He was entranced. Dark against light, cold against warmth, soft against rough. The most mesmerizing and haunting incongruities that casted a deep, dark spell on him. She was a witch, she had to be. Her sinful lips, tainted the most sweetest shade of red, called for him like a lonesome white pill calling out to its addict. He could almost feel her hands, touching him but never really touching him. It had been a year now, and finally he could see her facade. She didn't care for him at all. It took him seeing multiple hickeys on her neck to realize this. He knew now there was no authenticity to her words or her touch. There never had been.

She was a ghost, perhaps.

Her beauty still lived but the part of her that had once been somewhat humane, was now dead. Her eyes, now that he could see beyond their enchantment, were lifeless. Could she even see with them? Was the world in her eyes colorful like the one she imposed on him?

Sitting there in his desk chair, his back arched with the weight of his realizations, he stared at her as she lay on his bed. The sight was fluid and romantic; she was the perfect muse for any artist. The waves of her hair complemented the soft creases in the silk sheets draped around her, and the creamy pigment of her skin looked so pleasing amid the bed of white.

She was peering up at him through her eery lashes, her head near the edge of the bed. Any other day, and Stephan would've already dove into the lustful feast that was right before him. Not today though. His mind was too saddened by his thoughts for his hormones to control him like usual.

She doesn't love me. She doesn't love anyone.

This is what hurt him the most.

This beautiful, angelic woman that he had been so deeply infatuated with for a year, was not an angel in the slightest. She was not an angel for angels could love. Angels could see the beauty in life, in other people.

She was blinded by the greedy demons that haunted her. He could see this now.

He felt angry.

Her hand reached out, timidly almost, and brushed over his thigh. His body tensed.

"Don't touch me," he seethed, and her eyes widened in surprise. The peaceful silence of the room was shattered as Stephan stood up from his chair, standing tall and looking down at her with a furious gaze.

"What are you even doing with your life, Carmen? Where do you think all these lies and games are going to get you?"

She sat up slowly, her expression feigning confusion and hurt. It made his anger boil even further; how had he been so blind?

"What are you talking about?" she frowned.

"Stop," he closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. When he reopened them, they were softer and sadder. "Stop acting, Carmen. You don't have to do that around me anymore."

"Acting?" Her eyebrows raised. "You think I'm... acting?"

"Yes," he responded immediately, huffing out a breath. His eyes averted to the window, the fresh afternoon light seeping into the room. He swallowed thickly, the notch in his throat bobbing up and down. "Everything that you do... to me or to-to the other men that you're with... it's not real. None of it is."

"Not real?" Finally, the mask over her face was taken off and she smirked. "Am I not real, then? Am I just a figment of your imagination?" she mused, leaning down to lay against the feather pillows.

"Yes," Stephan breathed. "That's all you are. I have fabricated this-this idea of you in my head, and that's exactly what you wanted. Isn't that true? You have never had any feelings for me, none that exceeded your greed."

"I've expressed my lack of feelings to you before," she reminded him, her voice soft. It was always so gentle, even her harshest of words. It was like she was cutting through his skin with a blunt blade, but the pain was no less than if it were sharp.

"You have," he nodded. "You said that you were uncomfortable being in a relationship. You told only the partial truth, Carmen. You knew from the start there would never be a real relationship between us. Not because you were 'uncomfortable', but because you don't seek a relationship with anyone. You don't seek love or comfort. What is it then? What is it that you actually want?"

Carmen had never been asked such questions. She hesitated for the slightest moment, her dark eyes unsure of themseves for only a split second, until they hardened again. She sat up and crawled slowly until she was kneeling before him, the height of the bed giving her an extra few inches, her eyes level with his.

"There's only one thing that I want, Stephan," she mouthed, bring her lips to his. His mind begged for him to lean back to lessen the contact, but he knew that never in a million years would he deny her touch, no matter how meaningless it was.

"What?" he whispered desperately. "Tell me what you want. Maybe I can give it to you." Even after coming to terms with the fact that she would and could never want him the way he wanted her, he couldn't help but still desperately try to find a way to change that.

She shook her head slowly, solemnly, and kissed his plump lips, prying them apart with her tongue. For the first time, Stephan could taste the distance in her mouth; her mind was always there but her heart wasn't.

He wasn't even sure if she had a heart.

