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Henroin had regrets. Any man in his field with his list of accomplishment would have a list of regrets at least as long, not that many would admit it. He was the same. He spent most of his life insisting his actions were worth his empire, right up to the day he died the same way every man in his field did.
His death wasn’t one of his regrets. He knew it was inevitable from the moment he took the mantle from his father, the same way his father knew the moment he took the mantle from his father before him. He’d accepted the bullet long before he ever watched it blow through his chest. He didn’t even remember feeling pain, too numb to his body with the anticipation of reuniting with his wife, his daughter, maybe even his son…
That was a regret. Not missing out on heaven; he knew the idea of ever seeing his wife again was wishful thinking even as he breathed his last breaths. He hated it, hated the thought of never holding her, never speaking to her, but to regret his sentence would be to regret his entire empire. He’d made peace with who he was, just like she had.
No, he regretted the way he dealt with his children. That he ever thought his children were things to be dealt with at all. That he forgot, in his grief over losing his wife, that they had lost a mother. That he never realized, even after he’d pulled himself together, that they hadn’t bounced back and made their own way through without him. That he didn’t see the pain in their eyes until he watched the life disappear.
He didn’t learn his lesson in life, not even after losing two of his children to that grief. Arakniss seemed to be coping. He always had. He didn’t react to his mother’s death, or his brother’s, or his sister’s. He pushed through, throwing himself into the family business, finding the closest thing he had to joy in taking life. He never talked about what happened up top after Henroin kicked the bucket, but he didn’t last a month longer than his pops. Henroin suspected he went the same way as his siblings. He wondered, sometimes, what kind of boy had been buried under all that cold, detached rage, but he knew it was pointless. That boy was just another one of Arakniss’s victims, another person Henroin ordered him to kill. That was a regret.
Molly was another regret. She was always a sweet girl, always putting herself out for others. He never let her get her hands dirty except in the garden. It wasn’t right for a girl to tarnish her soul with the family business, no matter how much she wanted to help out just so she was helping. When her mama went, she clung to her twin for support. When her twin went, she had no one. He wished he made that connection before he found her cold and still in a tub full of red next to a note saying how hard she tried not to make a mess.
But his biggest regret was Angel. If he’d paid closer attention, if he’d tried to help rather than fix, if he’d listened all those times his boy cried out for love and support the only way he could…but he didn’t. Not when Angel ran off looking for any man he could get that support from. Not when he found peace in a syringe. Not when he begged for the doctors not to take him. Not even when he turned up blue and swollen in some dingy alley.
By the time Henroin made it to hell, Angel had already made a name for himself. As uncomfortable as it was seeing his boy plastered up on billboards looking the way he did, he was glad to know he was doing alright for himself, even from a distance. Even if he never wanted to speak to his dad again, at least he was safe.
Except he was wrong about that, too. Henroin never dealt in the flesh trade when he was alive or in his death, but he knew what came of it. He knew all about fancy-dressed men taking broken girls and breaking them more. Why did he think it would be any different in Hell, of all places? But then, he couldn’t have done anything to save his boy that time anyway, not even if he had known. His family had power, but it was nothing compared to an overlord.
The Radio Demon had that power. He took out Valentino just to pull Angel from his grasp. Henroin could only hope that this overlord would take good care of his boy, because he sure as hell couldn’t take him on if he didn’t. But this time, if he saw Angel hurting, he thought he’d try. He owed his boy at least that. After all the terrible things he turned a blind eye to, if Angel got into trouble again, Henroin had to save him at least once. Even if it killed him.
Henroin didn’t fear death. He had already accepted his fate in life. Why would he fear it now, when he’d already died once? Arakniss and Molly were safe and happier than they’d been since they were kids. They’d be provided for when he was gone. His only unfinished business was with Angel, and if his death had the slightest chance of protecting his boy? If it would bring his son any kind of peace? He’d face erasure gladly.
That’s why, when he felt himself being watched from a shadowy corner of his office, he didn’t go for his gun. He just muddled the sugar cube and bitters in his glass, dropped in some ice cubes, poured the whiskey, and sat back in his armchair. He stared into the fireplace. “You here to kill me?” he asked.
Red eyes glowed in the darkness, light reflecting off a sharp grin. The shadows grew solid around the Cheshire face. “No, not at all,” the Radio Demon said. “Angel gets that honor, if he wishes. I killed my own paternal figure, so it’s only fair that he gets to do the same.”
“You killed his pimp for him.”
“He was afraid, then.” He stepped into the dim firelight. “He isn’t afraid of you. Not anymore.”
“I’m glad.”
That seemed to surprise him—just a slight widening of those wild eyes, but no change in the smile. He walked to Henroin’s desk, examining papers and knickknacks. “You know of Valentino, then?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Do you know what Angel called him?”
“I can guess.”
