Domenico Rauth
You ever have one of those days where everyone around you seems committed to being an idiot?
That was my Tuesday.
By nine a.m., my consigliere had already managed to misplace a ledger, a supplier in Jersey was crying about "unfair distribution," and my cousin Giacomo was threatening to start a TikTok dance account to "rebrand" the family.
"People want relatability, Dom," he told me, waving his hands like a magician who just lost his rabbit. "You gotta move with the times."
Relatability. From the Rauth family. A collection of smugglers, thieves, and extortionists whose idea of customer service was not killing you today.
I told him if he ever posted a video of himself doing the Macarena in our warehouse, I'd put him in the river weighted down with his own ring light.
So yes. That was my morning.
By noon, I was in Brooklyn, dealing with two idiots who'd decided to skim from the cash flow. I'll save you the suspense: they won't be doing it again. I don't enjoy violence. People assume I do, because of the sharp suits and the sharper reputation, but truthfully? It's exhausting. Blood never comes out of suede.
By late afternoon, I was ready to pour myself a drink and consider whether everyone around me was born with half a brain cell between them. That's when Matteo, my second, showed me the video.
"Boss, you gotta see this," he said, grinning too wide. Always a bad sign.
I frowned. "If it's another TikTok of Giacomo, I'm not watching."
"No. This one's not ours."
He shoved his phone at me. On screen: a woman on a dingy stage, pacing with a microphone, eyes lit with fire.
"Queens is wild," she was saying, sass dripping from every syllable. "My neighbors argue so loud, I swear the FBI could just tap my walls and close three cold cases. Free labor, boys."
The audience laughed. So did Matteo.
I didn't.
I leaned back, arms crossed, and kept watching.
She roasted the mafia like she was auditioning for a roast of hell itself. Garlic smells, mob nicknames, death by sarcasm. The crowd ate it up. And her delivery… sharp, unapologetic, the kind of humor that cuts as it entertains.
By the time she got to "Congrats, you're Ricky Rigatoni the Squirrel," Matteo was wheezing.
"Funny, right?" he said.
I stared at the screen, at her. "Funny is one word."
Another word was reckless. Or maybe suicidal.
Because no one—no one—stood on a stage in my city and made the mafia name into a punchline. Not unless they wanted attention of the permanent kind.
But here's the thing. I wasn't angry.
I was… intrigued.
I've heard every insult. Every threat. Every desperate last plea. But no one had ever, in my thirty-five years, dared to joke about us like it was a comedy routine.
And certainly not with a face like hers.
Sharp mouth, eyes that sparkled like she knew the world's punchline and you didn't. She didn't even flinch in her delivery, not once. That wasn't ignorance. That was defiance wrapped in lipstick.
"Find out where she's performing next," I said, handing the phone back.
Matteo blinked. "You're not gonna—?"
"If I were gonna kill her, Matteo, would I need to buy a ticket first?"
He shut up.
That evening, I sat through more nonsense: a dinner with men pretending to be loyal while secretly calculating how much they could steal if I vanished tomorrow. I let them talk, nodded at the right places, and imagined how refreshing it would be to discuss something other than shipments and blood debts.
By the time I was done, I needed something different. Something unpredictable.
So I went to Queens.
The Rusty Mic. A dive. I'd stepped into interrogation rooms that smelled better. The floor stuck to my shoes. The bartender looked at me like he couldn't decide whether to serve me or confess his sins.
Good. Fear is honest.
I took the front row, center. Because if you want someone to know you're there, you don't hide in the shadows. You sit in the light.
And then she came out.
Lysandra Vale.
Smaller in person than she looked on video, but the energy? Bigger. She owned the stage like it was a battlefield and her weapon was sarcasm.
"My landlord still hasn't fixed my sink," she declared. "At this point I'm one leaky faucet away from joining the mafia just for the dental plan."
The crowd laughed. My mouth curved, just slightly. Dental plan. Cute.
She moved fast, sharp. A whip-crack of words. "I asked for pest control, and a guy named Vinny showed up with a baseball bat. To deal with the rat problem."
They howled. I didn't.
Not because she wasn't funny—she was—but because I was too busy studying the fire in her. The reckless way she invited danger with a grin. The way she didn't scan the room nervously like someone afraid of reprisal. Either she truly didn't believe in consequences, or she'd accepted them already.
Both fascinated me.
Then she looked at me. Our eyes locked, mid-joke, and for a fraction of a second, she faltered. Just enough to tell me she wasn't completely oblivious. She knew. She felt the weight of me there.
Good.
Still, she pushed on, poking the bear with a smirk. Garlic knots, carb-loading mobsters, all of it. The crowd roared.
I didn't move. Just watched.
When it ended, applause thundered. She bowed. Signed napkins. Took selfies. And I stood, slow, deliberate, and walked toward the exit.
Because that's how you test someone. You leave a door open and see if they're bold—or stupid—enough to follow.
"Hey! Suit guy!" she called.
I stopped. Turned.
Close now, I could see the sweat on her collarbone, the defiance in her chin tilt, the spark that hadn't dimmed despite the nerves behind it.
"You've got guts," I told her. Dry, even. Not a compliment. A fact.
She smirked. "Well, I'm not most people."
No. She wasn't.
I gave her my card. Just a name and a number. Heavy paper, black stock. The kind of card that means something.
Her fingers brushed mine when she took it. Warm. Steady. Not shaking.
I left without another word, stepping into the cool night air.
Behind me, the dive buzzed with laughter and spilled drinks, but all I could think of was her face.
Lysandra Vale.
Funny. Fearless. And very possibly the biggest problem I'd ever decide not to solve.
That night, when Matteo asked what I thought, I poured myself a drink and gave him the only answer that made sense.
"She's either the dumbest woman I've ever met," I said, sipping slowly, "or the most reckless one."
And for the first time in a long while, I found myself smiling.