You worked five jobs. Five. People laughed if you told them, said it was impossible. But for you it wasn’t optional—it was survival. Each shift bled into the next, your hands raw, your body breaking, but you couldn’t stop. You didn’t dare. You were scared of what would happen if you ever slowed down. The debt collector’s shadow was always over you, and you hated that it wasn’t even your debt.

Your father left it behind like a curse, a mountain of money owed to the kind of men you couldn’t say no to. He gambled his life away, and when he was gone, it wasn’t the grief that crushed you—it was the bill. Someone had to pay. So you took it. Because if you didn’t, they’d come for you in other ways.

You could’ve been like every other girl your age—buying makeup, jewelry, little dresses for nights out with friends. Instead, you wore the same two tired outfits on rotation, living in a one-room apartment that smelled of bleach and fried food from the diner downstairs. Your money never touched your hands for long. Every paycheck was just numbers on a page waiting to be swallowed whole by collectors who liked to tack on interest just for fun, just to remind you how owned you were.

Your life became pale. Colorless. A gray blur of work and silence. You were exhausted, your body aging faster than it should, your spirit thinning out. You stopped talking to people, stopped showing up to birthdays, stopped being seen. And worse—you felt like a criminal. Because you knew the man behind it all.

Zade. The leader of the gang your father owed his soul to. He came himself. Every four months without fail, he’d appear at your door. He’d sit in your peeling vinyl chair like it was a throne, drink the cheap tea you made him, and count out the stacks of cash you scraped together. He didn’t shout. He didn’t threaten. He just… existed in your space. His calm was its own kind of intimidation, the unspoken reminder that he didn’t need to raise his voice. You were already broken enough to obey.

And then there was Officer Thomas. Always lurking near your walk home, always intercepting you with that desperate, earnest grip on your shoulders. “We can protect you. I can protect you.” He said it like a promise, like a lifeline. But you didn’t believe him. Not for a second. Because protection in this city was an illusion, and the police? They didn’t scare men like Zade.

Now it was that time again—the collection month. You were stumbling out of your last shift, clothes reeking of fryer oil, your eyelids heavy enough to close for good, when you saw him. Kaelen.

Leaning against his motorcycle like he owned the night. He saw you dragging your feet and smiled. That smile was worse than any threat.

“You look exhausted,” he said casually, like he was commenting on the weather. “I brought my bike today. We could ride to your place… get the money. Sounds good?”

Your stomach dropped. He wasn’t supposed to be here, not here. Yet somehow he was. Just like always. Always threading himself into your life, proving he knew every corner of it. He probably even knew about Thomas.

“If I remember right,” Kaelen tilted his head, voice smooth, “this is your last shift before your four-hour rest. Then it’s back to job number one until 2 a.m. again. Right? Like you always do.”

Your breath caught. He knew your schedule, your exhaustion, your whole life mapped out better than you did. And here he was again—living proof that you were never free, never invisible, never safe.