‘t the kind of person who would bow her head to anyone. Even in front of her four most trusted subordinates, she rarely admitted her mistakes.

“I know that video was fake,” Mafia continued, her voice much lower than usual, as if she were saying something she didn‘t want anyone to hear. “I know you didn‘t cheat. I know he was sent to ruin my casino. I know all of that. But I still gave the kill order.”

“Why?”

“Because—” She paused for a moment, her gaze moving away from his face, falling on the distant sea surface. There was no moonlight on the sea surface, only a bottomless darkness, like the end of the world. “Because I‘m afraid.”

Chance didn‘t speak. He waited quietly, waiting for her to say those words she had never said to anyone before.

“It‘s not you I‘m afraid of, but my own feelings for you,” said Mafia. Her voice was trembling.

“I learned to control everything, my expression, my voice, my hands, my every look. But in front of you, I can‘t control myself.”

She turned her head and looked into his eyes again.

“You make me smile, chance. Not the fake smile you use in social situations, but the real, uncontrollable smile. You make me think of you late at night, you make me lose focus when making decisions, you make me distracted when facing enemies. You make me—”

She didn‘t finish.

“Become what?” chance asked softly.

“To be weak.”

When these three words came out of her mouth, they carried a heavy, almost suffocating weight.

For her, “weakness” was not a state, but a sin—something she had spent ten years destroying, denying, and fighting against. She had seen weak people begging, crying, and betraying in front of her. She had learned to despise weakness and respect the strong. She had molded herself into a person without weaknesses—or at least, a person who would not let anyone see her weaknesses.

But chance saw it. The moment she laughed out loud, the moment she put her hand in his palm, the moment she stood under the streetlight in her coat and said, “That‘s your business,” she was exposed.

And she couldn‘t forgive herself.

“You know,” chance said, her voice very, very soft, as if afraid of disturbing something fragile. “You‘re not weak. You‘re the strongest woman I’ve ever seen. But you have a misunderstanding—you think being strong means having no weaknesses, no feelings, no attachments. But that‘s not being strong, that’s being empty. True strength is being able to make the right choice even when you have weaknesses, feelings, and attachments.”

“But I didn‘t make the right choice,” Mafia said. “I gave orders to hunt you down.”

“Because you felt that was the only way to protect yourself.”

“That‘s not an excuse.”

“I know. But that‘s the reason.”

They were silent for a while. The sea wind blew from afar, carrying the sound of the waves. The distance between the shadows was closer than their actual distance. Under the angle of the light, the two shadows almost overlapped.

“What about the million dollars?” chance asked.

“No need.”

“Where‘s the badge?”

Mafioso glanced at him. “You‘re still wearing it?”

Chance looked down at the badge on his chest and reached out to take it off. The diamond sparkled in the streetlight, like a small piece of broken starlight.

“You should take it back,” he said, handing her the badge. “It belonged to Sonnellino.”

Mafioso looked at the badge lying in his palm, but didn‘t reach out to take it.

“Keep it,” she said. “As a... memento.”

“A memorial to what?”

“In memory of a woman who almost did something wrong.”

chance put the badge back in his pocket. He looked at her, his eyes as gentle as the That Evening Sun of late autumn.

“You didn‘t do anything wrong,” he said. “You made the decision a mafia boss should make. If it were me, I would have done the same thing.”

“You wouldn‘t.”

“How do you know?”

“Because you‘re not me. You‘re not the Mafia, you’re a gambler. Gamblers always take risks, the Mafia always avoids risk. We see the world differently.”

“Maybe,” said chance. “But there‘s one thing we agree on.”

“What?”

“We all thought the dance that night was very good.”

Mafioso looked at him, silent for three seconds.

Then she smiled. A real smile. Her shoulders trembled slightly, and a small patch of skin at the corners of her eyes wrinkled with the smile, revealing a shallow line that only appeared when she really smiled.

Chance watched her smile and smiled too.

“Mafioso,” he said. “You know, when you laugh, you don‘t look like a mafia at all.”

“Like what, then?”

“Like an ordinary person.”

“You said I‘m an ordinary person again.”

“Because you are.”

