TheVisit
981 Words
The knock came at dusk.
Three short taps, firm but polite—the kind that suggested the visitor already owned the door.
Amara froze mid-sketch. Her pencil rolled off the table and hit the floor with a hollow sound. No one had called ahead, and her phone was on silent.
“Who is it?” she asked, voice steady only because she forced it to be.
A pause. Then that voice—smooth, low, infuriatingly calm.
“It’s me.”
Her pulse leapt. She opened the door just enough to see him standing there in a charcoal coat, raindrops threading through his hair like silver. Damian Voss looked too composed for a man who shouldn’t have known her address in the first place.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded.
“I told you I’d check the new security myself.”
He glanced past her shoulder, assessing the locks, the lights, the entire world inside her apartment. “May I come in?”
“No.”
He stepped forward anyway—slow, deliberate, giving her time to stop him. She didn’t.
The scent of his cologne drifted past her, dark and clean, like thunder wrapped in silk.
“This is an invasion,” she said, backing up as he entered.
“This is prevention,” he corrected. “Two different things.”
She shut the door behind him just to keep the building from listening. “You can’t keep showing up whenever you want.”
“Then stop making me worry.” He walked toward the window, studying the view as if it belonged to him. “Your neighborhood has blind corners, no cameras, and a rooftop door that never locks. Do you think I’d sleep knowing that?”
“I don’t remember asking you to lose sleep over me.”
He turned, eyes sharp. “Maybe not in words.”
Amara crossed her arms. “You think everything means something just because you want it to.”
“And you think nothing means anything just because you’re afraid it might.”
The words landed too precisely. He closed the distance between them, not touching, but close enough that the heat from his body made her skin tighten.
“Tell me to leave,” he said softly.
“I’m serious, Damian—”
“No,” he interrupted. “Tell me to leave like you mean it.”
Her mouth opened, but no sound came. Every nerve in her body screamed that she should push him out, yet her heartbeat betrayed her—fast, reckless, alive.
He reached up slowly, brushing a loose strand of hair from her face with the back of his knuckle. The touch was barely there, but it felt like a claim.
“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered.
“Maybe,” he said. “But you’re not asking me to go.”
She stepped back, breaking the spell. “I don’t owe you access to my life.”
“You don’t,” he said, voice calm again. “But you owe yourself safety. That’s all I’m ensuring.”
“You don’t know the first thing about safety.”
He looked around the room, taking in the sketches pinned to the wall, the scattered threads, the unwashed coffee cup by the window. “I know that people who create chaos on paper crave control everywhere else.”
Her jaw tightened. “You read psychology textbooks along with business contracts?”
“I read you,” he said simply.
The silence that followed was unbearable. She wanted to shout, to throw something, to shake the calm off his face. Instead, she said quietly, “Why me?”
He didn’t hesitate. “Because you remind me of the line between obsession and purpose. I live on that line.”
Her breath caught. “That’s not romantic, Damian. That’s dangerous.”
His smile was faint. “Exactly.”
He moved through the apartment like a storm exploring new ground, checking windows, adjusting latches, making notes in his phone. It should have infuriated her. It did. But beneath the anger was something else—a pulse she didn’t want to name.
When he finished, he handed her a small card.
Private Security Contact. 24 hours. My code: Voss-Seven.
“I don’t want your guards,” she said.
“They’re not for me,” he replied. “They’re for you.”
She stared at the card, then at him. “Why do you care so much?”
He studied her face for a long moment. “Because once I start caring about something, I don’t stop.”
The room seemed to shrink. The air grew heavy enough to hold secrets.
She swallowed hard. “You need to leave.”
He nodded slowly, finally obeying. At the door he paused. “You can hate me if it keeps you alert. Just don’t ignore me.”
Then he stepped out into the hallway and was gone, leaving the scent of rain and a silence that refused to feel empty.
That night, Amara sat on the floor beside the door, the security card still in her hand.
She hated him for crossing lines.
She hated herself for missing his presence the moment he left.
Outside, thunder rolled far away, promising more storms.
Her phone buzzed. A single message.
Door secured. Windows reinforced. You’re safe now. Sleep.
She stared at the words until they blurred, then typed back before she could stop herself.
You should stop watching me.
Then stop making it impossible.
The typing dots lingered, then disappeared.
She turned off the phone, locked the door twice, and whispered to the dark, “You can’t control me.”
The dark, of course, said nothing back.
But somewhere across the city, a man smiled at a screen that glowed her name.
Teaser:
He crossed the line once. Next time, she might let him.
- Writer
