Evan always woke before Adrian. It wasn’t just habit, though he’d tell Adrian it was. It was necessity. He needed those hours of silence before the sun came up, when the world was dark and Adrian’s breathing was the only sound in the apartment. Those hours gave him time to think, to plan, to calculate. This morning was no different. He was up before dawn, watching the faint rise and fall of Adrian’s chest beside him in bed. For a fleeting moment, he let himself linger—watching the soft angle of Adrian’s jaw, the way his lips parted slightly in sleep, the strands of hair that had fallen across his forehead. Beautiful. Untouchable. His. But the moment broke as his eyes drifted to the folder on his desk across the room. Printed photographs. Still frames from grainy footage. Blurred outlines of a man too close, far too close, to Adrian in the past few weeks. Outside the café. Across the street from his office. Even in the park where Evan had taken him once for a walk—Adrian’s laugh ca
The threats didn’t stop.They came in waves—sliding under the door in cheap envelopes, typed messages tucked between advertisements, texts from strange numbers that vanished before Adrian could even screenshot them. Each one was more invasive than the last.I’m watching you.He doesn’t love you, he owns you.Every cage has a lock—and I have the key.And then the pictures started.Blurry at first, as though taken with a shaky hand from across the street. Adrian walking out of his office. Adrian laughing in a café with coworkers. Adrian waiting for Evan outside the gallery, arms wrapped tight around himself against the cold.The one that made his blood run cold wasn’t grainy at all. It was crystal-clear—him and Evan, seated at the restaurant weeks ago, Evan’s hand curled possessively over his thigh under the table. They hadn’t noticed the flash. They hadn’t thought anyone was close enough to see.On the back was scrawled: I’m coming for you.---Evan’s reaction was immediate.The first
The photographs didn’t leave Adrian’s mind.Even after Evan swept them off the table and shoved them into a drawer, even after he’d murmured soft reassurances that “nothing will touch you, I promise,” the images burned into Adrian’s thoughts.Every picture had been taken without his knowledge. Every smile, every glance across a table, every moment where he’d felt like maybe things were normal—captured, observed, stolen.And the words scrawled across the bottom of the page kept replaying like a drumbeat:I’m coming for you.Adrian had thought Evan’s obsession was suffocating before. He had thought the constant monitoring, the hand at his back, the eyes on him everywhere he went, was already too much.But after the note, it only got worse.---It began the next morning.Evan didn’t leave his side. Not for a moment.He trailed Adrian from the bedroom to the kitchen, insisting on pouring his coffee, watching him take every sip. He followed him into the living room, settled close enough on
Adrian woke with a dry mouth and a pounding head. For a moment, he didn’t know where he was—the room was dim, the curtains drawn tight against the morning sun. Then the weight at his waist reminded him.Evan’s arm.Heavy, warm, anchored across him like a chain.Adrian shifted slightly, careful not to wake him, but even the smallest movement made Evan’s hold tighten. He was awake instantly, as if he hadn’t been sleeping at all.“Morning,” Evan murmured, voice low, already pressing a kiss into the hollow of Adrian’s shoulder. “How are you feeling?”Adrian swallowed. “Tired.”“You drank too much.” It wasn’t a judgment, not exactly, but it was firm, an observation laid out like fact. Evan pulled him closer, burying his nose in Adrian’s hair. “You don’t need alcohol. You don’t need anything that makes you sick. You have me.”The words sent a shiver down Adrian’s spine. Comforting and terrifying all at once.“I just wanted to relax,” Adrian whispered.“You can relax here,” Evan said simply,
The silence in the car wasn’t empty. It was thick, charged, like static just before lightning splits the sky. Adrian sat rigid in the passenger seat, hands clenched together in his lap, watching the city lights smear by through the window. His pulse still thudded heavy from the bar—too much alcohol, too much adrenaline, too much Evan.The drive home was short, painfully short. Adrian almost wished for traffic, for a red light that lingered just a few seconds longer. Anything to delay what was coming once the car stopped. But the universe offered him no such reprieve. Within minutes, they pulled into the underground garage of Evan’s building, the sleek hum of the engine dying with a finality that made Adrian’s throat tighten.Evan didn’t move right away. He sat there, hands gripping the wheel, gaze fixed straight ahead. The only sound was the faint tick of cooling metal.Adrian swallowed, the alcohol haze thinning just enough for clarity to cut through. “Evan…”The word was a fragile o
The bass from the bar’s speakers thudded through Adrian’s chest, a steady vibration that mixed with the laughter of his coworkers. It was supposed to be a casual night out—after weeks of suffocating domestic routines with Evan, he had said yes to drinks with his team. He told himself it wasn’t rebellion, just… normalcy. A chance to breathe without Evan’s shadow trailing at his heels.His phone sat facedown on the table, vibrating every so often against the wood. He ignored it at first, too busy with the beer his friend Emma had slid across to him, the easy chatter about deadlines, office politics, and how their manager couldn’t organize a file cabinet if her life depended on it. Each buzz, though, tugged at the corner of his awareness like a hook. He didn’t need to check the screen to know who it was.Evan.Adrian’s grip tightened around his glass.“Another round?” someone called, and Adrian lifted his half-empty drink automatically, throat dry.Why not?The first sip burned in a way