Cesare had waved off his guards for the afternoon. He was in the middle of Chicago after all and Vesper's shop was only about a block from the HQ. He was tired of always having a small platoon follow him everywhere he went. He spent about an hour in the shop making all the preparations for he and Nikki's reception which was fast approaching. It was going to be much bigger than either of them had expected according to the amount of planning Capazzo was putting into things.

This was a pleasant change of pace for Cesare. Since Nikki had helped him chase down the last remaining killers of his brother, there weren't nearly as many brooding thoughts to occupy his mind. Business had taken him across the country, many times without her, but that was behind them now. He was planning time in Europe again; the warmth of Barcelona called to him as he crossed the street. The dream was shattered by the squeeling of tires in front of him as a black car swept inches from his legs and came to rest. Two men immediately emerged and came at Cesare from the back seat. The whole orchestrated movement took only a few seconds and happened so quickly, Cesare wasn't able to retrieve the gun from his waistband which was immediately taken from him. This wasn't a hit, he'd have been dead already, but these guys knew too much, they knew where to find him, they even knew where his gun would be...

The two backed Cesare against the door of the car and suddenly his eyesight went black. A high pitched ring echoed in his head as he refocused just long enough to see the butt of his own gun crashing towards his temple again. This was paired with a strong right-handed fist by the second man which buckled Cesare's knees and sapped what consciousness he had left.

When he regained consciousness, he thought he'd gone blind. He opened his eyes and saw only black. He blinked once, twice, before realizing he was blindfolded.

"There's our sleeping beauty." an arrogant voice came from the surrounding darkness, "Have a nice nap?"

a searing burning pain shot through Cesare's hand. He tried to recoil but found himself bound to whatever chair he was in. The pain was akin to a cigarette being put out on the back of his hand. Then a blow landed plus on his cheek, jerking his face to the side and slumping him off to the side.

"Fuck. Y-" Cesare was interrupted by what felt like a kick to his chest that sent him toppling backwards in the chair helplessly onto his back.

"You've been a busy guy setting up here in Chicago, Mr. Torretta. Got yourself a nice crew, lovely wife, money." The voice came closer to his face, "but you gotta learn to quit while you're ahead!"

A cloth suddenly pressed over Cesare's face and a rush of water entered his lungs. He tried desperately to kick out of the bindings holding him in place. Blind and dumb, he swallowed the flood of water until he nearly thought he would pass out. The cloth was removed and the voice returned.

"Consider this me introducing myself to you, Cesare. You don't know me, but I know quite a bit about you and your operation. I'm the new law here, and you're old news. I'm going to be taking a hard look at you. You won't be able to wipe your ass without me knowing about it. I've got a couple of leads already. Something about a man choked on glass in a Chicago motel, or how about the shooting of an entire pool-hall in Las Vegas? Think anyone was witness to that?"

The cloth returned and with it the terrifying flood into his lungs that had him gasping and clawing at the chair for oxygen.

"Its just a matter of time before someone flips on you, Cesare. When that day comes, I'll find you again, but if I even smell on the air that you're thinking of leaving Chicago, I'll whore out your wife before I put a bullet between your eyes."

Cesare coughed up water from his lungs as the voice finished. His brain struggled to maintain lucidity.

"Be seeing you soon, Cesare."

Then there was only darkness...

Nikki sat at her desk in the HQ, elbows propped as she massaged her temples. She'd spent nearly the entire day calling people, dictating telegrams, even making a few personal visits to people in town, people connected. People in the know. She'd met wall after wall of resistance, but as she was nearing the end of her rope of patience, she'd finally found a guy who knew a guy who was related to a guy that once worked for Al Capone. Now, it was just a matter of talking to said guy, loosening his tongue, and finding out where the damn vault was so that she and Vesper could purge it of its hidden contents.

