Time is a strange thing.

One minute you're a mobster working back in the Old Country, then a hit goes wrong. Your capo tells you to take a vacation for a while. And you do. You go to Vegas, with all the money and experience you have, starting over from scratch.

That's just one of many theories as to Mister Veils' origin story though, because nobody could figure it out. Even the old gangsters still with ties to the Old Country couldn't find anything on a man going by the alias of Veils.

He just appeared on the Strip one day like a ghost, with a duffel bag, a crisp suit and tie, and a title deed to a small building that used to be a bakery in Paradise.

"Hmm..." Veils hums as he walks around the empty two-floor building. "Certainly has a charm to it." Then he got to work, placing orders for new furniture, mannequins... there was even a backroom on the first floor for storage. "A new life..." He mutters to himself as he made some calls to his contacts for cloth and silk, and his personal Singer sewing machine. That would arrive over the next few days.

Now, to make contact with the crew running this part of town.

As he discovered, or rather expected, it was not so easy to find them. Partially because he was new in town. On the bright side of things, he was getting the lay of the land. His new tailor was in close proximity to a grocery, a few restaurants that he would like to try, and even a shooting range and a speakeasy.

It was on his way back from his little walk, still making mental notes of all the things he needed for his tailor that he bumped into somebody that looked like he had just come out of work, jacket over his shoulder, cigarette in his mouth. "Apologies." He says as he walks past with a nod, but the man had left him something as they brushed past one another.

An envelope. Inside was a list for a job: names of establishments, owners, and the expected payments from each, along with some money for himself.

And it was not a tailor's job.

Based on what he had read in the instructions for him, it was a simple case of collecting debts. Some of Paradise's businesses paid protection money to the gang, which simply had the initials stenciled as LVCC. Whatever that meant.

And it seems they knew him, or at least what he is, but he wasn't going to complain. This was work like everything else.

The sun has set, and the streetlights flicked to life. His first target was one of those restaurants he had seen on his walk across Paradise. "Good evening. Protection money time. You know who sent me."

To his surprise, the restaurant owner hands over his cut without resistance, something about business being good. "Glad to know." He nods his head, tips his hat, and walks out the door. One off the list, onto the next one.

Things were going well. Too well. His pockets full of debt money he had collected, he walked to the last location that was somehow still open this late into the evening. Then he spotted it. A 260D. Someone else was here to collect. His brisk walk slowed, his dress shoes no longer clicking sharply against the pavement.

"Where's our money?"

"Who the hell are you- OOMPH-"

Then he hears the impact of a fist against face, and the sound of tables being thrown aside could be heard even from where he was standing.

"Here's the quick rundown. You don't pay the Club anymore. You pay us. Now give it here."

He steps into a nearby alley as one of the would-be assailants steps out of the store to smoke, while the other remained inside to continue beating up the owner. For a moment, he's back in Sicily, then he leans down and picks up an empty bottle of whiskey, rounding the corner right into the nearby thug.

"That's a nice suit," was all the other man heard before he saw a whiskey bottle swinging right for his face. The bottle didn't break, but it did knock the thug out cold, hitting the pavement with a wet thud.

"Who the fuck-" The other turns away, his fist pulling away from the shop owner's face to look at the open doorway.

Veils stared. And the other thug still standing stared back. "H-Help..." The owner said, a black eye already forming on their face. And Veils dove for cover as the thug stood up and drew his pistol. Gunshots lit up the Vegas night, shattering the storefront's windows and whizzing past him to hit the 260D.

What a waste of a good car, he thinks as he sees the thug continuing to fire blindly into the side-panels. "You fucker-!" The shooter shouts in anger

He drops to the ground just outside the store, and he reaches blindly into the coat of the unconscious bruiser on the sidewalk. His hand wraps around the handle of a revolver, and as the other thug stepped out of the doorway to finish the job, they raised their guns and fired.

Veils gets hit through the shoulder. The thug gets lead right through the brain, spraying viscera up across the store's sign. It was over in seconds. "Urgh. Fuck..." He growls as he stands up. "This was a Brioni, you fuck-" He snarls as he stands up, his temper flaring as he started kicking the dead man. After a few more seconds, he takes a deep breath, growling in pain and he turns to pick up his fedora, slipping it back onto his head and tilting it forward.

The shop owner had gone into hiding behind his counter, then once the shooting stopped, he had gone out. "You're shot."

"I'm fine. I'm here to collect. Where is the money?"

