All the Devil's Men: Chapter Two

Please be warned this novella contains scenes dealing with violence, profanity, drug and sex abuse that may cause some readers distress. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental. It is an imaginary work of cautionary fiction.

Favour of Fortune | (Audentis Fortuna iuvat — Virgil's Aeneid, Book 10, 284)

Chapt 1 | Contents | Chapt 3

or Vittorio Caruso it had been a bad day. And it looked like it was only going to get worse.

He knew, only too well, as the feared Don of the clandestine Casa Nera that even the best laid plans could go wrong when you sent someone else to do your bidding. But his plans had gone wrong on a scale he couldn't have imagined.

He looked down at the hand typed message again. Read it for the third time.

All dead. Irishman on his way to Rome.

What a fuck up this was turning out to be.

The lines on his face deepened. His thick, hairy fingers, laden with diamond signet rings, clicked at the air. A young guard, standing by the heavy wooden doors to his study, stood to attention.

Chi fa da sé, fa per tre. If you want something done right, do it yourself. Even Satan had to come up from Hell and get his hands dirty sometimes. So, he would send the Devil himself.

"Where's Enzo?"

"I- I don't know, Don Caruso."

"Then go find him, porca puttana!"

"Si, Don Caruso. Right away."

As Caruso listened to his henchman's hurried footsteps echo on the marble floors of his sprawling mansion, he sighed and sat back on his burnished leather couch, massaging his throbbing temples. He wore the weight of this assignment like a crown of explosives. If they failed in this, he could not comprehend what the other fucking famigliùccia would do.

He shook his head. He could do with a drink. A large one. He could do with two.

Don Caruso got up, his gold embroidered silk gown pooling around him. It was a dark night in Rome, but it was about to get darker. For all involved. He threw the scrap of tickertape paper across his antique desk, a twin pedestal colossus of wood and iron, and poured himself two glasses of bourbon, the amber liquid catching the soft glow of the table lamps.

On the far corner of the desk's mahogany surface sat a large, handcarved long case clock, ticking steadily. It was a depiction of Fortuna, the Roman goddess of luck and fate, holding up a clock face as though it were her wheel of fortune. A Latin inscription was carved in large letters at its base: Audentis Fortuna iuvat.

Fortune favours the bold.

And the favours of Fortune had been plentiful for the Dons of the Casa Nera. The women in the family believed the brass timepiece brought them good luck; it had belonged to the first Don of the Caruso family who had founded the empire over which he ruled. He now wondered whether it was seeing its last. The goddess Fortuna was an unpredictable and fickle mistress, capable of bringing both good and bad fortune. Had their good luck finally run out? Was this Irishman an omen that he had fallen out of favour with the old gods?

He swirled the bourbon in his glass thoughtfully, the rich caramel scent hitting his nostrils, before knocking it back, relishing the burn that slipped down his throat. He would need that second.

By all accounts the Irishman they called the Bull of Blacklion was a force to be reckoned with, but Caruso was more concerned about the other families. If word got out of his plans, they would unify and descend on the Casa Nera in retaliation, no doubt, and his reign as Don would be consigned to the history books.

Or a three part Netflix documentary. A man like him deserved at least a three part limited series. Possibly more. After all, they were one of the oldest families in Italy, and the wealthiest, enriched by the olive oil production they used as a front for the organisation. The Caruso homestead, the Villa Nera, had been synonymous with formidable power for nearly a century. A mansion that stood as the eighth hill on the outskirts of Rome, it was a labyrinth of art and architecture, each corridor and room more breathtaking than the last.

Every succeeding Don had added his own touch to the place. His own legacies were the huge tapestries of ancient Roman legends that adorned the walls, their carefully restored threads shimmering under the glow of the baroque chandeliers. In his private study he had hung the woven images of his personal heroes and favourite gods. Julius Caesar and Octavian. Emperor Hadrian and Antinous. Caligula. Nero. All the great leaders he aspired to. Then the gods Pluto and his Greek counterpart Hades. And Bacchus, the god of wine and pleasure. His favourites from the pantheon.

For what else was there for a man, but sex and death? And the struggle to rule the world?

He took his glass and went to sit back down on the couch, patting his naked, portly belly under his gown. He wore little else these days, as little as his modesty, rarely leaving the mansion he'd turned into a fortress. That was his other legacy. He shifted his position further back from the edge of the couch, and his flaccid, hooded penis flopped out onto his left thigh. He left it in full view, crowned by a thatch of silver-black pubic hair, glimmering in the dim lamplight, glass in one hand, his other hand on opposite knee.

