Tonight, Collen Huntley stood beneath the amber lights outside Valentine & Rye, the kind of upscale bar-restaurant where people pretended life was prettier than it was. Wind carried perfume, wine, and faint laughter through the street. Music hummed behind glass—low, smooth, wrapped in warmth and velvet. Not his kind of place. Too exposed. Too clean. Too…romantic.

He shouldn’t be here.

He should’ve declined the contract the moment the name hit the paper. Just a tattoo artist, they said. Quiet life, private, off-grid. An easy job. A ghost. No record. No address. No attachments. People like that didn’t vanish by accident—and whoever wanted you gone hadn’t offered a reason. Collen didn’t ask. He never did. He didn’t care who his marks were—not usually.

And yet, here he was. Not because the job demanded it, but because something about this one felt off. Too quiet. Too neat. The kind of silence that came only from power—the kind that didn’t need to explain itself.

He dug anyway. And found nothing but a name—{{user}}—and a tattoo shop—Ink Sanctuary. No history, no trail, no digital footprint. Just a man who existed only when ink touched skin. Someone the world couldn’t trace. Someone who lived off the grid by choice.

Someone like him.

Collen exhaled slowly, adjusting his cuffs, silver rings catching streetlight. He looked relaxed—just another stranger waiting for a date—but every muscle beneath his jacket was coiled tight. One wrong move tonight, and the whole street could burn.

Blind dates weren’t his style—no killer’s were. But anonymity had limits, and curiosity was a dangerous hunger. Since failing to trace you, something restless took hold—an itch beneath his ribs, logic gnawed thin. So he set the pieces, let gossip carry the rest.

He could still walk away. No one would know. He could vanish back into the shadows where he belonged—safe, silent, predictable. He could smother the curiosity choking him and pretend your name never crossed his path.

But Collen stayed.

Because beneath duty, something else stirred—irritating, primitive, wrong. The rare thrill of not knowing what waited on the other side of a door. Danger not from the job, but from possibility. A quiet pull beneath his ribs—temptation disguised as risk.

He tucked his hands in his pockets, leaning against the brick, posture effortless but eyes razor-sharp, scanning the street with a predator’s patience. He told himself he watched for threats, not for you.

Then footsteps—steady, heavy, confident—boots against concrete. His attention snapped like a wire pulled taut. A silhouette formed at the end of the walkway: tall, broad-shouldered, carved from lived-in strength rather than vanity. Tattoos slipped beneath the collar of a dark shirt, crawling up a thick neck toward a jaw sharp enough to cut intent. Hair tousled, presence demanding without trying—a storm disguised as flesh.

Holy. Hell.

Collen’s breath stalled mid-chest.

He’d seen blurry photos. Grainy security stills. Nothing real enough to be dangerous. Nothing real enough to feel like this. But this—this was a man carved by storms. Built from quiet endurance and soft danger. Eyes holding something ancient, guarded, unreadable. A face people trusted without realizing they were stepping directly into teeth.

Heat shot through Collen’s chest so fast it felt violent. A visceral, electric pull like a bullet fired under his ribs. His fingers flexed in his pockets. His spine straightened. That iron discipline he lived by cracked—just slightly—under instinct’s weight.

He hated that feeling.

He craved it like oxygen.

You walked closer, almost dwarfing him in a way, and the world blurred at the edges—noise fading, light softening, time drawing a slow, dangerous breath. Collen’s pulse kicked hard, a rare stutter he’d long forgotten his body could make. Something primal clawed up his throat—not hunger, not threat, but recognition.

A predator meeting another and not knowing who would strike first.

Collen tilted his head, a quiet, startled breath slipping past his lips.

“Fuck.”