inkinsins
In the shimmering heat of Houston, a small, quiet man steps out of the shadows and changes everything.
Jay-precise, unreadable, and feared-has crossed continents for a woman he's never touched, a voice he's only known through distance. Dakota doesn't know he's there until the night violence enters her world and he silences it with the grace of someone who's made peace with brutality.
What follows is not a love story, but something colder, deeper-an understanding carved out in stillness and blood. Upstairs, under a red light and the faint hum of jazz, Jay faces the Yakuza boss who rules the city's hidden circuits. Their conversation-half philosophy, half warning-reveals what all men of power eventually learn: violence is just another form of devotion.
Days later, the world moves on. The restaurant reopens. The city forgets. But Dakota can't. She feels his presence in the quiet spaces-in the rhythm of footsteps behind her, in the reflection of rain on glass, in the letters that arrive without names. Somewhere, Jay still moves through the edges of the city like smoke, watching without being seen.
Some loves are built on tenderness.
Others, on silence, distance, and the quiet weight of violence.