The phone rang, and she grinned. That was quick! With any luck at all, she could get with the guy before dark and have a rough map sketched out. "Dead Poets So-"

"Heya, Slit. Might wanna come fetch your boy. He's in a bad way," said a gravelly voice on the other end of the line before the audible 'click' of disconnect sounded in her ear. Nikki blinked and stared at the receiver, nostrils flaring as her stomach flipped. She hung up the phone and picked it back up immediately, voice tense as she addressed the operator.

"The last call to this number...where was it?"

"Ma'am, I can't give out that informa-"

'GIVE ME THE FUCKING NUMBER RIGHT NOW!!" she screamed, and after a pause that stretched in to a small eternity, the operator came back again.

"Um. Well it's a payphone on the corner of Emery and Myers. That's down there near-" 

"The docks," Nikki finished, slamming down the receiver and rushing out of the doorway and into the hall. She never thought to grab a purse, or a coat...the only things with any relevancy at this moment were her keys and handguns, which she'd grabbed without thought. Down the hallway and out into the late, cold Chicago sunshine, she ran for the Talbot Lago and fired up the engine, tearing out of the parking space in a hail of horns and obscenities thrown by offended drivers. 

The twenty minute drive took her only ten minutes; fear, speed, and luck pushing her through catastrophically close calls at intersections and red lights. Spotting the corner, and the payphone, she pulled over and checked her weapons as she began a slow, quiet pace up the block. Listening, listening. He was alive, she knew this. The heartstring that stretched between them was intact. He was alive. 

And then, she heard it. Not much more than a scuffle...a shuffle of one object connecting with another. She edged towards the busted-out window of a dilapidated warehouse, placing her hands on the stained wall as she raised on tiptoe. Her 5'7 frame was no where near tall enough to see over the 6 foot sill, but she yelled for him anyway.

"CESARE!!" she called in, and was rewarded with another scraping noise. Nikki was moving before it even stopped, finding the rusty door and shoving it aside. Her eyes needed adjusting, and this was simply a careless. stupid move, but she did it anyway, walking headfirst into the darkness within, a gun in each hand but dangling loosely at her sides. She could smell before she saw...decayed metals...no...burnt pennies? No, it was singed flesh, intermingled with blood. Her vision finally caught up, and she saw him there, a heap of damaged, barely-conscious man. 

Cesare's eyes felt as though someone had installed a dimmer in his brain. He'd somehow loosed the blindfold from his head. The room pulsed from incredible brightness to absolute dark. Somewhere the chuckling of faceless men was replaced with the frantic sound of his name from a voice he recognized...

'Nikki...'

Words didn't come as easily as they had that morning. He lay on his back, every few moments a cough rocked him back into consciousness before he faded back away again. Once, the lights came up in his eyes and she was there. She touched his face before frantically pulling at the bindings around his wrists. Then he remembered sky, a grey cold sky sliding above him as she pulled him towards the car.

When next he came out of darkness it was only the hum of the engine that let him know he was alive. He could hear Nikki speaking but couldn't understand her as his head rocked back and forth with the momentum of the car. His head slumped forward on his neck and he caught the horrible smell from his hand, streaked with a blistered burn across the back of his knuckles.

'Nikki, I think...' He couldn't get the words to come out! He was thinking them, but jumbled moans were all his throat could manage, '...I think I'm dying...' his head fell awkwardly against the window and he faded into the black again.

A sudden panic swept over him. An unbearable sense of dread lifted his chest upwards. He felt as if his body had been flung towards the sun at an impossible speed; the burning orb of light growing bigger and burning him away as he lurched upright in the bed and let out a horrible cry.

"AAAAAAAAAHHH!"

He screamed into the air until his lungs gave out. Disoriented, he couldn't remember where he was or what had brought him there. Everything seemed unfamiliar. The fever dream continued even as Nikki's figure rushed through the door of their bedroom; all the shadows crept back into the corners of the room to bide their time...

