Weeks Later

She Never Left His Mind-

He hasn’t seen her since the award ceremony. But she hasn’t left.

---

It had been three weeks.

Three cities.

Nine boardrooms.

Dozens of faces and contracts and security briefings.

And yet—

he remembered nothing from them.

Nothing.

Except her.

---

Her eyes.

Large. Shiny.

Like they were holding stories too scared to fall out.

Her lips.

Soft. Plump. Almost parted when their eyes met—

as if she had something to say,

but didn’t.

Didn’t need to.

He remembered the way her fingers clutched the certificate—tightly—like it meant more than paper.

The slight tilt of her head.

The calmness in her chaos.

He remembered how the sun had kissed her skin,

how her presence had made the room too loud and too quiet all at once.

---

He had tried to forget.

Brushed it off as mere fascination.

A chemical misfire.

Something primal and fleeting.

He even said it aloud one night—

> “It was nothing.”

“A moment. That’s all.”

But the lie tasted stale every time.

---

Because he remembered too much.

Too precisely.

Too intimately for a man who had never touched her.

Never spoken her name out loud.

Never been close enough to hear her voice.

> “Anerah Elise Moreno.”

He only read it once.

But it replayed in his mind like scripture.

---

And when he closed his eyes—

She was there.

In white. In light.

In silence.

Looking at him like she didn’t know what he was.

Like she didn’t fear it.

Like she didn’t belong in this world… but somehow, in his.

---

He called it nothing.

He called it a phase.

He called it lust.

But obsession never needs permission to bloom.

And he was already past the point of return.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

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The Distraction He Won’t Name

---

The city blinked beneath his office windows —

a sea of lights stretching into fog.

But Ruveil wasn’t looking.

He stood with his back to it, arms crossed,

eyes focused on the untouched folder on his desk.

His assistant had said something about a merger.

Or maybe it was a lawsuit.

He didn’t care.

Not tonight.

Not when her face kept showing up behind his closed lids like a painting his mind refused to smudge.

---

It was pathetic, really.

He barely knew her.

A girl.

A student.

One accidental glance and she’d built a home in the back of his skull.

He hadn’t seen her since the ceremony.

And still—

> “Doe-like eyes.”

“Ink-stained fingertips.”

“Lips that looked too soft to lie.”

He cursed under his breath.

This wasn’t normal.

---

He tried to distract himself—

Meetings. Weapons trades.

Dinners with women who laughed too loud and wore perfume too sharp.

But even in bed with someone else,

he found himself annoyed.

Irritated.

Because their eyes weren’t hers.

Because no one looked at him like she had—

like she didn’t know who he was,

and still didn’t care to fear it.

---

At 2:17 AM,

he found himself standing by the floor-to-ceiling window, phone in hand.

Thumb hovering over a secure line.

To his intel team.

A single command away from—

No.

He turned the screen off.

Locked his jaw.

He wouldn’t do it.

He wouldn’t search for her.

> “It was a distraction.”

“It’ll pass.”

He told himself the same thing last week.

And the week before that.

But tonight, the lies were quieter.

And the silence she left behind was louder.

---

Then—almost absently—he murmured into the dark:

> “Anerah Elise Moreno.”

Her name curled around his mouth like smoke.

Like sin.

Like a promise he hadn’t made yet…

but already intended to keep.

---

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