He smiled. Thinking of his wealth and power always helped to restore his mood. Either that, or the Tennessee whiskey was taking effect. A throwback to his university days in America. Where he had learnt of the pleasures of the Greek life.

He looked around his study. Stared up at the tapestry that hung over the stone fireplace. It was a depiction of a goat-footed Satyr on bended knee performing cunnilingus on a lustful Maenad, with the god Bacchus watching from a throne of vine leaves. He opened his legs wider. Took a sip of his drink.

Magari! He was proud of his family name. Of his home. It was an impenetrable castle, a villa in name only now, as a Don's should be, he thought, whose power and influence stretched across the four corners of the world. He, Vittorio, was head of the Casa Nera, with the most feared mafioso in Italy, his second-in-command, Enzo.

Ah. Speak of the Devil, and in he walks.

The footsteps outside the door of his private study were slow and measured this time. This was Enzo. The Devil ran for no one. Not even his beloved Don. He walked.

"Enzo! Where have you been?"

"Checking the perimeters. I had a sense of something. Just making sure of your safety."

Caruso nodded. That was top priority, of course. He raised a hand to indicate the message he'd thrown on his desk. "Read it. Tell me what you think." He turned around to stare at the young footman, who had walked in behind Enzo.

"Pour my son a large one," he barked in command at him, "then leave us."

But Enzo shook his head at the drink, his eyes scanning the few words on the paper, which said so much.

"Do you not drink tonight, Enzo?"

"At a time like this, it's best I keep a clear head."

Caruso waved a hand at the young soldier to leave. "Close the door behind you. Do not disturb us."

The young man gave a nod, and without saying a word, exited the study.

When they were alone, Caruso stood up and walked over to Enzo, giving him his own glass. "Drink," the old Don said, his voice as smooth as the bourbon he offered. "Relax. You are too tense."

He rubbed the back of Enzo's neck, and felt it stiffen under his old hands. The room seemed to fall silent, as Enzo took the drink. Only the ticking hands of Fortuna spoke.

Caruso watched him, remembering how he had instantly been taken by this boy, picked off the streets of Rome by one of his soldiers. Dark, sullen, resisting. How he'd broken his resistance in this very room. All those years ago. His hair had been longer then, his eyes less guarded. Until he'd bled his innocence out all over Caruso's four hundred year old Ottoman rugs, with the Roman gods of death and pleasure watching.

And after Caruso had tamed one fire, he had lit another inside the boy. He remembered Enzo's sweaty, glazed backward glances as he'd enter him from behind. The low, soft moans. He'd been his, wholly and completely. The concoction he put in his drinks always made it better. He relaxed more, and remembered less the morning after.

"If you don't drink, you won't relax, will you? Now drink."

Enzo placed Caruso's drink on the desk, untouched. "You've always taken what you wanted. But I do not think the taking of the Irishman is a good idea."

Caruso's good mood was dissipating. He removed his hand from Enzo's neck. "You forget this was your idea? You remember you came to me begging?"

"I told you-"

"You told me?" Caruso's voice raised in anger. "And what did you tell me, boy?"

Enzo turned around and looked the Don straight in the eyes, his voice low. "I told you that when we began this thing, that we must first destroy the one they call the Bull. But you wanted him for yourself."

"To bring one of the greatest hitmen out of retirement and to our side to take over our competitors in Rome? Yes, boy. I want him. He is an asset. But I was thinking of your future."

Fortune favoured the bold, and Enzo was the boldest fucker he'd ever known, and the Don's favourite to succeed him. The Devil had worked hard enough for it. Hard enough to rise through the ranks without any favours, except for the ones his Don had commanded of him. The ones behind closed doors. On his knees. He had passed those trials of fire like a true professional.

Within the Casa Nera it was a time honoured tradition. You fucked your men like Alexander the Great fucked his loyal soldiers, or Julius Caesar fucked his protégés. Coitus a tergo was widely practiced not to control by shame, but as a gift from the gods and from the man who made you.

Caruso had not just made Enzo, he had adopted him, and given him the family name. When the time came for his apprenticeship to be over, like a true Caruso, Enzo would take the reins and rule the whole of the Italian underworld with an iron fist. The Bull of Blacklion could be that iron fist.

