Taste of Iron

Twenty Four: Kind Heart With A Sharp Tongue

Twenty Four: Kind Heart With A Sharp Tongue

"...that's it?"

"Yeah," Atlas replied. "You just have to make sure you've spread the dye all over evenly, wait for about an hour, and then go rinse your hair."

"Huh," Taylor blinked. "This was simpler than I thought."

"It's a bit more complicated when you have to use bleach, which I do because I have darker hair," Atlas explained.

"Oh well, it's a good day to be a natural blond then," Taylor retorted with a wide grin, making Atlas chuckle lightly and nod.

"You could always be a hair stylist if this chef thing doesn't work out," Ava joked.

"Ooh, or open a barber café!" Taylor added.

"A what?" Atlas questioned.

"A café where you can eat while getting your hair cut!"

"Won't the hair fall into the food?" Atlas reasoned. The soon to be pink-haired gangster frowned, as if he clearly hadn't thought through his idea.

"Oh," Taylor muttered. "Yeah. That won't be nice."

"I'm sure if we brainstorm then we can come up with something, though," Atlas spoke with a smile. The grin returned on Taylor's face as he nodded excitedly.

Atlas glanced at Emil, who was uncharacteristically quiet, only to find that the crime boss's eyes were already on him, watching him tenderly. Atlas had no idea what was going on in Emil's head, but the way that he was looking at him...it was enough to make the chef squirm just a tad bit.

Atlas shifted his gaze to Esteban, who was doing crossword in a small pocket sized book. As a fan of puzzles himself, Atlas approved. Though it was kind of weird to see a fully inked, tall and really intimidating looking gangster wear black, thick-rimmed glasses and jot down words in a tiny notepad.

"How did you all meet?" Atlas couldn't help but question. All four of them were so different yet they seemed to fit in together quite well, which made Atlas curious as to how they came to know one another.

Ava and Taylor glanced at each other, even Esteban looked up from his puzzle as all three of them stared expectantly at Emil, as if waiting for their leader to answer. Atlas wondered if maybe he asked the wrong thing. Emil cleared his throat and straightened his back as he finally spoke.

"Ava, Esteban and I had...a common enemy. That brought us together," Emil replied.

"Oh," Atlas mumbled. He knew this wasn't the time to dig deeper. Though he was really eager to learn about this so-called 'enemy'. "Uh, and Taylor?"

"They met me at taco bell!" Taylor exclaimed.

"O...Kay," Atlas nodded, not even bothering to question how that fit into their origin story. This was definitely something he was going to ask Emil later though, when they were alone.

Before Atlas could say anything else, his phone vibrated in his pocket. Atlas took it out to see that Damian was video calling him. Atlas picked it up without a second thought, happy to see his brother smiling widely at him.

"Look!" Damian spoke. "Trent got me this limited edition One Piece t-shirt!"

"Really? Show me!" Atlas was equally thrilled as Damian stood up and walked a couple steps back to show off his new piece of clothing. "It looks really fucking cool, Dame."

"I know, right?" Damian replied. "I love it so much. Okay, I got to go show it to mom. Bye Atty!"

Once again, before Atlas could respond, Damian hung up. Atlas was pleased to see his brother so cheerful, though he was wondering where the hell Trent got the money to buy the t-shirt. Especially considering it was limited edition so it couldn't exactly be cheap.