THE ONE WHO RAN AWAY

Chapter 3 — The One Who Left

Raphaël's POV

Bangkok, Thailand

The first thing I noticed was the silence.

My hand moved across the bed before my eyes even opened — slow, certain, reaching for the warmth that had been there when I finally fell asleep.

Nothing.

Cold sheets. Empty space.

I opened my eyes.

The ceiling of the club's private suite stared back at me — dim, expensive, the kind of room that existed behind unmarked doors that most people never even knew were there. The kind of room where anything could happen and nothing ever left.

I lay still for a moment. Listening.

No sound from the bathroom. No movement anywhere in the suite.

I turned my head slowly.

Gone.

I almost smiled.

I sat up and looked around the room properly — and that almost-smile became a real one.

Clean.

Almost perfectly clean.

The clothes that had been scattered across the floor — gone. The glasses on the side table — straightened. Even the curtains had been pulled slightly more closed than I had left them. Like someone had moved through this suite quietly and deliberately in the early hours of morning, erasing every trace of themselves with careful, practiced hands.

So you chose to run.

Interesting.

Most people didn't run from me. Most people stayed — waited — hoped I would look at them differently in the morning light. Most people wanted something from me the morning after.

This one had cleaned the room and disappeared before dawn without taking a single thing.

Except —

I looked at the chair near the door.

My trousers. Folded neatly. Almost apologetically.

Everything else — gone.

I stood slowly and walked to the edge of the bed.

My eyes dropped to the corner of the sheet.

Red.

Small. Undeniable. Dark against white fabric.

I stared at it for a long moment without moving.

First time.

Something shifted quietly inside my chest. Not guilt — I didn't do guilt. Something else. Something that sat heavier than I had expected it to. The kind of weight that arrives without permission and refuses to explain itself.

That was his first time.

And he ran.

I picked up the corner of the sheet between two fingers. Looked at it for a moment. Let it go.

Then I walked to the bathroom.

The mirror showed me everything.

I stood with my back half turned — looking over my shoulder at my own reflection — and said nothing for a moment.

Long scratches ran red lines down my back. Deep enough to still sting slightly in the cool air. The kind that don't happen by accident. The kind that happen when someone loses control so completely they forget to be careful.

My fingers traced one slowly.

I remember.

Not everything. But almost everything. Enough.

The warmth of him. The way he had tried to stay quiet and couldn't — sounds escaping him that he clearly hadn't intended to make. Low. Helpless. Completely undone. The way his hands had gripped me like he was simultaneously trying to hold onto something and let go of everything at once.

His body. His sounds. His smell — something clean beneath the expensive cologne that had rubbed off from the club air. Something underneath all of it that had no business being that distracting.

I remembered almost all of it.

Except one thing.

His face.

I had been behind him. Deliberately. Because that was how I preferred it — always had. There was something about it I found endlessly more interesting. More intimate. More complete. The way a person couldn't hide anything from you in that position — every reaction, every sound, every moment of surrender completely exposed and impossible to fake.

I had no regrets about the night.

But I had one.

I never saw his face.

I stood there looking at my own reflection — jaw tight, eyes dark — and felt something I was entirely unused to feeling.

Unsatisfied.

Not in the way of wanting more — though that was also true. In the way of a puzzle missing one piece. Of reaching for something and closing your hand around empty air.

Who are you.

I turned away from the mirror.

Back in the suite my clothes were completely gone.

Not misplaced. Gone.

My shirt — the white one I vaguely remembered losing somewhere near the door in the early hours — nowhere. My jacket. Gone. Everything except my trousers folded neatly over the chair like a small quiet apology left by someone who had taken everything else without asking.

I stood in the middle of the private suite wearing nothing but expensive trousers and an expression I reserved for people who had genuinely surprised me.

He had taken my shirt.

Left in my shirt.

I looked at the empty room — at the straightened curtains, the cleaned floor, the neatly folded trousers — and felt something shift in my chest again. Warmer this time. And far more dangerous.

Careful hands. Quick mind. Gone before sunrise.

Interesting.

I picked up my phone and called my secretary.

He answered on the second ring.

"Sir—"

"Bring me clothes." I kept my voice even. "Now."

A pause. Very short.

"Yes sir. Twenty minutes."

I hung up and sat on the edge of the bed.

The suite was quiet around me. Beyond the walls the club had long since gone silent — that particular heavy silence of a place that had swallowed the night whole and was now sleeping it off. Bangkok hummed distantly beyond that — already awake, already loud, already moving like last night had never happened.

But it had happened.

He had happened.

And I didn't have a single thing to show for it except scratches on my back and a red stain on a white sheet and the feeling of warm hands I couldn't attach to a face.

I didn't like that.

I didn't like it at all.

The car was cool and dark and moving smoothly through early Bangkok traffic when I made the call.

My secretary sat in the front. Silent. Trained well enough to know when to be completely invisible.

I looked out the window at the city sliding past and spoke quietly.

"Two things."

"Sir."

"First — find whoever was managing the private suite section last night." My eyes stayed on the window. "Someone drugged a drink in that room last night. I want to know who ordered it, who carried it out, and why." I paused. "By tonight."

"Understood."

"Second thing." I let the silence sit for exactly one moment. "Find the person who was with me last night."

A pause. Slightly longer than the first.

"Sir — do you have any details that might help narrow—"

"No name." My voice stayed calm. Quiet. The voice I used when something was not a request and never had been. "No face. He was in the private suite with me. He left before six this morning. He paid club staff to delete the suite footage and corridor cameras." I turned slightly from the window. "Find that staff member first. Find out exactly what was deleted and what they were paid. Then check every other camera — club entrance, main lobby, street level, every camera within three blocks of this building — and go through all of it."

"Sir that could take considerable—"

"I don't care how long it takes." I turned back to the window. Bangkok blurred gold and grey past the glass. "I don't care what it costs. Search everywhere. Every place. Every record. Every camera." My jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. "Find him."

My secretary was quiet for a moment.

Then —

"Yes sir."

I leaned back against the seat.

Outside Bangkok rushed past — loud, golden, indifferent — keeping its secrets tucked behind every corner and alleyway and unmarked door.

You cleaned the room.

You deleted the footage.

You took my shirt and disappeared before I could open my eyes.

The corner of my mouth lifted — just slightly. Dark. Patient. Completely certain.

Very smart.

But not smart enough.