"I have already chosen my second-in-command. And it will not be this Irishman. He is a liability that we will now have to deal with. It would have been easy to kill a sleeping bull. But now he is awake and aware."

"And you will now deal with it. In your own way."

Enzo nodded. "I promise you he won't make it to the front door."

Caruso took his drink, and sat back down with a satisfied nod. What the Devil promised, he always delivered. "And your second-in-command? Is it this man you took all this trouble for?" Caruso finished his bourbon, crossing his legs. "He doesn't look like much of anything to me."

Enzo said nothing, but turned around to walk out of the Don's study.

"But then again, they do say it makes you blind, don't they?"

He watched as Enzo left, quietly closing the door behind him. He shook his head and got up to pour himself another drink.

Power. Sex. Death. These things he understood. But what had love got to do with any of it?

He walked over to his desk and poured another glass of whiskey. A large one.

Love just got in the way. It was a man's Achilles heel.

Even if you were the Devil himself.

ante's world spun in a disorienting kaleidoscope of colours and shapes as he was jolted awake by a juddering movement in the air. The remnants of the drug he had been given still lingered in his body, but the realisation of his captivity gave him an adrenalin rush, and he shook himself awake to take in his surroundings.

He was bound and gagged, in a moving plane. Out of the window, he could see Rome materialise beneath him, ancient and golden in tbe twilight. Nestled between seven hills, it was a dazzling maze of movement, but it made Dante long for the green hills of the coastal town he had made his home, which had felt like a sanctuary after Downland.

His heart pounded to the beat of the growing rage in his chest, and he struggled with the reinforced restraints that secured him to his seat.

The last thing he remembered was being in his kitchen with his husband and his parents, when there had been a knock on the door. He had sensed something was wrong and called out to Cillian not to open the door. Too late. Thirty men filled the house. A cloth soaked in chloroform covered his face. His last conscious thought was of his promise to Cillian to never leave him.

A hulking silhouette came into his line of vision.

"Your past has caught up with you, Signor Dante," it said. "There are people in Rome who have waited a long time for this reunion."

Dante did not recognise the voice. He felt his strength returning, and he effortlessly pulled his handcuffs away from the armrests of the chair.

The shadowed figure quickly leant over and injected something into Dante's neck.

Determined not to succumb to the darkness, Dante continued to struggle. He promised himself he would get back home to Ireland. Or die trying. This would be a promise they could not make him break.

But the darkness overtook him, and he thought no more.

ante slept as the day dawned.

The plane touched down at a small airport outside Rome. On a private airstrip that belonged to the Caruso family. A van was waiting to take him to the Don's mansion near the river Tiber, on the outskirts of the city.

Enzo stepped out of the van.

You can't change the world. You can only live in it.

He had said that to Dante once.

He had been wrong. Don Caruso had showed him that if you had enough power you could change the world.

Now he had that power.

And Enzo was about to make some changes.

ante was in the dark.

"Cillian? Where are you, my love?"

No answer. He ran into the dark, and the dark was endless. He stopped running. He was lost. Or Cillian was. Maybe they both were.

"I promised not to leave you. Why do you leave me now?" He called out again. "Come back to me, please."

He listened out for a response, but this time all he heard was his own voice, echoing back to him. His pleas reverberated from the abyss, in ever decreasing volumes to reach him as scattered, meaningless whispers.

Prom-hee-seas. Prom-hee-seas. Prom-hee-seas.

In desperation, he began to recite the Lord's prayer, when, suddenly he heard a voice behind him.

"I will never leave you, Dante."

He turned around relieved, but his face dropped when he saw Dara in front of him.

"Where is my husband, Mr Dara?"

"Wait for me. I am coming for you, my friend. Will you do that?"

He awoke with a start.

or a moment Dante couldn't place where he was. He knew he was no longer on the plane. Then his senses registered the smell of copper and antisceptic. He peered into the darkness. It looked like he was in a cellar that smelled like a slaugterhouse. He tried to move, but a heavy chain, attached to a brick wall behind him, tightened the iron clasps at his wrists. He pulled at it, and tried to stand, but his restraints bit into him even tighter.

A voice from the shadows interrupted his efforts. It was not the voice from the plane. This voice he recognised. Sicilian, spoken with a patience that had once won him over. A long time ago. Was this a dream within a dream?