There hadn't been much she could do; she'd called in a few acquaintances with medical backgrounds who'd given her any number of possible injuries, accompanied by a long list of recommended treatments...most of which required a trip to the emergency room. She knew better, though. There was no way to explain his condition to medical civilians, and if word got out that the acting head of South Side was hospitalized, all hell would break loose. So she did what she could with the salves, the gauze, the anti-inflammatories and antibiotics, and simply waited. 

He broke through consciousness every now and again, nonsensical words, sounds, screams. As the night wore on and turned to day, he was more coherent each time he awoke, and Nikki had begun to put together something of a picture. It wasn't a rival crew, or even any new one trying to make their mark on the town. Hell, it wasn't even the local cops.

It was federal. 

The time between bouts of consciousness grew shorter, so she stationed herself next to him in an oversized armchair she'd pulled close to the bed. The urge to crawl in next to him had been overwhelming, but not knowing the extent of his injuries, it was a risk she couldn't afford to take. An entire night of lack of sleep and immense stress was taking its toll, though. The cooling mug of chai tea she held between her hands spilled onto her legs when he awoke with another yell; she'd dozed off without even being aware of it.

"Cesare," she said, calmly. She'd run in and yelled back at him in return the first time...it had done nothing to calm him and he'd slipped back under, anyway. She reached out a hand and tentatively touched his shoulder with her fingertips, waiting for him to slow his breathing and realize where he was. Home. Safe. 

For now, anyway.

Cesare's eyes darted back and forth from the door of the room to Nikki as understanding crept back into him. His head was throbbing. He finally was able to recognize his own room and his wife seated next to him. Through the terrible aching of his muscles, memory flooded back of what had happened the evening...day...week before? That voice. He turned panicked towards Nikki. Her face and the touch of her hand on his shoulder kept him from immediately jumping from the bed and hunting the voice.

His countenance softened and he took a breath,

"Hello, Love." he said, happy to have control over his words again. He thought for a moment she may cry. "How bad is it?" He asked looking down at himself, expecting to be missing a limb or something.

Suddenly he became concerned and his eyes swept back up to her face and he barraged her with questions, "Are you okay? Did anyone come talk to you? Thi-This guy, he was saying he was the 'new law', have any cops been around? Fuck, he knew about Vegas, Nikki..."

Nikki let the words wash over her as she watched him through bloodshot eyes. When the questions and half sentences stopped, her hand dropped from his shoulder to his bandaged hand.

"It's more than that, I'm afraid. He knows everything, Cesare. Everything. From the casino job, to the Ireland barfight, to this," she said, her voice wavering as she pulled a large envelope from the table where she'd set her tea. Her eyes overflowed then as she shook out the photographs of the church in Venice.

Of them on the balcony of their suite, afterwards.

"He called while you were sleeping. Those arrived shortly after," she continued, finding it difficult to talk past the lump that had wedged in her throat several hours earlier. It wasn't fear, or anger. It was the utter violation of every moment that Cesare and Nikki had been through since they'd met. She cleared her throat and resumed speaking.

"We're being blackmailed, of course. Not one lump sum, either. He wants payments each week until we no longer exist.

"There's no escaping this, Love. Our only option is to kill him."

Cesare's heart started to fly. The pictures brought out a primal rage that drove against the weakness of his body. He rolled towards the edge of the bed and slid his feet around to the floor. Whatever concern Nikki had was stayed by her shared hatred of whoever had done this to them. Cesare tested his ankles on the floor. He couldn't remember the last time he'd eaten. He shifted his weight onto his legs and took a stumbling step forward. As the blood moved to his legs he moved towards the main room of the house.

He leaned against the wall of the living room and looked out over the city. It wasn't supposed to go this way. Strong-armed by some faceless shadow who knew everything about them. Worse, there was nothing he could do about it. He had no idea who was coming at them, let alone how to get at them. The only choice was to let this play out and bide his time... the thought made him sick.

The shrill metallic ring of the telephone made him turn around. Nikki moved towards the wall near the door where the phone hung...

