1 - Isa #2
"The way you're looking at everything tonight. Like you're memorizing it." He leans against the bar, that easy smile never wavering, but his eyes stay intent, drawing more from me without asking. "Lisbon, right? You mentioned it once."
The fact that he remembers a throwaway comment from months ago shouldn't surprise me.
Adrian remembers everything, everyone, all of us pieces in the warm world he's built.
But the way he knows, really knows, before I've said anything.
That's different. That's Adrian reading me like no one else can, drawing out secrets I didn't know I was ready to tell.
I finish the pour, slide the drink to the waiting customer, then finally meet his eyes.
"I'm leaving," I confirm. "Soon. The passport paperwork is already started."
His smile doesn't change. Not a flicker. That perfect, warm, Adrian smile that makes you feel like the only person in the room while revealing absolutely nothing of himself.
"Everything you want is already yours, Isa. You just have to claim it." The words have an odd weight, like they mean something different in his mouth than they would in mine. Then, lighter: "Everyone needs a fresh start sometimes."
He straightens, heading back into the crowd before I can respond.
But there's something in the way he moves.
The same easy grace, the same warm attention to everyone he passes.
It feels like a wall I've just been shown.
Like that smile was a door closing so gently I won't notice it's locked until I try to open it again.
The rest of the shift passes in the usual blur.
Adrian brings two more espressos over the course of the night, our unspoken rhythm intact.
Each time he sets the cup down with the same casual precision, each time I drink it without acknowledgment.
The familiar dance of two people who know each other's patterns by heart.
"When?" he asks during a brief lull, polishing glasses beside me like he belongs behind the bar.
"Few weeks. Maybe a month." The truth feels lighter spoken aloud, more real. "Once I save enough for the plane ticket and first month's rent."
"Lisbon's beautiful in autumn," he says. "All those hills and yellow trams. You'll love it."
The ease of his response makes my shoulders drop.
I'd been bracing for questions, for resistance, for any of the hooks that usually come when you try to leave a place.
But Adrian gives me nothing to fight against, just that warm acceptance that makes him impossible to read.
Is he hurt? Relieved? Planning something?
His face gives away nothing but that same genuine care he shows everyone.
Behind him, Gunner emerges from the security office, shoulders filling the doorway.
He scans the room with those pale eyes that miss nothing, pauses on the corner table where the suited men sit, then disappears back into his domain.
The moment feels weighted, but that's just La Sirena.
Every gesture carries meaning if you know how to read it.
I feel lighter as the night winds down. The decision spoken, witnessed, accepted. The passport form waiting at home. The escape route finally marked. Whatever held me to Miami loosens with each passing hour. Guilt, fear, the weight of what I can't change.
The unease from my walk tries to surface again as I wipe down the bar, but I push it away. Big decisions make you paranoid. That's all.
I've started something tonight. Finally, actually started the leaving I've threatened for so long. The relief of it makes me feel almost weightless.
The crowd thins as we approach closing. The diehards nurse their last drinks while the staff starts the subtle dance of encouraging departure.
I'm measuring out the last of the good vodka when Adrian appears at my elbow again.
Not with coffee this time. Just himself, standing closer than he needs to.
Close enough that I catch that cologne. Tobacco and lime.
My pulse kicks, sudden and sharp. The same scent from the street.
"Few weeks then," he says, but he hasn't moved away.
He's standing close enough that I feel the heat radiating from his body, watching me with those dark eyes that see too much.
The warmth in them has shifted to something else, something that makes my breath catch.
"I should give you something to remember Miami by. "
Before I can respond, his hand comes up to my face.
His thumb brushes something from my cheek.
Coffee grounds, maybe nothing at all. The touch shoots through me like electricity.
My whole body goes still, hyperaware of every point of contact.
His thumb on my cheekbone, his fingers grazing my jaw, the heat of his palm so close to my mouth I could turn into it if I just—
We freeze there. His hand against my skin, my pulse racing so hard he must feel it jumping under his fingers. The bar, the club, the whole world narrows to this: Adrian's touch, the way his eyes darken as they drop to my mouth, the space between us that feels suddenly, dangerously thin.
"Some things," he murmurs, voice low enough that I have to lean closer to hear, close enough that I feel his breath against my ear, "are worth staying for, Isa."
His thumb traces down, the lightest brush against the corner of my mouth. Heat pools low in my belly, immediate and unwanted. My lips part involuntarily. I see his eyes track the movement, see something flash through them that looks like hunger.
Then he's gone. His hand drops away as he melts back into the crowd, leaving me standing there with my skin on fire and my careful plans suddenly feeling as fragile as glass.
The place where he touched me burns. I resist the urge to press my own fingers there, to hold the heat of him against my skin.
I watch him work the room, that easy charm back in place like the last thirty seconds never happened. But I can still feel the ghost of his thumb on my mouth. Still smell his cologne in the air between us. Still feel the weight of those words: worth staying for.
The espresso cup sits empty on the bar, and I realize with a start that I don't know if the decision to leave is still mine at all.