“It’s fascinating, really. What sort of relationship would one have to have with their father to give that title to a man who dictated how to sell their body? To a man who beat them as near to death as one can get without an angelic weapon? A man who threatened their friends and family, who demanded obedience without question, who forced himself and others onto them and punished the slightest hesitation—” He rapped his cane twice against the side of the desk. A demand for attention. A threat. “What kind of relationship would lead to that?”
“A bad one,” Henroin said. “I ain’t gonna justify myself to you. I can’t. We’re in hell. Nobody’s good people.” But that wasn’t true, was it? Not when sweet Molly had every chance of meeting her ma if she could have held on, if he’d seen her struggling, if he’d found her earlier… He busied himself with another glass, another sugar cube, more bitters and ice and whiskey, even though he’d barely touched his own drink. He placed this one opposite his own on the table, next to the second armchair.
The Radio Demon nodded his thanks and accepted the drink, but remained standing. “He doesn’t talk about you.”
“Didn’t expect he would.”
“He did, once.”
That surprised him. They were one for one, then. “Yeah? All bad things, I’m sure.”
“Of course.” He swirled the ice around the glass. “But he’s run out of words. Now, when he starts to say something about you, all he does is cry.”
He would have rather been shot. A thousand times over, he’d take the bullet over that. “I don’t doubt it,” he said without reacting. “He always was a crier. Just when he was angry, though, after he was grown.”
“Or he never let you see him any other way.”
“I don’t doubt that, either.”
He didn’t respond, but he did take a seat. They sat in silence, listening to the crackle of the fireplace, the Radio Demon’s vacuum-tube hum, the clink of ice in liquor glasses neither of them would drink from.
“He hates me,” Henroin said. It wasn’t a question.
“He does.”
He stared into the flames. “He should.”
“You’re right.”
From somewhere in the distance came the sound of gunfire. Another turf war, but nothing that would dare touch either of their territories.
The Radio Demon broke the silence this time. “You don’t hate him.”
“Never.” There was no hesitation.
He leaned his head back in the chair and closed his eyes, a dark chuckle bubbling from deep in his chest. The firelight glinted against every point of those sharp teeth and left a red shadow in his mouth, like it was blood bubbling in his throat instead.
Henroin’s eyes narrowed. He never took kindly to being laughed at. “What’s so funny?”
“You hated who he was.”
“Never,” he repeated. “I hated what all he got himself into. I never hated who he was.”
He shook his head, still laughing.
“You come here for a reason, or just to mock me?”
“I do have a reason.” He straightened his back and set his shoulders. One hand swirled his glass contemplatively before setting it onto the table untouched. The other clung white-knuckle tight to his cane. “I’m sure you know that I’m an old-fashioned man, and I suspected that you were, as well. I can tell already that I was quite right!” He laughed at his own joke, tinny and bright, so different from before.
Henroin reached towards the table and took his first drink of the night, a silent salute of acknowledgement.
“Of course, my beliefs aren’t quite the same variety of old-fashioned as yours. Obviously so, considering my relationship with your son. But there are certain traditions I feel should be followed, and I am going to follow them.” He turned his head to look Henroin in the eyes. “I’m going to marry your son,” he said quietly. “I’m here to ask for your blessing.”
Of all the things he expected out of this meeting, that wasn’t one of them. Two to one now, in the Radio Demon’s favor. He looked away, finished his drink, and refilled the glass with just whiskey. “My blessing.”
“Indeed.”
The fire lit up his glass, refracting an amber glow into his hand. He drained this drink, too. “And what happens if I refuse?”
“Then you’re not invited to the wedding.”
It was his turn to laugh, just a single breathy noise. “Was I ever invited?”
“That’s up to Angel.”
“He doesn’t know you’re here.” That wasn’t a question, either.
“He doesn’t.”
“You gonna tell him?”
The Radio Demon’s smile grew. He lifted his drink from the table, took a sip, and set it back down, ice clinking. “That depends on your answer.”
Distantly, an explosion sounded. The shockwave rattled the far window, but it wasn’t near enough to do damage in his territory. Even if it were, his men would handle it. He kept his eyes trained on the fire. “You get a ring yet?”
“Not yet. I thought it would be good manners to at least pretend that your opinion would have any bearing on my actions.”
“How polite of you.”
“I’m nothing if not a gentleman,” he said, tapping his foot, “but even gentlemen get impatient. Might I have your answer so I know how to edit the guest list?”
If Henroin didn’t know any better, he’d have called that impatience nerves instead. That was ridiculous, though. The Radio Demon didn’t get nervous, not asking for someone’s hand. He wasn’t some bumbling young lover terrified of a “no.” But the way his cane twitched in his grip, the way his knee bounced, Henroin couldn’t help but see that fidgeting as anxiety.
“You really care about my boy, don’t you,” he said. It was a question, this time.
“I do.”
“You love him?”
