ą¼āą¼ Aināt Mine To Hold. / Powerless. ā
Elijah āSmokeā Moore x Black Fem!Y/n
warnings: lmao murder, tw slight abuse but not detailed, soft but wary smoke, walls up higher than the eiffel, a man begginā on his knees, role reversal.
synopsis: playing a dangerous game with a gangstaās woman.
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āKillinā me softlyā¦āā£
He had never understood how some fools died for love.
How they'd lose their livelihoods and sometimes even their lives for some tail, long as she was shaped pretty and her curves felt nice and soft when he pulled her close. Flash that pretty smile just right and you could drive a good-loving, God-fearing man insane. That was dangerous in his world. Specially somewhere like Chicago.
Let your nose sniff round like a starving stray dog somewhere you ain't belong, and it just might be the death of you.
Being a fool for love made you weak, and Elijah 'Smoke' Moore was anything but.
He was forged in war, built to walk into a room and own it. Eyes sharp, calculating, and cold like he always knew something you didn't and wasn't gone tell you a damn thing bout it. He walked with a confidence and swagger that could buckle a lady's knees with just one heated gaze.
That's just who he was. He'd bring a lady to bed and send her bout her business soon after. Domestic life wasn't for him. He was made of gunpowder and tobacco smoke; love made men weak. All rosy cheeks and sweet moans. Sure, it was fun, but that's all it was.
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Madame.
There was only a certain type of man that ended up at Madame. a gentlemens bar that hosted your every fantasy if you came at just the right time. Pretty women for disgusting men to ogle when they should be at home with their kids and wife. Pretty women to perform and distract from the deals going on behind the scenes, maybe some of it might even be legal.
Madame was uptown Chicago, now you didn't go uptown without walking past a building that inevitably belonged to the Saintly Knights. That was their territory, and at the head of it was Louie Matafa. The damned son of the late founder of SK, Elan Matafa. Took over before his old man's body had even reached the ground.
He became a man with a name that held power. Held fear. Sumn Smoke had always desired.
Louie was 5'7, tan complexion and half-balding, slicked-back hair. This brooding Italian nigga from West Chicago with anger issues and an ego that didn't go with his looks, made only bigger by the presence he took up when he entered a room. He wasn't much to look at, but he walked around like he was. Louie was a nepo baby, simply put. And he was made of narcissism, born into the very midst of it until it was all he was allowed to become. He was worse than his father, though; he didn't make threats he wasn't sure he could carry out, and never was shy to send a bullet whizzing past a nigga ear when he needed to make a point.
There were two things Louie never played about as far as anyone knew. ā His money and his woman. Men ended up missing in action if they moved the wrong way around either.
That's why Elijah wasn't quite sure how he got himself in this predicament.
Smoke and Louie had crossed paths during a game of Spades, suppose he saw somethin' trustworthy in him, cause it wasn't long before he was moving pure Colombian brick through the streets for the man. After that, he'd become a sorta right-hand for Louie, though he ain't trust him far as he could throw him. Then again, Smoke trusted no one but his twin, and that was still an awful stretch.
He thought that's what this was, sumn routine, sumn familiar. He would've prayed on his knees like he'd never done before if only he'd actually known what he was getting himself into.
ā A cigarette dangled from the corner of his mouth, familiar blue tweed newsboy cap tugged over his eyes, and hands stuffed into the pockets of his slacks. He'd made his way through the salivating dickheads on the floor, only to find himself in the low blacklight of Louie's VIP. Guards with badly concealed guns cautiously allowed him through.
It didn't matter where you watched, though; everybody was eyeing the same thing. Try as he might, Elijah wasn't immune. His eyes silently observe, and the sight is damn captivating. She was helluva woman, and he was but a man.
Louie didn't spare a glance his way, beckoning him over whilst grinning something sick, something that'd make a weak stomach churn. "Take a seat, my friend. Enjoy the view."
With his eyes narrowed, Smoke made mental note of the gun strapped to his hip, just in case. Always just in case.
ā He takes a seat near Louie, his eyes still on that stage. He don't say nothing, nah, he was gone let Lou speak first. He had a show to watch.
