All Chapters of The Night Boss: Chapter 31 - Chapter 40

The morning broke with a haze that clung to the city like a damp shroud. Neon signs that had burned all night sputtered out one by one, replaced by the weak gray light of dawn. The radio towers on the east side still carried the sound of Kross’s broadcast; people in every corner of the city whispered about it over cigarettes, over cheap coffee, over trembling hands that knew the weight behind his words. But while the city reacted, The Boss remained locked in his own battle. He sat in his office, the blinds drawn, a cigarette burning down in a chipped ashtray on his desk. He hadn’t touched it in twenty minutes, letting it smolder into a ash. His men moved around the floor, sensing his mood and keeping their voices low. Kross had moved first, and fast. That reality pressed down on him like an anvil. The man hadn’t wasted time, seizing the airwaves, blasting his bait across every frequency. It was a move both arrogant and clever—loud enough to flush Rico out, irresistible enough to draw

The paper crinkled in Rico’s trembling hands, the ink smudging under the sweat of his fingers. He had woken before dawn, restless as always these days, and stepped outside the warehouse he’d been hiding in near the docks. The city still carried the mist of the night, that fog rolling off the water. Normally, the fog was a kind of shield—covering his face, cloaking his movements. But this morning it betrayed him. Everywhere he looked, it seemed, he was there.The headline wasn’t subtle. “A Message for Rico.”And beneath, his face—cropped from some grainy security still, blown up to fill the center of the paper. His own eyes stared back at him, watchful, caught in the slant of a car’s window. He looked hunted even in the photo, and the irony was sharp enough to choke him.The words underneath blurred as he forced himself to read them again:"RICO, COME HOME. NO DEBT, NO PUNISHMENT. You are wanted, you are missed. The streets are colder without you. I am waiting—The Boss."He dropped ont

The city had become a chessboard, and Rico was the missing piece both sides needed to control the game. The Boss and Kroos—two men who rarely walked the same road—were now locked into a silent contest. Each one desired Rico for reasons that went beyond business. One wanted him for love, the other for loyalty and control, and both were tightening their hunt.The Boss had started the morning with a spread of newspapers scattered across his desk. The headlines carried his crafted message, the one he’d poured his heart into without fully realizing how vulnerable it made him. “COME HOME, RICO. WE NEED YOU.” Below the words sat the grainy photograph of Rico, captured unknowingly, leaning against a car. The photo wasn’t menacing. It wasn’t staged to show him as a criminal or an outlaw. No—this was intimate. Human. The way a man looks when he thinks no one is watching.The Boss traced the edge of the photo with his finger, almost tenderly. He imagined Rico’s reaction when he saw it. Would he

The warehouse walls had become his prison, and the silence within them a weight that pressed harder with each passing hour. Rico’s lips were cracked from thirst, his stomach gnawed itself raw, and his eyes had begun to dull with the kind of fatigue that went beyond sleepless nights. He had been careful not to make too much noise, careful not to draw attention, but the stillness was killing him more than the fear outside ever could.And then, again, came the strange voice.It wasn’t the echo of his thoughts, not the ramblings of his own hunger-ravaged mind—it was clearer than that, threaded with intent. It came like a ripple across the stagnant air of the warehouse and strangely soothing.“You can’t keep running like this, Rico. You’ll starve before anyone finds you.”Rico froze where he crouched behind a stack of rusting barrels. His fists clenched until the scabs split on his knuckles. The voice was everywhere and nowhere, not anchored to the doorway, not slithering from the shadows

The sleep was heavy with weakness, the kind that pressed down on the chest until each breath felt stolen. Dust motes floated in streaks of light that bled through the cracks of boarded-up windows, and the damp stench of rusted iron filled Rico’s nose. His body ached from days of hunger and sleepless nights, but his mind was sharper than ever, strained like a bowstring drawn too far.That voice had returned, after a long nap.It always returned.First like a whisper, then like a low thunder rolling in the distance.But now it wasn’t just a sound in the shadows.“Boy,” the voice called again, deep. “You’ve been hiding here long enough. Step out.”Rico stiffened, his hands curled into fists as he crouched behind an old stack of crates. He had been tricked too many times—by Kroos’s words, by The Boss’s promises, by the very streets that raised him. Trust was poison. Trust was a blade pressed to his throat.“I’m not here to hurt you,” the voice continued. “If I meant you harm, you’d alread