His yellow grin pulled tighter for just a second, then loosened. It settled into something nearly human. “I’m not sure if that’s something I can truthfully say about anyone,” he admitted, “but with your son, it doesn’t feel as though I’m lying.”
And with that admission, Henroin believed him, more than he would have believed any simple “yes”. It would have been so easy to say what any father would want to hear, but he chose the truth. The only question was whether it was a testament to how much or how little the Radio Demon cared for his opinion. But that didn’t matter.
Slowly, Henroin rose from his chair. The Radio Demon’s grip tightened on his staff, but he remained seated, watching intently. Henroin reached behind his neck and unclasped the chain there for the first time in decades. He held it out for the other man to view.
“My wife’s wedding ring,” he said, answering the unspoken question. He took off his own ring, too, and set both between their glasses. “The engagement ring is in the desk, if you want the whole set. They buried me with ‘em, made a deal with some owl bastard to get ‘em down here just for this. Should probably go to Arakniss, but he’s said he’s married to his work so many times I’m inclined to believe him.”
His eyes didn’t leave the rings. “What are you saying, exactly?”
“I’m saying I want Angel to have these when he brings you into the family. Tell him you stole ‘em if you don’t want him knowin’ you talked to me, I don’t care. I just want him to have ‘em.”
“So I have your…?”
“My blessing, yeah.” He crossed the room and circled around his desk, found the hidden compartment of the drawer, and took out the ring he used to propose to his wife. He gave himself a moment to look it over, to revel in the memories, before setting it on the end table with the wedding bands and sitting back in his armchair. He didn’t glance over, but he felt those red eyes on him.
“Might I ask what inspired such a drastic change of heart?”
Henroin refilled his glass again. The ice had mostly melted, leaving him whiskey and water rather than on the rocks. He drank it all the same. “Two of my kids offed themselves while I was still up top,” he said, watching the fire. “Think the third one did, too, when I was already down here, but he still won’t talk about it. They didn’t know what was comin’ next for ‘em, but they figured anything was better than the world I made for them. I’m just tryin’ to make up for that. Don’t think I ever will.”
“But you intend to try by blessing a union you don’t approve of?”
He locked eyes with the Radio Demon. “Denying my son is what killed him. He can be the biggest fag this side of the pearly gates if it makes him happy and keeps him alive. So, Mister Radio Demon…” He set his glass on the table and leaned in close. “You and I both know I can’t hope to defeat you. But if you hurt my boy, I swear that me and my family will make the rest of your existence into a real Hell trying.”
That dark, bubbling laughter returned, echoing about the room. His head fell back, then his whole body lurched forward, cradling his stomach. Henroin nearly expected to watch black sludge fall from his mouth, all the evil inside leaking out, but the laughter didn’t change. Henroin waited it out this time.
“You dare threaten me,” he hissed out eventually, “after the pain you’ve caused? I could never begin to hurt him as much as you have!”
“But do you plan on trying?”
He sobered instantly, the cackling cutting out like he’d switched channels. “Never.”
“Then that’s all I need to know.” He reached for the whiskey. “But we’ll be keeping an eye on things. You want a refill?”
“Why not?”
The fire was dying. It wasn’t yet to embers, but it wouldn’t be long until the last flames receded entirely. The turf war, too, was receding. Explosions and sounds of gunfire grew quieter and quieter, falling away into the distance. The two men drank in silence, watching and listening.
“Is he happy?” Henroin asked.
“I think so.”
“I’m glad.” He swallowed thickly, eyes never leaving the flames. “Even if I don’t understand it, I’m glad you make my boy happy.”
“Why Henroin, it sounds nearly as though you may enjoy having me as a son-in-law.”
He let out a laugh through his nose. “It’s always nice to have an overlord in the family, ‘specially the Radio Demon.”
“It’s Alastor,” he said. “Like you said, we’re family, aren’t we?” Alastor stood, finishing his drink, and pocketed the rings. “As lovely as it was to drink with my future father-in-law, I’d best be going. It’s late, or early rather, and Angel will be worried about me.”
“Wait.”
Alastor stopped.
“If you decide to tell him about this, d’you mind askin’ him to meet up sometime?” he requested. “I’ll shut up and just let him yell at me, or I’ll talk at him and he don’t have to answer, or we’ll just sit around not sayin’ shit, I don’t care. I just want to see he’s doin’ okay with my own eyes, you know?”
He tapped his cane against his leg. “I can’t promise anything.”
“I didn’t expect you to.”
“But I’ll see how he reacts to…all this, then we’ll see.”
“That’s more than I hoped for.”
“That’s a bit depressing, isn’t it?” Alastor spun his cane. It stopped in a grip like a baton, as if he had a parade to lead. “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I have a proposal to do! Ta!”
And with that, Alastor disappeared into the shadows once more, leaving Henroin alone with his regrets once more.