She pulled away after a moment, her lips still brushing against his as she spoke, revealing more of herself to him than she ever had with just nine words.

"I want to get the fuck out of here," she whispered, and her eyes met his, truly met his. And the only thing he saw in them was desperation.

---------

Paranoid.

If there was one word to describe how Mr. Harry Styles was feeling, it was paranoid.

His finger trailed around the rim of his wine glass, which he emptied three times within the past half hour. The beverage had yet to give him the same burning feeling it normally did, and failed to dissipate the paranoia seeping into his mind with every second that ticked by without the sight of her.

"Why do you look like you're bored out of your mind?" Crook chuckled as he took a seat in the booth beside Harry.

"Because I am," Harry drawled out, not removing his anxious gaze from the crowd of people in the club. It would be easy to spot her, he knew that. Why was she an hour late? The anxious thudding of his heart was drowning out the loud buzz inside the club. He took another sip from his wine, hoping to calm himself.

"Well, I have something that might fix that," Crook murmured, his voice lowering an octave, and Harry knew exactly what that meant. In the four years that the two had known each other, their communication wasn't limited to words. It couldn't be with the kind of lives they lived.

Harry's chest flooded with a deep breath. He shook his head slowly, reluctantly. "No, no. I can't take care of any business tonight. I'm... expecting someone."

Just as easily as Crook could pick up on Mr. Styles's sly gestures during a game of poker, he could also pick up on the obvious signs of angst. The tapping of his fingers against his thigh, the half empty bottle of wine on the table; his good friend and partner in crime was, undoubtedly and oddly, nervous.

"Who are you expecting?" he pried, raising his thick brow, a sign that meant he wasn't going to take any sort of vague answer.

"A friend of mine," Harry replied simply. "A very good friend."

"You don't have friends, Styles," Crook chuckled. It was true, Harry Styles wasn't known for being very social. He kept to his cards and his money and that was it. The only people he interacted with, besides Crook and a girl every now and then, usually ended up with a bullet through their skull and nothing left in their pockets.

"You're annoying me," Styles gritted out, his teeth clenched together. On top of his unease about Carmen, now he had his so-called friend pestering him. Some part of Harry, the delusional part perhaps, was fabricating the idea that Crook already knew exactly who his 'friend' was, and maybe knew why she was late, too.

He was probably the reason she was late, Harry's mind convinced him. His hands fisted together at his sides as he imagined it, the skin over his knuckles turning bone white, and his short fingernails digging relentlessly into his palms. Harry could see it, too vividly for comfort; Crook's hands groping at her volumptuous chest greedily, her head leaning against the tile wall of the bathroom as he held her up. Harry could see her fleshy thighs wrapped around his waist, his hips thrusting upward mercilessly, feeling her the way that only Styles was supposed to feel her.

It made his stomach churn and tighten into knots.

"Did you just get here?" Harry asked suddenly, wrapping his digits around his glass of wine, downing that last bit of the blood-colored liquid. His eyes were darkening, finally tearing away from the crowd to look at his friend sitting beside him.

Crook doesn't even know her, he reminded himself. It did nothing to ease his growing paranoia, which was feasting on every last bit of his sane composure.

"No," his friend replied slowly, suspiciously. "I've been here for about an hour. I was searching more into that business that we need to take care of."

"For an hour?" Harry hissed, his chest rising with each lethal breath he took. "What else were you doing? Tell me right now or I swear to-"

"Calm down," Crook rolled his eyes. "I'm not sure what else you think I was doing, but I'm telling you the truth." He pursed his lips, studying his friend with a slight softness to his typically steel cold eyes. "You're really worked up about something, huh? I've never seen you like this... and it's not just now, Styles. You've been acting fucking weird for the past few days."

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," Harry mumbled, biting the inside of his cheek as he felt his face heat up.

"Oh my God," Crook gaped. "Are you... are you blushing?"

He couldn't believe what he was seeing. What the fuck? Harry Styles was reddening deeper with each passing moment that Crook sat there looking at him with wide eyes.

"It's some bitch, isn't it?"

That would make sense, Crook thought to himself. He had been so distant, so out of it; giggling like a school girl while looking through his phone, his mind always distracted whenever Crook brought up any of the business they needed to take care of. Harry was slipping, he could tell now as he studied him meticulously under his gaze.