"Ain't she somethin'?" Louie asked in this low rasp that told you the bastard was turned on, a fact Elijah wished he could ignore, meanwhile watching the man's sausage fingers clench a little tighter round the cigar he slid between thin lips, out of his peripheral.
He was right, though. She was absolutely something. Stood on that stage wrapped in navy blue satin, body moving like her voice carried, elegant, soft, but filled with a storm that spoke up somethin' harmful looking far too damn harmless. Real temptin. That was bad for Elijah.
"That's you?" Smoke finally spoke, all gruff yet careful like; That smooth Mississippi drawl contrasting those hard, sharp, and seemingly endless stormy mudwater brown eyes that gave no hint of emotion gazing out onto that stage.
"That's all me." Louie nodded, a proud yellow-toothed grin stretched across his face, leaving possession and unease in the air.
Neither of them spoke again for a good moment after that.
One of his girls puts down two glasses of Bourbon, and Smoke is more than grateful for the distraction, his hand clenched around the glass, swishing the amber liquid around until Louie's woman hits a particular high note that sends his heart thudding in his chest. He downs it without another thought, the burn highly welcome.
Louie finally breaks the silence.
"You like money, Smoke?"
Elijah grunts at this, eyes still on stage, "Don't everybody?"
At this, Louie lets out this hearty chuckle, sitting up straighter in his seat before turning to look at the man next to him, reaching over to pat Smoke's leg, leaning in like he was telling him a secret.
"Y'see. I like you, Smoke. I trust ya. You're a good kid, and I don't trust just nobody with my Star...No."
Smoke just watches him, trigger finger itching in response to the sudden nearness. As if sensing this, Louie's hand moves from his leg to his shoulder, still too close for comfort from Elijah's perspective but he allowed it.
"Here's what I'm gonna ask of ya, ight? I got some family business to attend tonight, and my Star don't need to be round that...so..."
He leaves the implication hanging in the air, waiting for Smoke to catch it, which wasn't too long left. He clears his throat, chin up when looking at Louie, "How much?"
Again, that deep hearty chuckle blankets over the room all unsettling like as he pats Elijah's shoulder, grinning something vile, "Ay, that's the spirit, kid. Knew I could count on ya."
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Louie wasn't a man who could charm a lady's drawls off, no, he was just a man who knew the power he held, and the fear he instilled, and the moment she'd moved to Chicago, desperate for a job, and hired at Madame? He'd set his sights on her.
She didn't fall head over heels for the guy; she wasn't sure she knew a soul in the world that could. He was cruel, mean, and abusive. But he offered protection. Money. In exchange, she played her part, became his 'Star', and squeezed her eyes tightly shut when they kissed or had sex, pretending she was anywhere else with anyone else until it was all over, and she could break away to the apartment he'd bought her, only blocks away from his place where he could still keep an eye on her.
She'd learned to play pretend.
She was good at it.
So, when Louie kissed her goodnight and told her that a dear friend of his would be taking her home? She played the obedient little fiancƩe right up until she was escorted out the door and into Smoke's truck.
When it was finally just them, her facade dropped just as quickly as she built it, eyes unfocused and staring ahead in a disassociation that Elijah had only seen in the trenches. A look he, himself, was quite familiar with.
He glanced over at her a couple times before finally speaking up, pulling out onto the street. "You okay, Star?"
That snapped her out of things, the nickname like curdled milk to her stomach, tongue in cheek as though she were holding back some unanswered anger that had been boiling over for the last year and a half.
"That ain't my name. Don't call me it."
Elijah couldn't help himself but to chuckle; he liked a woman with some mouth on her. He shook his head, arching a brow at her attitude, "What is your name then, Darlin?"
He takes note of how her arms are crossed defensively over her chest. She kept herself guarded. It wasn't hard to see why.
He almost felt sumn akin to pride when she finally glanced his way, expression hard as stone, but something vulnerable in those stubborn, unwavering e/c eyes of hers. She mutters it soft as snow, but he still catches it, and fights back a grin when he does.
