"Why?" The word comes out strangled. "Why would you do that?"
"Because I needed a reason to touch you." I watch her face. "I couldn't just approach you on the street. You would have been wary. But if I saved you from danger I created, you'd be grateful. You'd let your guard down. You'd smile at me the way you did over coffee."
"You're insane." It's barely a whisper.
"Obsessed," I correct. I take another step closer. She takes another step back. Her spine hits the wall. There's nowhere left to run. "There's a difference,piccola. Insane implies I don't know what I'm doing. I know precisely what I'm doing."
"Don't call me that. Don't—" She holds up the pepper spray like a weapon. "Stay back."
I stop, but only because I want to see her from here. I want to see the way her chest rises and falls with each breath. I want to see the moment she realizes that pepper spray won't save her.
"You've been in my apartment," she says. Not a question. She knows. "Multiple times. Moving things. The chair in my kitchen. The book on my coffee table."
"I have." I don't apologize. I'm not sorry. "I picked your lock in less than a minute the first time. It was easier every time after that."
She's testing the weight of it. She's understanding the violation. "You broke into my home."
"I didn't break anything. I was very careful." I tilt my head, studying her. "I stood in your bedroom doorway, watched you sleep and counted your breaths. I learned everything about you while you dreamed a few feet away from me. I opened your drawers and touched your things. I sat in your kitchen."
She makes a sound—half fury, half fear. Her knuckles are white on the pepper spray.
"I needed to know you were safe," I continue, my voice soft. Reasonable. "That you were real. That you were still here, still waiting for me, even if you didn't know it yet. I took photos of you and they helped, but they weren't enough. I needed to be close to you. I needed to breathe the same air. I needed to see you vulnerable and soft and perfect."
"I'm not yours." But her voice wavers when she says it. She knows she's lying.
"You are." I move closer. She's pressed against the wall now, and there's nowhere to go. "You have been since the moment you touched me in that hospital. Since you looked at a stranger covered in blood and saw someone worth saving. Since you lied to protect me without even knowing who I was."
"I didn't lie to protect you. I just—" She stops. She realizes what she's admitting.
"You reported my gunshot wound as a construction accident," I say softly. "You protected a criminal. You saved my life. And in doing so,piccola, you made yourself mine."
"That's not how it works. That's not—" She shakes her head like she can shake away the truth. "You're a criminal. You've been stalking me. Breaking into my home. Following me.”
She stops. She stares at me.
I pull out my device, show her the pictures and send them to her phone. Her at the bodega. Walking to work. Standing at her window.
"How many pictures?" she whispers.
I could lie. I could soften the truth. I could make it easier to swallow.
But I don't lie to her. Not about this.
"Hundreds. I started the first day. Every time I see you, I take another. I can't help myself."
"You're sick," she says, but this time it sounds different. Like she's trying to convince herself as much as me.
"Obsessed," I correct again. "I think about you every waking moment. I dream about you when I sleep. I see your face when I close my eyes. I've memorized the way you move, the way you smell, the way you tuck your hair behind your left ear when you're nervous. You're all I think about, Francesca. You're all I want."
"That's not love. That's?—"
"Obsession," I finish for her. "I know. Does it matter? Love, obsession, possession—they all end the same way. With you belonging to me."
"I don't belong to anyone."
"You do now."
She moves toward the door, like she actually thinks she can leave.