Mafioso shook his head, but the smile didn‘t disappear. She reached out, adjusted the collar of her coat, and then put her hat back on. The shadow of the brim once again hid half of her face, but chance could see her mouth.

“What are you going to do now?” she asked.

Chance shrugged. “Keep gambling. It‘s my profession.”

“Who‘s casino?”

“That depends on who‘s willing to let me in.”

Mafioso thought for a moment. “The door to Sonnellino is always open for you. But there‘s one condition.”

“What condition?”

“Don‘t win too much.”

Chance laughed loudly, and his laughter drifted in the night wind, mixing with the sound of the distant waves, turning into a wonderful melody.

“I can accept that condition,” he said.

Mafioso nodded, turned around, and walked toward the street. The sound of his high heels made a crisp sound on the stone pavement, and the hem of his coat fluttered gently in the night wind.
Caporagime and Soldier saw her coming and automatically followed behind her.

She took a few steps and stopped.

She didn‘t turn around, but her voice clearly reached chance‘s ears:

“chance.”

“Hmm?”

“Next time you come, bring that record with you.”

Chance stood where he was, watching her continue walking forward. Her back was getting farther and farther away under the streetlight, becoming smaller and smaller, until she finally disappeared around the corner.

He took the badge out of his pocket and held it in the palm of his hand, watching the diamond sparkle in the streetlight.

Then he pinned the badge back to his chest, put on his fedora, pressed down the brim, and turned to walk in the opposite direction.

The night was very dark, and the sea breeze was very cold, but his gait was relaxed. Like a man who has pushed all his chips onto a gambling table and is smiling as he waits for the dealer to turn over the last card.

No matter the outcome, he would not regret it.

Because this was the biggest bet of his life, and he was willing to bet everything.

♣️ ♦️ Epilogue♠️ ♥️

Three months later, in the second-floor lounge of the casino, Frank Sinatra‘s voice rang out again.

Chance was leaning back on the sofa, his fedora resting on his knees, his sunglasses off on the coffee table, a glass of Barolo in his hand. His tie was neatly tied today. Mafia had tied it for him, because she couldn‘t stand the crooked knot he’d tied himself.

Mafioso sat across from him on the single sofa, legs crossed, also holding a glass of wine in her hand. She wasn‘t wearing a suit jacket tonight, only a vest and shirt, her fedora resting on the rack beside her.

“You said last time you were looking for something,” Mafioso said. “Did you find it?”

Chance took a sip of wine and thought about it. “I found it,” he said.

“What is it?”

He put down his glass and looked at her. Those gray-blue eyes seemed especially deep in the dim light of the lounge.

“A place worth stopping at.”

Mafioso‘s fingers spun lightly on the stem of her glass. Then she put the glass down, stood up, went to the record player, and put the needle back to the beginning of the record.

The music started up again, singing that song “The Way You Look Tonight”.

♫~Some day when I‘m awfully low~♪

She turned around, looked at chance, and held out her hand.

“One more dance?”

♫~When the world is cold~♪

Chance stood up, walked in front of her, and took her hand.

They were so close that they could smell each other. Her fingers intertwined with his, a little harder than last time. His hand fell on her side, and she put her hand on his shoulder.

♫~ I‘ll feel a glow just thinking about you~♪

The music was flowing, and they were spinning.

“You know,” Chance whispered, “when I was on the run, I thought about this moment every night.”

♫~And the way you look tonight~♪

“What are you thinking about?”

“I want to dance with you again.”

Mafioso raised his head and looked at his face. Her lips were slightly curved, the curve softer than he could ever remember.

♫~ Yes you‘re lovely with your smile so warm~♪

“Then you have your wish now,” she said.

“Not quite yet.”

♫~And your cheeks so soft~♪

“Why?”

“Because this song isn‘t over yet.”

Mafioso laughed. Her laughter echoed softly in the music, interweaving with the singing, becoming a gentle, lingering melody.

♫~ There‘s nothing for me but to love you~♪

They spun around the lounge, the record turning slowly on the turntable, the needle sliding through the black lines, releasing those sealed melodies again, filling every corner of the room.

♫~And the way you look tonight~♪

Caporagime stood in the corridor, his back against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest. He heard the sound of music and faint laughter coming from the lounge, and shook his head expressionlessly.

The music continued.