As he walked through the crowd, her eyes followed him, drawn to him against her will. Why am I doing this? she thought, her heart racing, a mix of curiosity and fear. What's wrong with me?
She followed him from a distance, her every instinct telling her to turn back, but her feet kept moving. Her mind was a storm of questions: Where is he going? Why is he alone tonight?
She watched as he took a sharp turn down an alley, then another, until he reached a dilapidated building at the edge of the city. Her stomach twisted. This was no ordinary building. She knew the area-it was a place where only the dangerous and desperate went. A place where secrets were buried and lives were lost.
Renji paused at the entrance, a dark smirk playing at his lips, his eyes glinting with something far more sinister than anything she had ever seen in him before. He stepped inside without a second glance, and Miyuki, heart pounding, found herself following him into the darkness.
Inside, the air was thick with tension. The place smelled of decay, the lights flickering sporadically, casting strange shadows on the walls. She could barely make out the shapes of men standing in a loose circle around a single chair in the center of the room.
As Claire aims to leave her oppressive stepfamily behind, she befriends Zion. Will he be her ticket to freedom or a distraction in achieving her dreams?
*****
Claire Olsen has had a crush on Zion Petrakis since the first time she laid eyes on him, but he never noticed, instead only having eyes on the school's it girl, Maddie Jennings. Knowing she couldn't compete with Maddie, Claire hid her feelings for Zion, satisfied with admiring him from afar. However, when a series of events led Claire closer to Zion, her feelings for him grew from infatuation to love. And despite fighting hard to keep her feelings contained by distancing herself from Zion, he was determined to show her that he's earned a spot in her life.
[[word count: 100,000-150,000 words]]