Not What She Came Here For
935 Words
Dahlia hadn’t planned on staying long. It wasn’t like the woman behind the counter made her feel welcome. She planned on coffee and a moment to breathe.
That’s what she told herself as she sat in the corner of the diner, fingers wrapped around a mug that had long gone lukewarm, her notebook open in front of her.
Words filled the page. Messy and emotional. Words were crossed out and the rewritten. Nothing felt right. Nothing was enough to express how she felt right now.
Her pen hovered for a second before she pressed it down again, scribbling a line that didn’t quite land the way she wanted it to.
Her mind wasn’t in it. It kept drifting back to him.
Killian.
The way he looked at her. Cold and distant.
Like everything they had meant nothing more than a mistake he had already buried.
Her grip tightened slightly around the pen.
If he had just given her a few minutes to talk then maybe things would have been different. Maybe she wouldn’t feel like she had walked into something already over.
She knew he had every right to feel the way he did. She was the one who walked away and never looked back. She built a life that didn’t include him.
Yet Killian was the only one who felt like home to her.
The bell above the door rang.
Dahlia didn’t look up. She had felt the shift in the air. Like something just entered the room that didn’t belong to anyone but itself.
Her pen stilled yet she ignored that feeling. She forced her attention back to the page. Back to the words. Anything that wasn’t…
Him.
“Trying to escape your life… or just this town?”
Her breath caught. Slowly, Dahlia lifted her gaze.
There he was…
Beck.
Standing beside her table like he had every right to be there, one hand resting casually against the back of the empty chair across from her.
His eyes dropped briefly to her notebook before returning to her face, like he had already seen enough.
Like he already knew something she hadn’t said out loud.
Dahlia closed the notebook in one smooth motion, sliding it slightly away from him.
“That depends,” she said evenly. “Do you usually read things that don’t belong to you?”
His lips twitched, “Only the interesting parts.”
She leaned back slightly in her chair, studying him now the same way he had studied her the moment he walked in.
“Shouldn’t you be busy?” she asked, her tone light but edged. “Or did they downgrade you to prospect duties?”
A beat of silence followed. Dahlia didn’t break eye contact. She let him sit with it because she knew exactly what she was doing.
His gaze sharpened slightly, something flickering beneath the surface that most people probably missed. She didn’t though, she leaned into it.
“From what I’ve seen,” she continued casually, “the prospects are already doing a great job keeping an eye on me. Didn’t realize I’d get the full VIP treatment with the president showing up in person.”
There it was.
Direct.
Unapologetic.
A challenge.
For a moment, Beck just looked at her. It looked like he was deciding something. He then pulled the chair out and sat down across from her.
“You always talk like that,” he said calmly, “or is it just me?”
Dahlia tilted her head slightly, her lips curving just enough to make it clear she wasn’t backing down.
“Depends,” she replied. “Are you always this interested in the women your club is watching?”
His gaze didn’t waver, “If I was,” he said, voice low, steady, “I wouldn’t be asking questions.”
Her pulse shifted. She didn’t feel nervous but aware. This feeling was different than what she felt for Killian. It was unfamiliar. Definitely not safe. But it was also not something she could ignore.
Dahlia leaned forward slightly, resting her elbow on the table as she held his gaze.
“Then what are you doing?”
A beat passed. Then another. Beck didn’t rush his answer and it showed that he didn’t feel like he needed to fill the silence.
“I’m deciding,” he said finally.
Her brows lifted just slightly, “Deciding what?”
His eyes didn’t leave hers, “Whether you’re trouble,” he said, “or just pretending to be.”
The corner of her mouth lifted because she recognized that heated look in his eyes. This was the game men like him enjoyed playing, and she knew it well.
“Careful,” she murmured, echoing his earlier warning from the night before. “You might not like the answer.”
Beck leaned back slightly in his chair, his gaze still locked onto hers, but something about him had shifted. Not less intense, just more certain.
“I don’t mind trouble,” he said.
Dahlia held his gaze for a moment longer before leaning back again, breaking the tension just enough to breathe.
This wasn’t what she came here for. She came here to fix things and figure things out. Then she was supposed to leave and never look back. She wasn’t here to get pulled into something new.
Something dangerous. Something that could complicate everything even more.
Especially with Killian still in the middle of it.
Her fingers tightened slightly around her coffee mug. She needed to stay focused and remind herself why she was here because whatever this was, it wasn’t safe.
- Writer
