Across his sharp features, the ghost of concern fights with pride. We can't keep the kid out of the ring. The world can't keep the ring out of a Butcher's soul.
So this will become the new place to meet my associates—on hallowed Butcher ground. A physical change that shifts the men chosen by Jimmy. I need to create my own mark and ensure my own loyalties. This is the place.
Beside my father, my other brothers watch Xander, and I note their expressions seem to mirror my thoughts. Pride in his abilities. Reluctancy in the situation.
I don't know them…
Not really.
I just know the legacy.
"Keep your distance."
"This is your legacy."
"Your birthright."
And I feel the detachment between us because I wasn't present, because I had a singular focus on the legacy. I forced our segregation. Ignored them as children.
Accepted that a leader is by default alone, only dragged down by common needs and wants. So, while Max played rugby and Bronson fixed his bikes, Xander followed them around, and I listened to the Family heads. Learned.
A leader is always alone.
It is achingly obvious too. My brothers sit together at the east side of the ring—always loyal to one another. I weather the west side alone, circled by sharks. Surrounded by the Capos and the Underbosses hand-picked by my ex-Don. A man who betrayed us, who us Butchers executed.
So today, I show this pack of cruel, greedy fuckers a new order. I don't trust them, yet. They'll want to earn that from me soon. We won't be doing things the Jimmy Storm way. We'll be doing things theButcherway. I'll be splintering teeth in this new world where my last name carries with it utter loyalty, devotion, even.
"Your brother fights like Luca," Joe says, drawing me from my thoughts, his gravelly voice melodic with his old-world Sicilian accent. Had I not known, I would have assumed he was a new immigrant to Australia. But he is one of the oldest Underbosses in the District, one of the most devout to Jimmy Storm, even in memory. One I need to crack open and bleed the loyalty from…
"He does," I agree, my mouth patting the thin port cigar dangling from my lips. I look on at the match but listen to the man beside me as his sighs expel in rough displeasure.
"Your father always was more comfortable in the ring than in a suit. It should have stayed that way," he says with a derisive scoff. "He left the Family all those years ago. Spat on his legacy and left Sicily. Changed his name, a name rooted in Family honour, and still, they loved him. And now, his son, the son of a boxer, is the Don in the District."
"A history lesson, Joe."
He folds his arms over his chest, still watching the match as I do. "What do you want, Clay? I've been keeping up my end of the deals made with Jimmy. Like I agreed to. What is this really about?"
Loyalty.
Devotion.
I inhale the cigar, and answer around the exhale, my words rolling along the smoky ribbons. "A history lesson… A lesson in loyalty. In your loyalty to the Family. Your loyalty to Alcue's ancestry, the bloodline that runs through this boxer's son's veins." As the words leave my mouth, Xander receives a bolo punch that throws him off his pace, allowing his opponent to land a cross jab on the right side of my brother's jaw.
The impact hushes the crowd.
The sound of Xan's grunt instinctively brings me to my feet. With my eyes glued to the match, I watch my sweet brother take a second jab to the eye, the first having clearly rattled his vision, the follow-up throwing him into the far rope. My father and brothers have also risen to their feet, large ominous shadows backing Xander.
All Butcher's on their feet.
Joe's voice wraps around my spine as he says, "Let's talk about loyalty." He is standing beside me now, and I turn my chin towards the snake to listen to every word without breaking my arrowed watch on Xander. "Your father took an oath but left the Family. Alcue had to hunt him down when he should have left the man in the ring where he belonged, not make him a Boss. No refinement in him—that was apparent when he fucked another made man's wife."
His words boil my temper between my ears. I pinch the cigar and throw it to the floor, grinding it into the cement with my heel.
Xander hops from foot to foot, but he's behind pace, careless, receiving another cross to the same gash below his eye socket. I hiss at the contact.
"Your father," Joe continues, "the Family favourite, drove a divide between our association in Australia, but Jimmy… Jimmy kept him under his protection because ofyou. Because of your brothers, because he lacked his own male soldiers, his own heirs."
Jolted backwards, Xander hits the rope, bouncing on it for a moment of careless reprieve until Eddie meets him in his recovering position, jabbing his face in brutal succession. My father barks orders at his son from his flank. The crowd is a calamity of boos, cheers, and vicarious groans.