Chapter 4

Ophelia’s visit left Frankie confused. He hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary—yet something felt off. She would’ve never stepped foot in his lounge; only women of questionable reputation did so. But Ophelia Cabernet, wife of the most odd, secretive, and strange rat in the French Quarter, waltzing in with a frantic request for help? That made him question everything.

Yet here she was—
Wearing a tight dress, drenched in perfume and fury, wrapped in velluto like vengeance made flesh. That look in her eyes screamed vendetta, and she wanted it delivered on a silver platter.
Not even Il Principe dell’Oscurità would be a match for this woman.
She looked like she wanted to slap the red right out of him.

He observed from a cloud of smoke, cigar smoldering between his fingers, leaning against the black-and-gold wallpaper like a question mark.
Something was off.
And it smelled like a fiamma rossa—scorching and unrelenting.

She looked too arrabbiata to be shy, and too sad not to be pazza.
She hated jazz—called it jungle music—and couldn’t care less about the bubbly.

Yet she was here.
Her bloodshot eyes and swollen lips—like she’d been biting them just to hold herself together—almost made him pity her.
Almost.

Then word got out.
She had devoured Salvatore—Sal, of all his men—like a desperate siren straight out of the Iliad.
But Frankie didn’t feel jealousy.

He felt curiosity.

What had driven this kind of woman to cheat on her husband?
Especially a man like Sirah—who hadn’t been seen with a single goomar?

Frankie, used to having women swoon over his masculine bravado, asked himself—why not him?
Why Sal?

He didn’t like Sirah.
Never had.
And now Ophelia… she might be a pawn he didn’t know he needed.

So why the hell was she really here?

She had claimed—between tears and a trace of blood—that her husband was hiding something.
That he was obsessed. Whispering names she didn’t recognize.
She was certain he had a goomar.

But Frankie didn’t buy it.

No one had seen Sirah with anyone.
Sure, he looked a little more groomed lately—cleaner, slicker.
But there was no woman at his side.

His curiosity got the best of him.
Tonight was the night he would venture out—just a little—and see what was going on.

The air outside struck his collarbone like a vampire’s kiss: sharp and humid, like a whispered seduction… or a soft moan.
Frankie lit another cigar and walked.

Not too fast.
Not too slow.
Just enough to let his mind wander and run wild with scenarios.

The French Quarter at night is a parade of its own mythology.
Bourbon Street is always alive with whispers of lust and mysticism.
Jazz bleeds through cracked stone walls.
Perfume mixes with cigarette smoke like a powerful incense.
Saints and sinners share the same table.

But tonight… something else lingered.
Something older.
Something powerful.

It felt as though an envisioned Venus had escaped her shell—like Donatello himself had carved whatever divine creature was roaming the air.
It felt royal.
And it smelled deeply of arance.

As he continued his path down toward St. Louis Street, he noticed the lamps begin to flicker, as if dancing.
A breeze gently caressed his face—
but it didn’t feel like wind.
It felt like a peck on the lips.

He paused for a minute near the antique shop, far enough not to be seen.

Sirah’s place stood at the end of the block like a mausoleum dressed in a velvet gown.
Lights were off.
No sound.
But the scent…

Oranges. Clove. Cinnamon.

And something darker—like musk pulled from beneath cathedral floors.

Frankie exhaled slowly and muttered under his breath,
“Fiamma di velluto.”

A phrase he’d only ever heard in a Neapolitan legend his nonna told him as a child.
A story carried on the lips of drunk men in smoky rooms, whispering that the hills outside Naples hid a sleeping witch.

La gente parla della Volpe d’Oro…
The Vixen in the Gold Coffin.

Only a man with fire in his blood, and guilt in his soul, could awaken her.

And Frankie?
He was la Fiamma Siciliana.
And his guilt ran deep enough to drown in.

He stepped closer to the door, fingers brushing the antique knob.

If she was in there—
he wanted to be the first to see the infamous goomar that had Ophelia unraveling like a madwoman.

No more games.
No more wives crying for favors to rid themselves of imaginary lovers.

But he had no idea what he was walking into.

This wasn’t a shop anymore.
It was a trap.
A tomb.
A sacred place soaked in that damned delicious smell.

The door was slightly ajar.

And through the dim light, he could see Sirah, clinging to a golden coffin—
embracing it like it was the nude body of a woman.

🕯️ Felt the pull? Let her haunt someone new.

If this chapter moved you, pass it on.
One soul. One shadow. One whisper.

Mylene remembers the ones who speak her name.

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