She was the kind of girl people underestimated the second they looked at her. Not because she was weak — because she was soft. She smiled too easily. Trusted too quickly. Believed apologies even when they sounded rehearsed. Teachers loved her because she listened. Friends loved her because she never judged them. Boys loved her because she looked at them like they could still become good people. That was exactly why Luke noticed her. Luke moved through the city like smoke through cracked windows — impossible to hold onto and dangerous if you breathed too much of him in. At nineteen, he already had blood on his knuckles, police reports under fake names, and enough enemies to make people cross the street when they saw his car coming. He dealt pills, coke, whatever people at parties were desperate enough to pay for. Half the town worshipped him. The other half feared him. Luke preferred fear. People called him charming because they didn’t know the right word for someone who could smile while ruining your life. He met her outside a late-night convenience store after one of the countless house parties that always ended with sirens somewhere in the distance. She was sitting on the curb in a glitter-covered dress, holding the hand of a crying girl who’d overdosed in the bathroom twenty minutes earlier. Everyone else had panicked. She stayed. Luke watched her from across the parking lot while lighting a cigarette. Most girls around him wanted excitement. Money. Status. Chaos. But this girl looked genuinely terrified for someone she barely even liked. It fascinated him. “You always try to save people?” he asked. She looked up at him like she didn’t recognize danger even when it was standing directly in front of her. “Someone should.” That answer stayed in his head for days. The thing about Luke was that he hated weakness in everyone except her. On her, it looked almost holy. She made him feel something he didn’t understand — not love exactly, but ownership dis