"My name's Y/n. Not Star. He gave me that name."
"Y/n," He repeats, liking the way it tastes on his tongue, real and beautiful and her, none of that build-a-woman bullshit that Louie gave her. He nods, "Suits ya."
At this, he can tell she's starting to relax around him. Her expression no longer set in stone and hesitant, now all soft contours and overwhelming beauty. She was even better up close, but he wasn't sposed to notice that, so he looked back to the road ahead.
"What's yours?" She asked, eyes roaming over him, observing, and trying to get a read on him, but not quite being able to just yet.
"Smok-"
Before he can even get it out, she cuts him off, shakes her head.
"No. Nun of that street name bullshit. I wanna know your real name. The one ya mammy gave ya."
Goddamned, she was a real spitfire, wasn't she? This was gon be harder than he thought.
He chuckles softly, his eyes on her now, good and on her when he answers her question. "Elijah. That what you wanted?"
"Elijah..." She tests his name on her tongue, and it damn near disarms him. Her voice was too damn soft, honeyed, and low to be good for his health. His hand clenched tightly round the wheel when he heard it, knuckles all pale and ash as he cleared his throat.
"That's right." He says, simple as can be, though his tone is raw and rough, struggling to hold back an emotion he refused to let be named.
"I like that. I like you, too, Elijah."
Lord, have mercy on his soul.
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After that night, Elijah thought he was in the clear. Out of her clutches, at least, at least...until Louie lets him know he wants him to be his 'Star's' bodyguard full time. Louie'd been pestering her about security detail, and she didn't like most of his men. They were the types she needed protection against, the kind that leered all they could when the boss wasn't looking. Says she'd known Elijah was someone her boy trusted, and who better for the job?
Course, Elijah knew that wasn't quite it. It was more so that he'd been one of the only people who worked with Lou that ain't look at her like she was a mere extension of him. A trophy he liked to parade around.
If he were a better man, he'd have said no. The pay was great, sure, but Elijah was still a man when it mattered. His body had said no, but his mouth spoke faster than his mind could stop him, and try as he might to deny it, it wasn't the pay that'd made him say yes.
It was human nature to insist that what happened to the next could never happen to you. You wouldn't be as weak. You wouldn't make the same mistakes they did. You would never let that happen to you.
Humans were the epitome of arrogance, whether a person admitted to it or not. Elijah Moore was not immune to this. He'd seen men fall to their knees for a woman; didn't matter if she was his or someone else's. That's why he'd always sworn he could never be that man.
Till he met Y/n Leviniskie, and lord did she turn his world upside down.
He regretted accepting the job the moment he started it. Why the fuck had he stayed? Same reason he was ever so adamant couldn't be him. ā He was a weaker man, whether he liked it or not.
It'd been a month, a mere month, and she was already driving him up the wall. If he'd smoked before? He could probably chain smoke a pack a day now. The more time Smoke spent with Y/n 'not Star' Leviniskie, the more time he was sure she was a succubus intentionally set in his path to destroy him. It was bad for his health, he was convinced; He'd started smelling the scent of magnolias with his mind drifting to her.
She always smelled of magnolias, jasmine, and cocoa butter.
Still, he never knew just how fucked he was till she laid the bait out for him round one month into the job, being the damned one he deemed it. He watched her watch him take it, fish to fucking hook, while she had the nerve to giggle about it.
He still stayed. Didn't tell Louis he couldn't do it no more. Nah, she gave him a challenge, and he was going to rise to it.
First, it was just her prancin' round in satin, his swishing sumn tempting enough he was beginning to understand why Eve ate the fruit.
She, a woman who could bring the most devoted priest to confession, begging for repentance? Oh, she had him sprung as hell, and even tighter.
His self-control was a mere thread now, and today it was coiled so tight he could snap. Because now, now she wasn't just prancin', she was pissing him off.
How she slipped through his cracks so easily, he ain't know. All he knew was that he was now stood in a juke joint, watching her twist that thick ass of hers with some girl friends, glowing in brown silk, looking like she was dripped in honey and gold, already knowing they wasn't sposed to be there, and his blood was running hot.