"You're with the Club?" The owner asks as he stands up from behind the counter. Veils walks into the establishment. It was a grocery store, but the thugs had taken their time trashing the place.

"Yes." And that was all the owner of the store needed to know as he reached under the counter for a lockbox. "Here. You should get that-"

"I can handle it." He opens the lockbox, then grabs his list. He only takes what was written. Nothing more. "Good evening." Veils tips his hat, walks out the door, then realizes there was a dead body and an unconscious bruiser that was starting to wake up.

And it just so happened that the car was still nearby. "... so much for laying low."

I was heading back to my room late when I saw a figure limping down the street. Dressed sharp, but there was a tear in the shoulder of his jacket, dark with blood. He was holding his arm tight against his side, moving slow but steady.

I didn't stop to ask questions. Figured a man in that state didn't need a stranger poking his nose in. But I recognized him—Mister Veils, the tailor from that strange shop in Paradise. He'd made me a suit just a week ago.

I didn't say anything. Just gave him a nod as I passed. He nodded back. That was enough.

Veils barely looked up when he noticed the stares from someone across the street. The man nodded, and Veils nodded back. Perhaps somebody in connection to LVCC. Nonetheless he got to work dragging the bodies into the back of the 260D. It pained him to ruin the interior of a nice car with blood, but it had to be done. Veils looks over to the shop owner.

“I saw nothing.“ The shop owner said as he began cleaning up his grocery, pulling up toppled-shelves and some tables nearby, then he walked to the back, returning with a broom. “At least those pricks have been dealt with. Good riddance,” the owner says as he starts sweeping up the broken glass.

Veils understood. “Enjoy your evening.” He tips his hat, then steps back into the cold night air. No police movement, no sirens getting closer. Lucky night for him, he supposed, as he looked through the two thugs’ pockets for the keys. Finding them on the dead man, he gets into the driver’s seat, before realizing something. “Excuse me. You wouldn’t happen to have a shovel, would you?” He says after getting out of the car. The owner shakes his head. “There’s a hardware store down the street that should have what you need.”

”Thank you, again.” Veils says politely as he gets back in the running car. Now to head for the desert to finish this properly. He still had a tailor to properly set up.

The next day, Veils woke up on the second floor housing just above his tailor. He could hear a delivery truck unloading things outside. It seems his calls worked. The 260D was parked outside, the side with the bullet holes facing towards his tailor to avoid suspicion. He slips on a dress shirt, some pants and his shoes from yesterday and heads downstairs to talk with the driver.

"Are you... Alan Reeves?" The driver asks as he looks down at his clipboard. All around him, his men were moving stuff inside. Wooden cabinets to display dress shoes and heels. Mannequins for his work. But the most important one was the Singer sewing machine "Yes, I am. Please bring that sewing machine to the backroom, along with one mannequin would you?"

"Of course. Come on, let's get this done!" Veils meanwhile fishes out some cash to pay the driver, and while he was directing the workers on where to put stuff, he thinks back to the night before.

The Mercedes-Benz rumbled down the street away from the hardware store that was luckily just minutes away from closing when he had arrived. He kept his car at the speed limit should some police be nearby, lest they find it suspicious. The tank was full, so he was certain he had enough time to find his way out of Paradise and into the desert of Nevada. He was certain that tomorrow, he was going to make contact with somebody from the LVCC, whatever that acronym meant.

After a few turns and crossing, he was approaching the edges of Paradise. The open desert unfolded in front of him as he hit one of the highways. He had to go just far enough away that nobody would ever come looking for these two.

"Urgh..."

He hears the one living suited gangster groan in the backseat. "What the fuck-" Veils picks up the pistol, deftly flips it so the handle was facing up, and he stops the car in the middle of the empty highway, turning around to swiftly whack the man back into unconsciousness.

"Uh sir Reeves?" Veils is broken out of his thoughts when he hears his 'name' being called. "Where shall we put this register?" He sighs. "There. On the counter, on the far left."

He looks at his new tailor. On the right side was suits, fedoras, and dress shoes. On the left was dresses, sunhats and heels. The floor had a dark wooden exterior, so there wasn't much he needed to do there. "Okay. Are we even?"

"Yes, sir. All payment accounted for."

"Thank you very much." Veils and the driver shake hands, and the latter whistles for his boys to get on out. Soon Veils is left alone, in the middle of a tailor that would soon open, a Mercedes-Benz that still bore signs of last night's violence, and a chance still that he could lay low. Maybe.