"It is designed to tighten when it finds resistance," the voice said. "But I have found the best way to resist is to let oneself go."

Dante heard footsteps now. Close. Familiar.

Rome, he thought. Of course.

"Don’t fight it," the voice said, low and thick with emotion. "And I will release you."

Ignoring the instruction, Dante pulled against his restraints even harder. His arms felt as though they had no weight, but it did not deter him.

Enzo's hand slid into view. It did not touch Dante, but hovered above his head, as though he were unsure over his decision to unchain him. “It took me a while to find you. I came back to our village to find you gone."

"I waited for you, and you never came." Dante held his gaze, adding, "Only a coward behaves in this way, Lorenzo."

"They call me Enzo, now." He laughed just once, bitter and breathless. "And I see the great Dante still does not love cowards."

“I discovered I could love a coward of consequence, but not of character," Dante said, bluntly. "I have discovered many things about myself since we last saw each other. Tell me, why bring me back now, after all this time?”

"I once told you we cannot change the world. I have the power to change it now. I found a world where we can be together." Enzo’s expression shifted, raw emotion escaping from behind his guarded eyes. “I brought you back home. To me. Where you belong.”

"Back home? You kidnapped me from my home." Dante shook his head in disbelief at him. Why did he stand there as if the years between them had been a brief misunderstanding? "You think you can just abduct me and we shall pick up where we left off?"

"Is it so impossible? I dream of you every night, of that night underneath the stars," he said, his voice heavy with implication. He took a step towards Dante, his tall, broad form casting a shadow across him. He smiled, a slow, predatory smile, his fingers brushing a strand of hair away from Dante's forehead. "I have changed. I've become more. And now, so will you."

Enzo was close now, their noses almost touching, his breath on Dante's lips, and the fiery flecks of desire in his eyes. When he moved in for a sudden kiss, Dante froze against his advances, as though a victim of Medusa turned to stone.

But his breath pushed against Enzo's own in response, as he said, "We are no longer under those stars. There is nothing I want from you, but to go home."

"Merda!" The irritation at Dante's control tore at Enzo's own, and he ripped Dante's clothes from him, leaving them both exposed, and breathless. Tilting his head sideways for a better angle, his tongue brushed impatiently against Dante's lips, trying to make him part his mouth and feel the tremors his nakedness had released in him.

"Stop, Lorenzo, please."

"You do not understand what I offer you," he said, his trembling breath moving its caressing touches from Dante's lips to his neck. "More than just a boy who can offer nothing but a walk beneath the stars. I am now a man who can offer you the world."

Dante came to life, shaking Enzo's attentions away with his head, resisting the urge to kick him where he knew he could do the most hurt. "And you offer it like this, when you could just ask me? You have no right—"

"No right?" Enzo interrupted, smacking a hand at the brickwork, angry at being rejected, but his voice barely above a whisper. He looked deep into Dante's eyes. He saw something there that made him feel shame, but he tried to hide it. "Maybe not, but I've learnt to take what I want. Mio dio, in ways you cannot imagine."

"Dio? You speak of God, when you are just another coward who thinks himself above God," Dante said, seeing Enzo flinch and step away from him, realising he hit a nerve. He switched to their native Sicilian, to say, "Ti cridi di essiri Diu? Are you God, Lorenzo?"

"No," he replied, quietly. He backed further away, slowly, his eyes never leaving Dante's own despite the inner turmoil it stirred in him. "Not God. Just a man with enough power at his command to change the world. I have killed for you. I will kill more for you. Your Irish friend, the one they call the Bull is coming to Rome under the delusion he can save you. I know about what they did to you in England, too. If you want I could wipe this Downland off the map. Just ask it, and it shall be done."

"No! No! A thousand times no! You must hurt no one." Dante stared at him, trying to read in his eyes the answer he feared the most. "Who have you killed for me?"

Enzo did not answer. He could not, he realised that now. Instead, he said, "I will leave you hanging here for a little while more, to think about what it is I offer you. Accept my proposal, and no more will die. I will even grant you the life of the Bull of Blacklion if you so desire."

His words, a promise and a threat braided together, seemed to hang in the air between them. He turned to leave, giving Dante a look that spoke of great consequences should he be crossed.

"But know this. You are home. You are mine."

He gave another predatory smile. "And you are going nowhere except to my bed."

Published 5 July, 2026

All the Devil's Men >>