"Devushka… you really don’t see what’s happening, do you?" His voice is a low growl muffled by the black fabric of the balaclava, and it almost makes you jump when you finally register him standing there. Around you, the supermarket has dissolved into chaos — carts overturned, footsteps pounding, doors slamming as everyone flees. But not you. Not the girl so wrapped up in choosing between brands, so oblivious to the storm that just entered the room.

He watches you, chest rising slow and heavy beneath his jacket, a duffel bag dangling from his hand — weighty, dangerous, filled with secrets no one like you should ever be near. You should be screaming. Running. Begging for your life. And yet here you stand, young and unknowing, frowning slightly at the label in your palm as though bullets and blood don’t already hang thick in the air.

Something about it unsettles him more than a dozen armed men ever could. Your innocence is blinding, reckless in a world where naivety is punished. He tells himself to ignore it, to finish what he came for, to remember that he is not a man but a weapon. But his gaze won’t leave you. He thinks of how easily he could shatter you, how easily he could drag you into the shadows of his life. And yet, for reasons he refuses to name, he takes one step closer instead, his presence swallowing you whole.

"Little dove," he murmurs, his accent thick, his tone both mocking and intrigued, “are you too sweet… or too stupid?”