Chapter 1
Atlas
It’s Saturday night and we’re relaxing in our usual spot.
The VIP booth at Elixers is dark enough we won’t be bothered, but it gives us a full view of everyone else in the room.
I won’t sit with my back to a room, EVER.
It could just be me being paranoid, but I like to think it’s the fact I can never turn my hacker brain off.
Not everything my company is hired to hack into is exactly legal, but as long as the money keeps flowing in, I do what I’m best at without asking questions. It’s not like it can be traced back to me anyway, so I don’t really care.
Gavin is already looking for his next victim.
Some chick he’ll sleep with and string along for a few weeks before ghosting her.
It never fails. He shoots me a cocky wink, walking off towards two blondes standing by the bar.
I chug what’s left of my whiskey and prepare to head home.
Scanning my surroundings one last time before I leave, I stop as soon as I meet a pair of dark green eyes from across the room.
Those eyes are attached to a five-foot-three brunette whose hair tumbles past her shoulders in waves. I’ve never seen her in this club before and, while I didn’t particularly feel like dealing with people tonight, there’s something captivating about her.
Unlike other women in this bar wearing dresses that barely cover anything, she stands in the middle of the crowd wearing black jean shorts, fishnets, a crop top, and black converse. She carries herself like she owns everything she does without a care in the world.
Before I had time to plot out my next move, she was walking towards me. I swear the air changes temperature with each step she takes. I can’t help but follow her with my eyes. The way her hips sway as she walks, her eyes darkened with mischief.
When she stops in front of my booth, the temperature drops ten degrees. The tension between us is thick enough to cut with a knife.
The way she raises her brow as a smile twitches on her lips told me everything I needed to know. She’s looking for trouble, that much is obvious.
The question is, will I let her drag me into it?
She parts her lips and I brace myself for the cheesy line women always spew. But surprisingly, what comes out of those plump lips is the complete opposite.
“Is there something I can help you with, Mr. Business man? You seem to have a problem keeping your eyes to yourself. Am I too under-dressed for you that I’m ruining your night? What’s the deal?”
To say I was shocked would be an understatement, but I couldn’t let her know that.
I motioned for the bartender to send over another whiskey. I was going to need a drink for this one.
“You’re mistaken, Darling. I didn’t notice you until you were standing in front of me, but since you’re already bothering me, you might as well have a seat and make it worth the disruption.”
She huffs out a breath but scoots into the booth opposite of me anyways. A wicked smirk reaches her lips as soon as my drink hits the table. Her eyes flick to my drink twice before she locks eyes with me again. This is about to take an interesting turn, I can already tell.
“Whiskey? May I try it?”
I slide the glass towards her without saying a word and watch as she takes a sip. She doesn’t make the slightest face as she swallows it. A woman who can drink whiskey and she drank it like it was water. That more than got my attention.
She wasn’t like anyone I’ve ever met before and that irritated me, for the simple reason that I didn’t know her name yet.
Well, fuck. This might become a problem.
She, in fact, seemed to have some kind of effect on me and I didn’t like it one bit.
“It’s good… Just good, sadly. Though, I know what would make it taste better, but I’m not sure if you’re up for it.”
“Try me.”
With my whiskey glass still in her hand, she quickly rounds the booth to stand next to me. I angle my body towards her as she reaches for my chin with her free hand. She puts one foot on the bench behind me, and my hand automatically wraps around her upper thigh to steady her.
What kind of game is she playing and why am I enjoying it so much?
She tips my chin up until I’m staring back at her. There’s that smirk again.
What the fuck is she about to do?
“Open your mouth.”
She taps her index finger against my lips until I comply. I thought she was going to pour the whiskey into my mouth, but no, that would’ve been too easy.
Nope, she takes a sip and instead of swallowing it, she spits it into my mouth before pushing it closed. Her lips brush against mine before I can react to what she just did.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Beep! Beep! Beep!
My eyes flutter open and reality settles back in.
Of course, it was another fucking dream.
It’s been five days and I’ve relived five different memories. I fucked up and now she’s gone. Maybe just from my life, or maybe, from this world entirely. She’ll probably haunt me in my dreams until the day I die.
I deserve it.
I shouldn’t have let her walk out the door that night. I have no idea what happened, I can’t find a single trace of her, like she vanished into thin air.
No matter how many cameras I hack or how many leads I try to follow, I can’t find her. I keep replaying the voicemail she left me. The weight in my chest gets heavier every time I hear her voice break right before the loud sound of wreckage.
No one knows how much she means to me. At the time, I even refused to admit it to myself, so no one knows how much this hurts me. They have absolutely no idea how much I’m crumbling under this mask I put on every morning.
It’s morbid, but I check the obituary section on the news website again like I do every morning, praying I never come across her.
If I don’t see her name next to a picture of those blazing green eyes, then it gives me hope she might still be out there somewhere.
When I don’t come across her name, I get up and continue the cycle. I’ve always prided myself on being organized. I want everything to work efficiently. It didn’t always bore me, but it works.
I will live a boring life if it means I get to control the outcome.
My friends and company depend on me to keep a tight ship. I, for one, prefer having a meticulous schedule. Wake up, work out, go to work, sleep, my routine visits to the club on Tuesday and Saturday nights, then repeat.
It leaves little room for error or surprises. Errors? I can fix, but I don’t do surprises. Surprises seem like organized chaos I have no control over.
I thrive in situations I can control.
He who has control, has all the power.
I went into tech, knowing full well that I didn’t have to deal with people face-to-face.
And when I do, it’s usually transactional, something good for business and nothing more.
I refuse to pretend to care when I don’t.
Emotions aren’t really a thing I do, I’ve protected my mask of indifference for a long time.
My father taught me at a young age that emotions were useless. They make people weak. While I may hate my father, I agree with him on this. Emotions are messy; I don’t have time for messes in my life.
At least that’s what I thought, until her.
My need for control was one of the main reasons I started Torres Security, with the help of my best friend Gavin. We practically grew up together, and he’s the only person I trust to never betray me.
It took Gavin years to break through my walls. He’s like a brother more than anything else. No one else is even close to knowing the real me, just him and Maze. But, I had to fuck it up and push her away.
How fucking stupid can I be?!
I keep to my routine like everything is normal. To the outside world, it is.
No one, not even Gavin, has noticed my well-placed mask, but day by day I feel the mask cracking.
I’m not sure what feels worse: being numb or feeling EVERYTHING.
Before she came into my life, I was numb. Everything was a dull grey, and I simply went through the motions.
I was just a mask among many others.
I knew the faces I needed to make to match what I should’ve been feeling, but that doesn’t mean I felt them; my father made sure of that.
I knew my thoughts and actions weren’t exactly normal, but there wasn’t much I could do to change that.
The day I met her….how could I ever forget that day?
It was the first time I felt my own heart beat, and it fucking scared me. It skipped in my chest. I thought I was dying.
I wish I could flip that switch in my brain controlling my emotions and turn them off, but I think she broke it the day she stormed into my life.
I don’t know how much longer I can keep pretending.
I also didn’t know what I was going to do if I didn’t find something soon.