Page 3

“I will do what you never could.” Giving his father one last defiant look, he whispered his final vow for Lucifer’s ears only, “I will be king.”

As Dominic took a seat on the leather throne, Lucifer’s image disappeared into the wind; the ghost of his father vanishing as quickly as he had appeared. Son replacing father, underboss replacing boss, new replacing old.

Never once had he sat in it as a child, to dream about this day. He’d always known if he even touched his father’s chair, the punishment wouldn’t have been worth the daydream.

“Now”—Dominic sat back as he squeezed the tufted leather arms in the palm of his hands, the dark, gothic-style lettering of his tattoos spelling out the letters O-V-E-R-C-O-M-E across his fingers—“let’s begin.”

One

Jesse James Was a Mean Son of a Bitch

Dominic, Age 5

Sitting crossed-legged on the dusty wooden floor, a young Dominic stared up at the small TV that was a foot away. A Wild West movie was playing, which looked fuzzy when the signal went out. It wasn’t just his favorite thing to watch, it was the only thing he watched. He thought that was all the two-by-two-foot box played. When he’d gone to kindergarten and was around kids for the first time, they had asked him what his favorite cartoon was, and when he said he didn’t know, they all looked at him funny.

Dominic quickly learned he was much different than the other kids in school. They wanted to play cops and robbers, and all he wanted to play was cowboys and Indians. The kids spoke of shows like Bugs Bunny, Rugrats, and something lame called Thundercats—that looked like a human fucked a cat—while all he knew was John Wayne, High Noon, and Clint Eastwood. When asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, Dominic confidently stood tall, telling the class he wanted to be Jesse James.

Jesse James was a mean son of a bitch who could dual and wield two pistols all while riding a horse. He was the greatest outlaw to ever live, and one day he wanted the name Dominic Luciano to go down in history, right beside Jesse James.

The front door opening had Dominic turning his little head away from the epic draw that was about to play out on the buzzing TV to see his father walking in carrying two baby carriers.

“Where’s Carla?” he asked when Lucifer kicked the door closed behind him.

Without hesitation, his father answered, devoid of any emotion, “She’s dead.”

His little lip curled up, feeling a sudden sadness, but Dominic didn’t let himself cry, knowing he’d be punished if he allowed any tears to fall.

Carla had been nice to him and even gave him ice cream a couple of times for breakfast when Lucifer was still sleeping. He thought he was finally going to get a mommy, but even at five years old, he knew he wasn’t going to see Carla again. When they left for the hospital, his father had been looking at her the same way that Clint Eastwood did right before he whipped his gun out to shoot someone.

She had cried almost every day, and whenever Dominic asked what was wrong, Lucifer always spat out, “because she’s weak,” before mumbling under his breath that his sons better not come out weak either.

When he set the carriers down on the living room floor, young Dominic scooted his knees across the hard floor, the head of an exposed nail tearing apart one of his hand-me-down jeans. Peeking over from behind the carriers, he saw the two tiny, sleeping figures.

“Don’t you dare fucking wake them up.”

“I won’t,” he promised on a whisper, just wanting to get a good look at them. They were so small and perfect. They looked just like the baby doll a girl in his class always carried around with her. “What are their names?”

Pointing to the one on the right, Lucifer told him, “Angel”—before pointing to the baby on the left—“and Matthias.”

“But, how do you know who is who? They look the same.”

“You’ll see when they wake up. This one doesn’t stop crying,” Lucifer said, pointing to the one called Matthias. “Like that,” he grumbled when the baby woke up right on cue and began crying.

“Go get the bottle out of the bag on the table,” Lucifer snapped at him.

Dom quickly got up and ran over to the diaper bag, pulling out the plastic bottle. “I can feed him,” he said when he came back with the bottle that was still half full, wanting to help.

“That’s all right.” Lucifer took it from Dom’s little hand and put it in the baby’s crying mouth before scrunching up the blanket that had been covering his tiny body so he could drink it without anyone having to hold it.

Baby Matthias’s tiny mouth sucked the rubber nipple until it popped out and he began to cry again.