The safe didn’t hold gold or diamonds—it held a death sentence signed by his closest partner.
The Setup
The heavy steel door groaned, swinging open to reveal a hollow belly of absolute nothingness. Except for the white rectangle sitting dead center on the velvet shelf.
Nick “The Finger” Faliski pulled his hand back like he’d been burned. His chest tightened. “Tubby,” he whispered, his voice catching in his throat. “We got a problem.”
Tubby Links didn’t turn around. His massive silhouette remained glued to the frosted glass of the office door, neon rain from the street below bleeding through the blinds, casting prison bars across his trench coat. “Pack it up, Nick. The black-and-whites just turned the corner on Fourth. We got two minutes.”
“There’s no ice, Tubby. No cash.” Nick reached in, his gloved fingers trembling as he snatched the heavy vellum envelope. “Just this.”
Printed across the front in sharp, mechanical type were two names: Faliski & Links.
Tubby finally turned, his face half-swallowed by the shadows of his fedora. The yellow light of his cigarette flared, illuminating a sudden, cold calculation in his eyes. He didn’t look surprised. He looked ready. “Open it,” he grunted, his hand sliding slowly into his coat pocket—where his snub-nosed .38 lived.
Nick tore the seal. His eyes flew across the single sheet of paper inside. It wasn’t a setup by the cops. It was a ledger. Specifically, a list of offshore accounts detailing exactly how Tubby had been feeding info to the Maroni syndicate for months—including the tip that put Nick’s brother in a concrete jacket.
The sirens screamed closer, rattling the windowpane.
Nick looked up, the paper clutching his fingers like a death warrant. Tubby’s gun was out now, the silencer catching the dim neon glow.
“You shouldn’t have looked, Nick,” Tubby sighed.
But Nick’s other hand was already in his pocket, wrapped around his own cold steel.
Finish the Story
The sirens are outside. Two old friends are trapped in a dark room, guns drawn, and only one exit. Who walks out into the rain, and who stays behind with the safe? You decide how the curtain falls on Nick and Tubby.
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