A nightmare-inducing scream burst out of my lungs as my mother's body landed on the asphalt floor of the road with a sickening thud after she was shot.

I stood a few feet away from her unconscious body as the person who had shot my mother zoomed off into the distance. The sound that her body made when it collided with the floor played over and over in my head as I stood there, frozen in shock.

"Mom! Mom, please!" I screamed when I finally got a hold of myself and went over to her body. I sat in the middle of the road, cradling her to her chest. I pleaded for her to open her eyes, but she didn't.

There was blood everywhere, too much of it for me to comprehend.

"Somebody call an ambulance!" one of the witnesses shouted as people started to rush to the scene.

I willed myself to reach into my purse for my phone to dial 911, but my hands couldn't move. Even my fingers were frozen.

~~

"Your mother just died, Jasmine," my father told me sternly over the phone as I told him what my plan was.

"And that's exactly why I'm dropping out of college. The debts are starting to cripple me, and they're not enough. I can't handle all of this with Mom being dead as well," I replied.

I didn't have to freak out and lose my sleep over assignments I had not turned in. No college debts, and I wouldn't have to study over and over.

The one con about it was that there were very limited jobs I could get in a place like Mesquite.

I didn't want a long-term job. I had business plans. I had unlimited sketches of jewelry I wanted to bring to life and sell to jewelry lovers all around the country and, dare I dream, the world.

That would take a huge amount of money to establish, and even more to get it marketed.

The amount of money I had gotten from my dad out of my college funds, which he wasn't too happy to give since I wasn't even going to college, was not enough.

"I still think you need to think—"

"I have spent two good weeks thinking about it, Dad. It doesn't get any better from here if I keep going to college. Just let me do this, please."

With a defeated sigh, he hummed.

"I hope you know what you're doing," he said.

"Me, too." I hung up and turned around.

"Vera."

My roommate dragged her eyes from her MacBook to look at me, her reading glasses perched on her nose.

"I'm broke."

She looked at the empty space, her head comically going from her left and her right and back to me, as if figuring why I had admitted that so suddenly.

"Not broke, but I'm heading in that direction. I have enough money to keep my head above water, surely, but it's not permanent. I wanna start up a business, but my money's not nearly enough—"

"You're going somewhere with this, Jasmine. Just get straight to the point." She cut me off, curiosity on her face.

"You have all of these nice things! A MacBook, designer dresses that I could never dream of having—"

"You want to know how I make my money." Bingo.

"Well, yes." I nodded.

She sighed, placing the laptop on the small table beside her couch. She rubbed her face and grumbled. "I have an apartment, handed to me by my father." She paused, looking at me. "I take it you don't have a property somewhere."

"Nope." I shook my head. If I were being paid every month, I wouldn't be struggling.

"I do have a job. It's not one I'd like to introduce you to, but it does pay enough."

My heart thumped in anticipation and fear.

"You'll have to work for the Capo."

A spark inside of me died. There was only one person in Mesquite that everyone knew as the Capo – Luciano D'Angelo, the Capo of the mob all over Las Vegas.

I had sworn to have nothing to do with him, including setting my eyes on him. I had heard stories, and I only wanted things to end there. Hearing the stories and never seeing it would make it less real, like an old wives' tale.

Working for him would be crossing the line by so much distance.

"And by the Capo, you mean…"

Vera nodded, confirming my doubts.

I would say no, I had to say no. I just had to know the details before refusing the offer.

"And how exactly do I work for him?"

"There are two spots available. One of his strip bars, right before Devil's Bowl. You could be a server." She shrugged, not mentioning what the second spot was. She obviously didn't want me to know about it, but I was close to desperate in that moment.

"Or…?"

"Jasmine," she called, "are you sure you want to? I don't work full-time. I could give you a loan or something."

Yes, I knew Vera came from oil and gas old money, but I also knew she made a considerable amount for herself where she worked. I had woken up to her counting numerous bills of hundreds when she returned.

"I'm not saying I want to do it. I'm going to give it a thought before I make a decision." There it was, the truth. I was not going to reject the offer immediately.

I was going to think about working for Luciano. The world had gone mad, and I had caught the virus.

She let out a breath before giving me a shrug of indifference. "If you want to make quick cash, you'll have to go for being a dancer."

"A dancer?" My eyes narrowed as I waited for her to broaden the details.

"A stripper."

My mouth opened, then closed, then opened again.

"My father would kill me!"

"I'm not saying you should do it, you asked me." She raised her hands in surrender as a smile crept up her face.

"How much do I get paid as a server?" I inquired.

"I don't know, but you get paid hourly, with tips. Dancers get paid per hour, too, but their tips from the men and women at the bar are way more than you could ever get as a server. All you have to do is find your target audience and hook them."

I didn't know if stripper jobs had ambassadors, but Vera sure as hell sounded like one.

"You know, it's like you're selling this dancer package to me," I laughed.

I was buying it.

"It's not as bad, since everyone's afraid of Luciano and what would happen to them if they treat his dancers the wrong way. I don't think he cares that much, though."

"Anything else I should know?" I was highly considering it now. The more she spoke, the more I was drawn to the idea.

I would have to be a server. I would only have to serve people their drinks. I didn't necessarily have to see Luciano. Maybe once every week, or not even at all.

"If you decide to dance, which I don't think you will by the look on your face, the men will hit on you. Most will want to take you home for the night and sleep with you. You can say no, and you can say yes. Doesn't really matter. Just don't sleep with anyone for free, it's not worth it." She shook her head, cringing. I had a feeling she had slept with someone for free before and she regretted it.

"They won't, if I'm a server?"

"Oh, they will. Have you seen you?" I rolled my eyes, playfully tossing a throw pillow at her as she laughed.

"Can you help me? I wanna serve. I'll figure things out, maybe get a better job, while I'm at it."

"Can't, Jaz. The only help I could give, I already did. You'll have to take your two feet up to Devil's Bowl and tell the Capothat you want to be one of his workers." She shrugged.

"How do I do that?" The thought of doing something like that made my heart want to leap out of my throat, fall to the floor and crawl away from my body so that it wouldn't be involved in whatever I wanted to get involved with.

"Well, you'll have to find him. He does spend most of his afternoons and evenings at the Devil's Bowl Speedway with his brother. If you're lucky enough, you'll find him at the bar."

"I heard the speedway is dangerous."

"It is." She nodded.

Was anything safe in Mesquite?

"Now, Jasmine. If you ever do meet him, don't stutter. Don't start a story and beat around the bush like you always do. He'll walk away while you're in the middle of your monologue, and you'll feel stupid. Trust me, I've been there."

"Anything else?"

"I would say you shouldn't do anything to piss him off, but a lot pisses him off. And you're…" She stopped before she could say what she originally wanted to say. "Good luck."

"I'm what?"

"Oh, nothing." She took her laptop, hiding the mischievous smile on her face.

That evening, I threw on a windbreaker with a pair of jeans and a pair of Converse I only used when I wanted to look like someone who wasn't going down the drain of capitalism.

It took me about half an hour to comb out my hair and tie a silk scarf over it before I headed out to hunt for Luciano.

Don't mess it up, don't mess it up, don't mess it up.

I chanted the four words in my head until it felt like that was the first thing I would say when I saw Luciano D'Angelo.

When I got to Devil's Bowl Speedway, my feet stuck to the ground as I found two racecars speeding towards each other on the track, not one of them showing a sign of stopping.

The drivers were going to kill each other.