Alessia
I never should've taken the back street.
Trastevere was older than sin and wore its age like perfume — heavy, aching, unforgettable. The rain came down in soft drizzles at first, whispering against the clay-tiled rooftops, until it thickened into sheets. Rome in the rain was supposed to be romantic. But tonight, it felt like a warning.
The alleys here twist like secrets. My boots echoed on uneven stone as I made my way home from the art supply store, fingers curled tight around the strap of my bag. I should have stayed at the café until the storm passed. But my nerves had been crawling under my skin all evening, and the rain had always felt like a cleanse to me.
I needed to be alone.
Instead, I walked straight into hell.
It was supposed to be empty. That alley near Via della Scala — I'd taken it a dozen times. This time, there were two men. One standing. One kneeling. Then, a flash. A sharp crack. Not thunder. Thunder doesn't come from a silencer.
The kneeling man collapsed in a graceless heap, blood spilling across the wet stones like red ink in water. The man holding the gun barely moved.
I froze.
And then… he looked up.
Even in the low light, I could see him clearly. Tall. Dark. Ice carved into a man. Black coat soaked at the hem. A face too precise to be kind. His eyes latched onto mine like claws — sharp, cold, and assessing.
And then he took a step forward.
Not rushed. Not surprised.
He was calm.
I ran.
Panic screamed through me as I stumbled back, boots slipping against stone. I could hear my heart in my ears, louder than my footsteps, louder than the distant sirens of a city that wouldn't care about another body in the rain. I didn't look back. I didn't need to. I could feel him behind me, even if he wasn't chasing.
I burst into my building, slammed the stairwell door behind me, and climbed three floors with my lungs burning. My apartment was dark and cold. I locked the door. Bolted it. Pressed my back against it and sank to the floor, shaking.
I had seen someone die.
And I had seen the man who did it.
A man who didn't run.
A man who saw me.
I was still on the floor when I heard the knock.
Three raps. Calm. Even.
My chest seized.
No one knew where I lived. No one ever came by. I hadn't told anyone I was taking that alley. My hands trembled as I reached for my phone, but I dropped it when I heard the voice on the other side of the door.
"Open the door, kotenok."
My breath stopped. I pressed my fingers to my mouth to keep from making a sound. His voice was thick with a Russian accent, deep and velvet-smooth, like a blade wrapped in silk.
"You saw something that doesn't belong to you," he said, quieter this time, like a secret. "And now I have to decide what to do with you."
I backed away from the door, heart pounding hard enough that it made my chest ache. My apartment felt too small, too fragile. I turned off the lights, praying he'd leave.
He didn't.
He never does.
Nikolai
She ran like prey.
And I let her.
There was something beautiful about the way she moved. Panic sharpened her. The stiffness in her spine, the raw sound of her breath — it reminded me of something old. Something untamed.
She didn't scream. Not loudly. Not until she thought she was safe.
I could have ended her in the alley. Or outside her apartment. Or inside it, before she even saw me.
But something about her stopped me.
Her sweater was too thin for the cold, and her eyes too wide for this city. She was soft — fragile in a way that begged to be bruised. I don't like soft things. They never last.
But I wanted her.
Because when our eyes met — just for a second — she didn't look away. And I needed to know why.
Alessia
He was already inside.
The lights in my living room flickered once. Then again. And when they came back fully, he was standing in the shadows, near my easel.
I froze.
He didn't speak. Didn't smile. Just watched me like he was deciding where to cut.
"How—how did you—?" I couldn't even finish the question.
He moved closer. No rush. No sound. The kind of man who owned silence. "Your door was unlocked," he said, clearly lying.
"You killed someone," I whispered.
He tilted his head. "Did I?"
"I saw—"
"You think you saw," he interrupted smoothly. "And that's the problem."
He circled my couch like a wolf sniffing territory. My art studio was messy — canvases stacked in corners, jars of paint left open on the counter, a smudge of crimson across the window sill that looked too much like blood under the low lighting.
He paused in front of a painting. One of my recent pieces — soft pinks bleeding into charcoal grays, hands reaching through fog.
"You dream in color," he said. "But live in fear."
"I'm not afraid."
He laughed once — low and dark. "You're trembling."
"I don't know who you are," I said, my voice barely a whisper.
"You will."
He moved toward me again. I took two steps back, but he didn't touch me. Just stood close enough that I could feel the heat coming off him.
His hand came up — slow, deliberate — and brushed a curl off my face.
"Soft," he murmured. "Delicate. Breakable."
"I'm not," I lied.
He smiled. "You're mine now."
Nikolai
She didn't scream. Not even when I got close enough to see the pulse in her throat jumping.
There's a moment right before someone breaks. A silence. A flicker in their eyes. I watched her dance at the edge of that moment and step back.
She was braver than I thought.
I left without hurting her.
Because pain was easy.
Fear was better.
Alessia
I didn't sleep that night. I couldn't.
I kept the lights on, my phone in my hand, a pair of scissors under my pillow like it could do anything if he came back. But the silence was worse than the knock. It stretched until the sun bled pale orange across the sky.
And then I saw the black car.
Parked across the street.
Engine off. Tinted windows. It didn't belong here — this was an old building, filled with families and students and forgotten people. No one here drove cars that clean.
They were watching me.
And I knew — he hadn't forgotten me.
Nikolai
When Luca called to confirm she hadn't left the apartment, I gave one order.
"Bring her to me."
"She's not going to come willingly."
"She doesn't have to."
He hesitated. "We're grabbing a civilian?"
I smiled coldly. "She watched me kill a man and didn't run fast enough. That makes her mine."
And I always take what's mine.