This was not a good thing.

"She's not some bitch," he gritted out in response. That was all Crook needed in order to confirm his assumptions.

"Oh no..." he groaned, shaking his head slowly. "You've got to be fucking kidding me, Styles. You can get yourself any whore that you want. Don't let this chick get in the way of what's important here."

Harry's nails were still digging into his palm. Half of him was listening to Crook, but the other half was keeping a sturdy gaze on the swollen mass of people that only seemed to grow as the evening turned to later hours of the night. But yet, much to his dismay, there was still no sign of his dark beauty. Everytime his eyes spotted out a head of dark hair amongst the dancing bodies, his heart would beat to a new tempo, his blood warming up. But when the head turned and the face was not the pearly, beautiful one he was hoping to see, his veins flooded with dissappointment.

"Are you even listening to me?"

"Hm?" Harry flickered his eyes to the broad man beside him, who was becoming more frustrated and concerned with each passing second. "Yes, I'm listening. I don't really care about what you're saying, though."

"You'll be over her in a week tops."

"You don't understand," Harry shook his head slowly and sighed. "She's more than just some girl. She's... she's my girl."

"Yeah, and I'm your boy," Crook rolled his eyes and Harry choked out a laugh. "Now treat your boy right and listen to the what I have to say."

"Fine," Harry huffed in defeat and leaned back against the cushion of the booth, pouring himself another glass of wine. He was going to need it if he were to direct his attention to whatever his friend had to share with him. Whatever it was, it couldn't be half as important as Carmen.

"I counted up what we made this past month from our customers," Crook explained, his arm swun casually over the back of the seat. He raised his eyebrow expectantly, and sure enough, Styles perked up at the mention of money.

Once a greedy bastard, always a greedy bastard.

"And?"

"And it added up to be five grand," Crook drawled out, smirking. He knew this would arouse a reaction from him.

Harry's eyes widened and his jaw clenched. "What?" he seethed, slamming his wine glass down on the table, the liquid splashing out onto the mahogony surface. "Five grand? Where the fuck is the other three thousand?"

"You tell me." Crook raised his eyebrow.

"Someone isn't giving me what they fucking owe," Harry gritted out, the muscles in his beautiful features tensing. If only Carmen were there to see him this ticked off; she would be all over it.

He couldn't even go a minute without thinking about her.

"Already way ahead of you, Styles." He reached into the pocket of his slacks and pulled out a piece of paper. On it, the printed name and information a certain customer of theirs. Harry grabbed the paper from him and furrowed his eyebrows.

"Daniel Coranza," he muttered, reading over the name. "Son of a bitch has bought from us before. He never pays."

Harry continued to read over the paper, his lips pursed into a straight line. He didn't like to be messed with. He felt like his status was being threatened; someone wasn't giving him what they owed, as if they didn't fear the consequences that would follow. Their mistake, Harry thought to himself. They'll learn to fear me when my hand is wrapped around their throat.

Harry hadn't always been a violent person. In fact, as a boy, he was gentle and quiet and stuck to himself. Something in his twenty five years of living changed in him, though; it was now one of his most joyous hobbies, after poker and fucking of course. The thought of someone's blood staining his hands as he stared down at the lifeless body... that shit was like a drug to him. The vivid picture of it was already playing through his mind.

The images in his head, however, inevitably became more detailed. He was looking down at the body, his hand prints red around their neck, and somehow he could recognize their anonymous face.

Stephan.

Harry smiled to himself. How he would love to see the terrified look in that bastard's eyes as he stared at the end of Harry's gun, pointed directly at his forehead. He would want Carmen to be there to watch, of course, so she could witness Harry's primal need for her.

She would surely be impressed, he thought.

"Styles?"

A voice broke him from his derranged thoughts and Harry turned his head. "Hm?"

"So what do you say?" Crook smirked. "Does tomorrow night sound like a plan?"

"Sure," Harry smiled darkly. Daniel Coranza was no previous lover of Carmen's, but he would be good enough for now. "Sounds like a plan."

--------

OK OK im sorry for taking so long damn :/ i suck. i didnt read over this so its probably really bad i apoloGIZE

btw i hope harry's character isn't too fucked up for you lmao..... he will change with time, i promise. so will carmen (:

it will allllll make sense eventually

50 votes by tomorrow & i'll update again B-)