He couldn't tell the anger from the lust; all he knew was, Louie's gal was in a rival's club acting like she owned the dance floor, and the toothpick had long since snapped between his teeth. There was a couple of things wrong with this situation.
One, she looked good enough to fucking devour, and he was distracted. Very badly distracted.
Two, this wasn't their territory, and this could very easily go left if she was recognized.
Three, Louie'd probably put a couple on his head if his 'Star' got hurt.
Lastly? Her beauty wasn't his alone to recognize, and he wasn't dumb nor blind to the eyes on her. Call it hypocritical cause she wasn't his to look at either, but he still didn't fuck with it.
It took him a moment to make his way across the floor, he had to gather his thoughts and compose himself before he forgot his ever-loving mind and himself. When he got to her his hand reached out for her arm immediately, a zero nonsense look in his eyes and a mission on his mind.
When he pulled her out of the joint, ignoring her pleas on the way out, he walked her straight to the car without one damn word until they were a safe distance away, that's when he let her go, though make no mistake, he ain't let her get too far. Crowding her against the back door of his ride, his blood ran damn hot, looking down at her, expression matching his own ā Frustration, and anger etched on angelic features. If he wasn't so hot, it would've turned him on; hell, maybe it was doing that anyway. He was feeling a shit ton of things.
"What the fuck was that?" She asked. She actually had the nerve to ask him that shit. He nearly laughed a little in disbelief.
"Real funny you ask me that, ain't it? I was just gone ask you the same, darling." His voice was low, smooth, and boy, was it dangerous as all hell too. Made her almost shiver under his unwavering gaze, and ticking jaw that made him look ten times sexier than he already was. She could practically feel the air and the anger dissipating from her body, now replaced with sumnin new, sumnin charged, electric, and absolutely forbidden. He wasn't finished neither, one of his arms caging her against the car, allowing her to feel the heat emanating from his body: inhale the scent of his cologne. Sumnin full of musk, earth, and masculinity. Made him smell like power.
"You know you coulda been hurt if one of them niggas in there realized where you belong and who you belong to before you walked in there twisting that ass like you own the place dressed like..." His words seem to die in his throat for a moment, looking her over one more time in that little brown getup she wore, looking like a gift packaged up for the worst sinner you knew, and she'd been in a room full of em. His free hand clenched into a fist at his side, trying to keep himself. She saw it though. It wasn't just anger in his gaze now.
"Dressed like what, Elijah?" She whispered in a drawl that sounded far too much like an attempt at seduction, all soft feigned innocence and big brown eyes he couldn't stare too long into. He was trying so hard. He knew he was walking on thin ice, and right now the danger, it was hellbent on rising.
That was the day the lines got crossed, something changed between the two of you. Maybe it was just what the good Lord had ordered, or perhaps that was just your hopes speaking after being with a man like Louie for so long. You ain't mind; hearing Elijah's heartbeat thump against your ear was comfort enough at the moment.
It was peaceful, the vibrations. The ambience. His breathing evened and soft.
"Sometimes, I think I might just run away. Start a new life. Get outta Chicago."
Elijah grunts at this, tugging you tighter against him and pressing his lips firmly against your head before responding, "Why ain't you? Hell, anywhere'd probably be safer than Chicago. Specially with the niggas you're around."
His voice is gruff, and he's trying his best to not sound too worried and invested, though his ears had perked up and his mind had gone running the second you spoke bout getting the hell out of dodge.
"Funds. Louie." Simple as, really.
Elijah wanted to believe otherwise but he could've sworn he'd heard a hint of absolute fear behind the way you said Louie's name.
He tugs you even closer.
"I hear that." Loud, and motherfucking clear to be exact.
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Elijah was a soldier. When he got a command, he tended to take it very seriously, and though the situation was complicated, there was nothing in him that hesitated.
