chapter 3
1176 Words
Leon wasn’t used to this.
He wasn’t used to wondering about someone. Especially not someone like her.
He had buried men for less than the way Ivy Gold looked at him — like she couldn’t care less. Like she didn’t know his name was carved into backroom walls and whispered in fear across three boroughs. Like his power meant nothing.
And that… did something to him.
He watched her from the shadows again. Not because he had to.
Because he wanted to.
She moved through her shift like she didn’t belong there. Too focused. Too composed. She wasn’t like the other women in the club — no flirting, no small talk, no theatrics. She worked with her head down and her walls up.
Uninterested. Unimpressed. Untouchable.
It infuriated him.
It fascinated him more.
He watched her laugh once — not real laughter, but the forced kind people use to survive — and he hated that sound. Hated that someone had taught her to fake joy just to get by.
He found himself gripping the edge of the booth tighter than he should.
“Boss.” Marco leaned in from the opposite side of the booth. “You’ve been staring at the bartender for twenty minutes. People are gonna notice.”
“I don’t give a damn who notices.”
Marco gave him a look. “You planning on doing something about it?”
Leon lit a cigarette. “No.”
Marco waited.
Leon took a drag and exhaled slowly. “Not yet.”
---
Ivy hated how aware of him she was.
She didn’t want to notice the way he sat alone, his eyes cutting through crowds like weapons. She didn’t want to feel his gaze on her neck every time she turned. She didn’t want to think about him.
But she did.
She didn’t trust him — and not just because he was dangerous.
She didn’t trust men like him because she knew what they did. She’d lived it. Seen what power did to people. What silence masked. What obsession turned into.
And Leon... he was all of that.
Control, power, silence — wrapped in expensive suits and sharper instincts.
She wanted nothing to do with him.
So, when she passed his table and he said her name — low, calm, like a secret — she kept walking.
“Ivy.”
She paused. Slowly turned her head.
He was sitting there, eyes unreadable, cigarette burning down in his hand.
“What?” she said.
“You could at least look at me.”
“I’ve seen enough.”
A faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “You always talk like that?”
“Only to people who think they can own the room.”
“I don’t own the room,” Leon said, voice quiet but sure. “I am the room.”
Her expression didn’t change. “Is that supposed to impress me?”
“No,” he said. “It’s supposed to warn you.”
She stepped closer, just enough to drop her voice. “I don’t scare easy.”
“I noticed.”
And yet, something flickered in his eyes — not frustration, not anger. Something darker. Something dangerously close to awe.
He leaned back in his seat and tilted his head slightly. “You always keep your guard up like this?”
“It’s what keeps people like you out.”
Leon didn’t answer. He watched her walk away, and that should have been the end of it.
But it wasn’t.
It never was.
---
The next night, Ivy left the club early. Her manager had called in a favor — cover the late shift, go home by ten. She didn’t argue. The headache pounding behind her eyes made it hard to focus anyway.
She walked the long way home, sticking to the main roads. Neon signs glowed through misty rain. The city pulsed with distant horns and night traffic. She didn’t wear headphones. Not anymore.
Every few blocks, she checked over her shoulder.
She didn’t see him.
But she felt him.
And when she turned the last corner before her apartment, he was there — leaning against a streetlamp, coat collar turned up, cigarette burning between his fingers.
She stopped.
He didn’t move.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she asked.
“Watching.”
She stared at him. “You following me now?”
“You walk alone at night through the same streets that almost got you killed a week ago.” His voice was flat, unreadable. “Someone should be watching.”
“Not you.”
“I disagree.”
“Of course you do,” she snapped. “Men like you don’t hear the word ‘no.’”
Leon stepped forward, but not close enough to touch her. Just enough to be heard over the distance. “If I didn’t hear it, I’d already be in your apartment.”
She hated how calm he sounded. How sure.
“You don’t scare me,” she said again, even though her heart was pounding.
“I’m not trying to scare you.”
“Then what are you trying to do?”
He didn’t answer.
Because he didn’t know.
She waited, then turned away. “Don’t follow me again.”
He watched her walk up the steps to her apartment. Watched her close the door, lock it. Watched her lights flicker on upstairs.
And still, he didn’t move.
Because something inside him was shifting. Slowly. Unwillingly.
He didn’t want to feel anything for her.
But he already did.
And he didn’t know what to do with it.
---
Leon sat in his penthouse suite later that night, whiskey untouched on the table, the city stretched out beneath his window like a kingdom he didn’t want anymore.
He couldn’t stop thinking about her.
About the way she didn’t flinch when he spoke. The way she didn’t soften when he touched her. The way she didn’t fall into his orbit like everyone else did.
She stood outside of it.
And somehow, that made her more powerful than all of them.
“Leon,” Marco said from the door, “you’ve got three meetings tomorrow. Weapons drop. The Italians at noon. Then your doctor at six.”
Leon didn’t react.
Marco hesitated. “You want me to cancel?”
Leon finally looked up. “Cancel everything after four.”
“You sure?”
Leon stood, poured the whiskey, and stared at the skyline.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’ve got something more important to do.”
Marco blinked. “What could possibly—”
“She doesn’t want me near her.”
“Okay…”
“I’m going anyway.”
Marco exhaled. “Boss—”
“I’m not going to touch her. I’m not going to say a word.”
“Then why go?”
Leon finished the drink in one swallow, the burn welcome.
“Because every time I try to walk away… I end up wanting to see her face again.”
---
- Writer
