“Yes, positive. If I were you, I would drop it. What do you even want from him?”
“Alex, darling.” A dangerous smile forms on my lips. “Since when do I have to explain myself to you? He’s just a tool for a small project that’s school-related.”
The words are a blurred truth, per se. After all, we don’t share personal information.
“Just send everything over,” I mention vaguely before I end the call.
Alex has never questioned me before, and this isn’t the first time I’ve asked him to look into a random person. The guy who is cleaning my house every week? Full profile of his drinking addiction and his AA meetings. The woman who cooks my food and delivers it to the door? Gabriela, my other team member, put a camera in her house just to make sure she’s not trying any funny business with what I’m eating.
But Alex is also known for minding my business a little too much sometimes, so this must be it.
I open the Professor’s picture once again. If his brain is not appealing enough, his face would make it work. Azrael’s face is a work of brutal art on its own. Every feature is perfectly shaped—a chiseled jaw, a sharp nose, and cheekbones that belong on Greek gods’ sculptures. He’s perfectly made, perfectly shaped, perfectly blank.
How calm he looks in every shot is what undoes me when I try to read him. Like nothing can shake him because he’s already imagined the moment and decided precisely how it would end.
His cold, unblinking eyes are the only indication that all that perfection promises nothing but ruin. His entire persona emanates danger, and under normal circumstances, a person should be slightly scared to approach him at high speed. But not me.
He doesn’t know it yet, but I’ve decided. He’s my new toy now.
Alex sent a lot of empty information, about the same as what I got, most of it school related. The only difference is the forum, which apparently is filled with nothing more than horny students drooling over their professors while wondering how big their cocks are.
Everything about his educational life is out there in the open.
And then there is silence. Nothing about his personal life, family, or anything remotely close to friends. No intimate pictures, no “I caught this fish, like the picture” posts—although, to be honest, I’ll give up on the idea he is anything but a worthless tampon if I come across anything like this.
Not the casual quiet of privacy, but the absolute kind.
Why does it make me want him even more? God, I love a human who makes me question everything. I can’t wait for him to shatter whatever fragile part of me can’t pull itself together. And then, when he is done, I will make him my puppet until I’m over him and that beautiful mind of his. Then maybe I’ll kill him later.
The thought of him knowing I exist is enough to short-circuit the fragile scrap of sanity I have left. I imagine his hand around my throat, depriving me of air, so close to death I can feel my soul leaving my body and going straight to hell just so he can pull me back up and revive me. To whisper words of death in my ear as he gives me my life back.
Azrael Lennox will not save me. He’ll ruin me, leave fingerprints on my brain I would never scrub clean, and I will thank him for it.
The phone buzzes. The image of Alex with a hole in his brain from my bullet becomes more vivid with every interaction.
“He left the lecture early. Heading to the café on campus.”
“And you’re telling me this… why?” I answer, not giving in to the excitement I feel inside. “Is he our target now, or are you just telling me where my belongings are?”
But I’m low-key pleased with the new information.
“Not quite.” His voice is laced with subtle anger. “He’s not a target, but I also don’t particularly care. So go, have fun, and get over this. We have a job to do and not enough time for your hobbies.” And with that, he hangs up the phone.
Call it strange, but I couldn’t care less about what he wants or what needs to be done. It’s time to play.
I slip on my leather jacket before picking up my bag, and vanish into the gray chill of evening, melding into the crowds. The distant hum of traffic, the frenzy of people rushing aimlessly around—a million lives flowing around me. But only one that matters.
The café he chose is simply unremarkable. From my shadowed corner seat, I watch Azrael as he sits alone, absorbed in his phone, fingers forming messages I long to delete so nobody knows about his existence.
The subtle parting of his lips before the mug touches them, the tension in his jaw, the flex of muscles beneath his sleeves—each small motion ignites a fierce hunger inside me. The way he lifts the coffee cup, fingers curling like they’re gripping a weapon. Fingers meant for choking…
No, Victoria. You’re not allowed to fuck him, not until he fixes you at least.
But this will be so hard. This man is the pure dictionary definition of my fantasies, my own slow-motion porn. And man, objectifying him must be my very new favorite activity.
His eyes flicker up for a brief second, scanning the crowd coldly. Is he aware that he is being hunted? Not a chance. I know how to run surveillance better than anyone alive.
“More coffee?”