Crash and Burn (1)

to kill him?

**HEYYYYYY GUYS. I haven't figured out an update schedule yet, so bear with me! I'm slowly coming back to life, I think. 😂

♚ ♛

SILENCE.

I didn't know what I'd been expecting. He wasn't going to take my hand and run with a plan I'd hardly thought out.

Trust. It was short-lived and hard to come by in this city.

"Oh, yeah?" he finally drawled, but it wielded a soft, mocking edge that had a hotline straight to my temper. His fingers grazed my chin again, and I fought off an impulse to flinch away... or hit him.

We would need to work together.

"What would be your plan then?" It rolled off his tongue too cut and dry, a husky, barely there accent sharpened in dark amusement. "Hm? To kill him?"

Suddenly, I was aware of my heartbeat between my ears, thundering, louder and louder...

To kill him?

Was that really my plan?

Breathe.

In. Out.

Breathe.

He let out a quiet, ragged sigh when I didn't say anything. "Ah, carajo, that is your plan."

Spanish.

I scowled at him, pissed off I couldn't pick apart an expression through the darkness. Instead, I settled for tracing the nearly indecipherable lines of a hood that hung low, casting another thick, heavy shadow. It could be a suicide mission to even say it to him.

"I just..." My heart twisted into a knot in my throat, trapping the truth. "I can't keep running. I can't keep living like this."

His breath swept across my face again, flushing my cheeks with the faintest scent of cigarettes. Measured. Calm. It was contagious, and I needed him.

He could help me.

Slowly, I registered his shadow stirring—a cock of his head, calculated in every single inch. "I get it. I do," he said, before softening into an understanding lull, almost... resigned, as if it was... impossible.

My lip snuck between my teeth as I waited for him to say something—anything—else. Each second he stayed silent, I struggled to force the ballooning anxiety in my chest, down, down, down. Focus. Distant reminders of truck traffic, muffled, far along Flushing. Rain. Breathing.

Breathe.

I knew. If I was alone, I would have stayed here, too, as still as death, until I knew it was safe to step out. He knew. He was doing this, too, taking the same precautions to stay alive.

His weight shifted. Minuscule. Fleeting. A quick flick of his head, slight of his gaze, exposing the littlest things—the tips of his dark, damp curls, the bridge of his nose, the curve of his lips in a din fluorescent haze. Barely able to reach him. Scruff. His profile, contoured by an opaque streak. He let out a huff of cold air.

Breathe.

Eventually, though I didn't see him move again, I felt his gaze on me. Heavy. It seemed to burn through the darkness, and I didn't... I didn't understand it. Fuck, it was a mistake. He was going to kill me.

My gaze shot up, and I tried to raise to my tiptoes, desperate to escape the thick, hazy tension. Run. His chest pressed forward, shutting it down, disarming any defense I had, restrained, pinned between a wall and a stranger I'd low-key propositioned murder to.