“An eternal shine,” Gunn says to the audience. “A bottle of pure, liquid magic, caged by magic. An old and secret magic that we have perfected, that would not have seen the light of day without the power of this magic haven.” Gunn hands the bottle back to Joan. “Or of course, without a powerful, resourceful sorcerer.”
Colletto stands up slowly and walks to the front of the stage. “May I see the bottle?” he asks Joan.
“Go on,” Gunn tells her.
Joan heads down the stairs to hand the bottle to Colletto, while I get a strong, overwhelming urge to gut Gunn, right here and now. He’s standing so close, I could wrap my fingers around his neck. I could conjure a thousand knives, incise him with cuts just like Joan’s, let him bleed out slowly.
“That’s yours to keep,” Gunn tells Colletto, once Joan takes her place back among us. “I knew you wanted to make sure there was no tampering with the sample I showed you last time. You saw this one brewed and bottled yourself—so take it back with you, confirm its shelf life, and open it in a few days. When you see it’s real, I expect we’ll have a deal.”
As Colletto studies the glass bottle, the room buzzes around him. The air is tense, expectant, excited—and my mind is buzzing right along with it. Because everything I’ve been shelving . . . Joan’s relationship with Gunn, her caginess, her secrets, her unparalleled power . . . there’s no ignoring it anymore. It’s impossible not to bring this deal down without bringing Joan down with it. Because Joan is the magic behind the largest score in Unit history. Joan is the eternal shine.
Colletto says, “Tell me exactly how it’s done.”
Gunn shakes his head. “If we’re going to embark on this road together, there needs to be a foundation of trust, of partnership. I assured you that I can make this product, again and again. Now leave the magic to me,” he says. “Our history of hate has lasted far too long. It’s time to put the past behind us.”
Gunn is a cold, ruthless bastard, but even still, I can’t wrap my head around his decision to team up with Colletto. He’s shaking hands with the gangster who gunned down his father, Danny the Gun. He’s delivering the death blow to his mentor McEvoy, to align with the enemy. This bastard deserves everything that’s coming to him.
Colletto looks up at Gunn on his stage, nods. “How much?”
“You give me two hundred and fifty dollars for every gallon. You charge double on the street, and the difference of course will fall to you. We shake hands, and you’ll have our word that you’ll be our sole distributor, on the only shippable shine known to man,” Gunn says slowly. “And in exchange, you give up the shining room business—my Shaws get a complete monopoly on performance magic in the city.”
Colletto keeps his eyes on the glistening red bottle. “And the rest of our operations? Gambling, racketeering, loans?”
“The rest of our proposed agreement would go immediately into action. We reorganize the district. Everything west of Fourteenth Street is ours. You take the east. A smooth criminal empire, as I believe my father once called it,” Gunn says tightly. “Before lesser men took a hammer to his vision.”
A true deal between the Shaws and their enemies. A deal across all operations, no less—hell, a partnership. Agent Frain is going to flip.
Colletto turns the bottle over once more in his hand. “Thursday,” he finally answers. “I’ll give you ten thousand for fifty gallons. You throw in the sweeteners we talked about, and we’ve got a deal.”
Gunn breaks into an uncharacteristically wide smile, a smile that almost makes him look boyish—reminds me of just how young this mongrel is, and just how high he’s managed to claw. He gestures for our troupe to descend the stage. “I think this calls for a toast.”
On cue, stagehands file into the performance space with large silver trays loaded with shot glasses, ascend the stairs, and grab the remaining six bottles of shine from the stage. And with that, the vibe of the room shifts. Shine is being poured. The deal is going forward. Foes have turned into allies, and an almost festive air settles over the crowd. I need to pass this on to Frain, all of it—
“But first, how about a round of applause for our performers?” Gunn says.
Colletto claps a full, long applause, and his team of thugs joins in. We bow slightly, as Joan, the star, takes a full curtsy in front of their benches. Does she realize that all eyes are on her now? Does she understand that these gangsters see her as a commodity, a valuable asset that could be sold, or stolen?
Another reason why I need to shut this operation down.