Because Zara Cruz had looked me in the eye, called me crazy, and walked out.
And I wanted her more for it.
I pulled out my phone to see three new messages.
The first was from Peter, confirming that the kitchen for my other restaurant was closed and the staff had gone home. The second was from my father, which I deleted without reading. The third was from my PI.
Peter
Zara Cruz. Age 21. Born in California. Works a marketing job at Henderson & Associates. No criminal record. No outstanding debts besides student loans. Credit score: 612. Minimal social media presence: Instagram account with 12 posts, the most recent from 8 months ago. No serious red flags. She’s clean.
Clean.
I didn’t know why that word made my chest tighten. Maybe because I was used to people with skeletons—secrets they’d buried, pasts they’d run from. But Zara wasn’t running from anything. She was just… surviving.
I typed back: Dig deeper. I want everything. Bank statements. Family history. Medical records. Every interaction she’s had in the past five years.
Then I hesitated.
No, that wasn’t right. I wanted to know her. But I didn’t want to invade her. Not yet. There was a line—a thin, blurry one—between obsession and violation. And I needed to stay on the right side of it if I wanted her to trust me.
I deleted the message and typed again:
Me
Don’t worry about it. I’ll handle this myself.
Peter
Understood. Let me know if you need anything else.
I slipped the phone back into my pocket and stood. The bar was empty now, quiet except for the hum of the refrigeratorbehind the counter. I walked to the window and look out at the street.
She was gone.
But I knew where she was going. Her friend’s apartment. A couch. A place that wasn’t hers, with people who weren’t her family, in a city that had swallowed her whole.
I should have let her go.
I should have walked away.
But I’d never been good at doing what I should.
I pulled up the contact I’d saved earlier, an unnamed number that belonged to a friend of a friend who worked in data retrieval. Three hundred dollars and thirty minutes later, I had Zara’s phone number.
I stared at it for a long moment.
This was a boundary. I knew it was a boundary. She hadn’t given me her number. I had no right to contact her. But the need thrumming under my skin was louder than logic, hotter than reason.
I typed out the message carefully:
Me
It’s Lorenzo. In case you change your mind.
I hit send and then I waited.
But no response came. Not that night, not the next morning. I checked my phone obsessively—during breakfast, during a meeting with Marco, during a phone call with my father that I ended after thirty seconds.
