CHAPTER TWO
700 Words
LUCA
Two months.
That’s how long I’d been walking into that run-down cafe, sitting at the same table, and ordering the same bitter black coffee I didn’t even drink.
Two months of watching her.
Iris Rodriguez.
The girl with too-big glasses, tired hands, and a quietness that didn’t fit in this loud, filthy world. The kind of quietness men like me ruined.
She thought no one saw her. That she was invisible in this place.
But I did. From the very first day.
She wasn’t meant for this—the bullying coworkers, the endless shifts, the weight she carried like the world had been unkind too early in her life. I saw it in the way she tried to make herself small. But no matter how small she tried to be, she couldn’t hide her light. And light attract shadows.
At first, it wasn’t intentional. I’d only noticed her because she didn’t belong in the kind of places I lived and breathed in. She was too quiet, too soft,someone who should have been walking through a bookstore instead of the streets of my city where people like me ruled the night.
But then I kept seeing her.
The girl from the café, with tired eyes and the kind of smile that made something unfamiliar twist inside me. I told myself it was curiosity—nothing more. That I just wanted to understand why someone like her survived in a world as ugly as mine.
But curiosity turned into something else.
I memorized her schedule, her favorite corner table, the way she tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear when she thought no one was looking. She didn’t know she was being watched by a man who had done things that would make her run screaming.
I’d known the second I laid eyes on her that it was only a matter of time before someone else noticed. Someone worse than me. Someone who wouldn’t hesitate to destroy her just for existing in their path.
That’s why I stayed. That’s why I watched. That’s why I made sure every man who stared at her too long left with a warning they wouldn’t forget.
Still… I wasn’t protecting her out of kindness.
No.
It was selfish.
Because Iris had something I hadn’t felt in years. Innocence. Not the fake kind. Not the kind that breaks the moment it’s touched. Hers was real. Fragile. Dangerous. And I wanted it.
I wanted her.
The thought should have disgusted me. A man like me—blood on my hands, power stitched into my skin with ink and scars—had no business wanting a girl like her.
But desire doesn’t listen to reason. And mine had already decided.
I leaned back in my chair, letting my gaze pin her as she walked toward me, tray trembling in her hands. She tried not to meet my eyes, but she failed. She always failed. And every time she looked at me, something in her cracked open a little more.
She didn’t know it yet, but she belonged to me.
Not because she chose it.
Because fate already had.
When she placed my coffee down, her fingers brushed the table, nervous, delicate. I let her turn away, let her believe she could keep ignoring the pull between us.
But my restraint wouldn’t last much longer.
Especially not after last night.
I still saw it—her wide eyes catching mine across the alley, her body frozen as I pulled the trigger and the man crumpled at my feet. She wasn’t supposed to be there. She wasn’t supposed to see.
Now she was more than just the girl who caught my interest.
She was a witness.
And in my world, witnesses didn’t live.
Unless… they belonged to me.
I would give her a choice, though it wasn’t really one at all.
Either she’d stand by me, under my protection, or she’d be swallowed whole by the enemies that were already circling.
I was going to make it simple.
Iris Rodriguez would be my woman. My fake girlfriend, if that’s what it took for her to say yes.
A lie to ease her fear.But in reality…She would be mine.
- Writer