Louie could be hotheaded, and he was losing out on a bunch of money with a current deal he was trying to close. In turn, he was getting angrier, and that led to the first argument Elijah had seen him and Y/n have. He could hear their voices muffled but loud through the closed door, sumn in his chest ain't feel right. Not with her in that room, sounding distressed. And to his credit, he had knocked all polite and right before he walked in, and that's when facades fell into place.
He caught onto Louie's forced toothy grin, and her wiping the tears from her cheeks, sniveling as she passed by Louie and told Elijah she'd be in the car before leaving them be.
That night, he could've bet all his money on him seeing her sitting in front of her vanity, trying to put makeup on an eye turned all black and blue.
"What's that?" He asked, pointing at her eye, toothpick tween his teeth.
She barely looks at him when she responds, continuing to cover her eye up with foundation. "Makeup."
He grunts in acknowledgement but doesn't believe a damn thing she says.
++
If you asked Y/n Leviniskie, her days were spent in sorrow, nights spent basking in peace she knew darn well wouldn't last too long with Louie's leash wrapped all tight and secure round her neck.
ā She knew Elijah was suspicious, but she also knew she had him in enough danger as is and bringing him into this would mean his death. So she took the hits in stride and covered the marks with foundation.
That was, until the choice to hide was taken away. She and Louie had been arguing all day, him irritated by a deal he was trying to close and her trying to make the best she could of a bad situation. Apparently, her best wasn't good enough.
Eli wasn't sure at first; He'd heard them arguing, but when that sound, sumnin like a fist being thrown, reverberated through the air, he was more than. He knew that sound well. His hand twitched against the pistol holstered at his hip, ears on high alert. Then he heard a cry...He was sure as the day was long now. Her legs follow her out of the room and carry her as quickly as they can out of the building, only shooting him a terrified glance as she passes.
Louie came out next. He shook what looked like blood off his fist, calmer than he should be after putting his hands on a lady, but unsurprising nonetheless. It's all too simple when he looks up at Elijah, a yellow-toothed, cigar-stained grin on paper thin lips. He whistles and motions Eli over.
"Let's have a drink, shall we? I have a job for ya."
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One bang. Then two. Then three more.
You barely get a chance to tug on your robe as ya rush to the front door of that old, rundown apartment, Louie tucked you in to keep you as close to him as possible.
After the fight, you went home, took a sleeping pill to forget it all and conked clean out, tears soaking through your pillow as you did. Hadn't heard a peep from either Louie or Smoke since you ran out. Maybe that was a good thing.
"I'm coming, I'm-" When you looked out the peephole, you could've sworn you felt your heart drop, swinging that door open like the place had caught fire; Your panicked gaze meets familiar browns. He falls to his knees in front of you, all bloodied with an expression showing weakness for the first time since you'd met him.
"Elijah-"
"It ain't mine." That's all he can say before you're tugging him in, looking out to see if anyone had followed him before closing and locking the door, sinking to your knees beside him. His arms reach out without hesitation and pulls you to his side, neither of you too much caring about the mess. Something told you that was the last thing that should've mattered at that moment. You ain't say a word, though. Let him take his time.
"He told me, told me like it was just us shootin' the shit o'er a game of poker that sometimes a woman needed to be tamed into obedience. That he was showing you your place in this world, and I saw red..."
Your blood pumps loudly in your ears as you process it, but he ain't done yet, he moves so he's kneeling in front of ya. His hands clasped over yours, eyes pleading, wild and desperate.
"I'm powerless, woman. I ain't know I could be till I saw the fear in your eyes. I'm powerless. Canāt go back.ā
Your gaze had been disassociated for a moment, just for that moment, until you snap back into the present, shush him, and pull him close. Your expression hardens into that of his on a normal ole Tuesday, tears all dried up; You whisper against his temple, "We gotta get out of here, alright? Get out, and go."
You feel the first tear he's ever cried in front of you dampen your nightgown.
Some fools died for love, it seemed, but some fools killed for it, too.
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A/N: happy new year! i know itās been a while but a lot has happened within a few months and iām also starting college soon š„¹ miss you guys mucho, though! more writings to come fs! this isnāt as detailed as i wanted it but i MIGHT make a pt. 2 so :)).
