The Price Of Survival
636 Words
Chapter Two: The Price Of Survival
Alina’s Pov
(Flashback)
The bell above the café door chimes, and my stomach knots. Another rush, another chance to screw up.
Balancing a tray of cappuccinos, I weave through the cramped tables when bam—I stumble. My arm jerks, and a river of steaming coffee splashes down the sleeve of a stranger’s suit.
“Oh my God!” I gasp, my face flaming. “I’m so, so sorry.”
The man doesn’t shout. He doesn’t even move at first. He just looks at me—really looks at me. His eyes are piercing, cool gray with an intensity that strips me bare. His jaw is sharp, his golden hair perfectly styled, his body… impossibly sculpted, like he was carved out of arrogance and marble.
I’m ready for him to explode—this suit probably costs more than our entire rent for a year. Instead, he smiles. Slow. Dangerous.
“It’s fine,” he says, voice smooth as velvet and twice as lethal. He takes the napkin I offer but doesn’t use it. He lets his gaze linger on me instead.
Rebecca, my coworker, darts over with wide eyes. “Sir, we’ll cover the cleaning cost—”
He waves her off. “No need.” Then, to me: “What’s your name?”
My lips part. My throat is dry. “Alina.”
He nods like he’s just memorized it, like it matters. Then he adjusts his cuff, turns, and strides out of the café. A black town car waits at the curb. He gets in, not once glancing back.
I blow out a shaky breath, press a hand to my racing heart, and pray I never see him again.
I did.
He came back the next day. And the day after. Always immaculately dressed. Always asking for me, even when I’m not on shift. Sometimes he sits in the corner, laptop open, but his eyes track me like I’m the only thing in the room. It’s unnerving. It’s… addictive.
Rebecca whispers one afternoon, “He asked about you. Wants to know why you’re not always here.”
My cheeks burn. “And you told him?”
She shrugs, defensive. “He looked concerned. Like—really concerned. I just said you’ve got two jobs, and that things are… tight at home.”
Tight. That’s one way to put it. Barely breathing is another.
And then it begins.
A box left at our doorstep. Groceries. Then another week, money folded inside an envelope with no note. My mother cries, saying we can’t accept it. But when hunger gnaws at your bones, pride becomes paper-thin.
Three weeks, every Saturday, an invisible savior. Then—nothing. The boxes stop. The envelopes disappear.
That’s when my mother calls me home one evening, her voice trembling. I push open the door to find her pale, clutching a letter from the bank. Eric sits stiffly at the table, jaw clenched, his eyes burning holes in the wood grain.
And in the middle of our kitchen, like he belongs there, stands him.
The stranger from the café.
Except he isn’t just a stranger. His presence is too commanding, too deliberate. The sharp cut of his suit swallows the shabby kitchen whole.
“I believe introductions are overdue,” he says smoothly. “Ethan Kingston.”
The name knocks the breath out of me. Everyone knows the Kingstons. Billionaires. Untouchable. Dangerous.
My mother’s eyes shine with something between fear and hope. “He… he says he can help us, Alina.”
Ethan’s gaze finds mine, and my blood runs cold. “But not for free.”
My voice trembles. “What do you want?”
His smile is slow, predatory, the same one he wore the first day I spilled coffee on him. “You.”
- Writer