It was almost as if the phone had a different tone, now. She knew, before even touching it, who would be on the other line. When she lifted the receiver, she didn't bother with any niceties; she simply held it to her ear and listened with a growing dread to the voice on the other line. When acknowledgement was required, she replied with a simple, "alright".

It wasn't alright. None of this was alright. Nikki wondered if anything, ever, would be alright again. She could feel Cesare staring at her as she hung up, then ran to the kitchen where she dry-heaved over the kitchen sink until her stomach cramped. By the time Cesare appeared in the doorway, her arms were propped on the counter and her face was buried in her hands. 

"He wants us to kidnap the mayor's daughter, ransom her for five million. If we don't, he'll kill her and frame us. 

"She's only five, Cesare.

"And he just shut down your DFP."

Cesare cringed at the news. What could the man possibly gain by holding the mayor's daughter ransom? It was exposure Cesare didn't need, and on top of it, his income stream was being cut into. This guy was already putting the screws to them and they didn't even have a name or know what the fucker looked like.

"We have to deal with it ourselves." he said finally breaking out of the shock, "No one else can know we're getting handled by someone. Especially not before we know who it is."

He shuffled over behind her as she leaned over the counter and embraced her from behind. There was nothing to be done. They'd have to face this the same as they'd faced everything...

Together.

It was relatively easy, stealing a child. With your hands, but maybe not so much with your heart, if you claimed to have one. 

The kindergarten at PS107 let loose a flood of chirping youngsters into the afternoon sun at three o'clock. It was Friday, and they were extra happy to be free for the next couple of days from the grueling tasks of finger painting and forced naps. Nikki and Cesare had made a quick stop at the mayor's home just fifteen minutes before, and while Nikki idled in the roadway, Cesare had simply leaned out the passenger side door and stuck a blade into the nanny's rear tire.

Now, positions reversed, Cesare idled behind the Lago's wheel and Nikki glanced back and forth between the old newspaper clipping in her hand and the horde of children rushing through the double doors of the school. Finding the little toe-headed girl straight away, Nikki tossed the clipping aside, gave Cesare a rather defeated smile, and stepped out of the car. Using a determined, yet casual pace, she approached in a low-key, flowery sundress and large hat that obscured most of her face. Just another mommy. A faceless one, at that.

"Maggie, Honey?" She cooed at the young girl as she knelt next to her. The girl looked up, and in that moment, Nikki never hated herself more. Blind, trusting innocence stared back at her. The girl even smiled.

"I...um. Hi! Nanny has had car trouble, Sweetie. She asked if we'd pick you up and take you for ice cream while the car is being fixed. Would that be okay with you?" The girl had enough sense to hesitate; Nikki approved. But then she pushed harder.

"We can go to that shoppe around the corner and wait. But there's some at my house, too, Chocolate! And...we have a puppy," she said, hitting ground zero in her self-regard at this point. It worked, of course.

"Oh gosh, you have a puppy? What kind? What's its name?" Maggie started in with a litany of endless questioning as Nikki placed a hand on her shoulders and directed her to the car. 

"Is this your car? Is that your husband? Both very nice looking!" She continued as Nikki slid in and popped Maggie onto her lap. The young girl never stopped prattling, but rather than annoying, it was endearing. Nikki flopped her head back onto the head rest and rolled it to the left, looking at Cesare.

'We're terrible people', that look said.

Cesare hung up the payphone on the corner of the street and turned back towards the car. The mayor's office had been informed of the situation and were instructed to drop the ransom money in the park in the next 48 hours. He turned to walk back to the car and through the windshield saw Maggie seated facing Nikki in her lap giggling as she played at styling Nikki's hair by effectively messing it up with her hands. He opened the car door and sat down.

"Look at her, isn't she pretty?" the little girl inquired with a mischievous grin as she looked at Cesare. Nikki turned her head with hair pulled down over her eyes.

"Absolutely gorgeous." Cesare grinned. He turned the key as Nikki tickled Maggie's sides causing her to burst into a fit of giggles.

It would have been incredibly heartwarming if it wasn't so incredibly wrong...