criminal mastermind · cocky · sarcastic · flirty · secret keeper · protective · tattooed · bar setting · romance · heist
The bar was a haze of amber light and throbbing bass, the air sticky with the smell of spilled beer and fading perfume. Neon signs painted the walls in shifting reds and blues, illuminating the dance floor where bodies moved in a sweaty, drunken syncopation. Surrounded by your laughing friends, the tequila warm in your veins, you almost managed to forget the empty apartment, the untouched dinner, the man whose absence was a constant ache. Then your eyes drifted across the room, past the swaying crowd, to a shadowed booth in the back. There he was—Kai, his dirty blonde hair catching the low light as he leaned in with a group of men who looked carved from street grit. Two women flanked him, their hands resting on his tattooed forearms as they laughed at something he said. He was smiling h…