"Words are weapons." ― Cassandra Clare

To love is to destroy, and that to be loved is to be the one destroyed." ― Cassandra Clare

Chapter 4

I woke up feeling rather fresh. Finally, after so long, I had one of those nights when you don't remember your dreams or don't dream altogether. I made an effort to process everything that happened last night, however, the last thing he had done before he went home, wouldn't let me be. At that point, I had tried so hard to remember the awful scene I witnessed in the restaurant, but the only thing I could have think of was his perfectly shaped lips. I considered an option that he was an unearthly creature, yet again. Never in my life have I believed in those things, but I had a feeling that, with him, many beliefs I had would be changed.

Like every addict ever, I took my phone from the nightstand, the first thing in the morning. As I was trying to bring it closer to me, the exact thing that only happens to people with as much of a bad luck like I had, occurred - I dropped it and it fell on my face. Annoyed with myself, I brought it back to my face, but not before I cursed at him.

I was surprised at first, seeing as my evil baby hadn't responded. Feeling utterly confused, I tried to remember at what moment had my nose become so big that he was able to crack my phone. Only after a while, occurrence from last night appeared in my memory. I could clearly see, like it was happening in that very moment, the way Mateo had grabbed it from my hands, cut the call, turned it off and threw it on the backseat. Everything around me seemed to fade as I could only see red. Irritated by his act, I pushed the button, waiting for my phone to turn on.

The moment the display was shown, I noticed I had one missed call and two messages. Like I had suspected, the first message was from Lena. However, I absolutely forgot about that when I realized who sent the second one. I could clearly feel my heart beating faster than ever when I was about to open the said massage, and I'm not sure whether I liked it or not.

'Morning, baby girl, I hope you dreamt of me.'

I smiled, not even aware of it. No matter how much I tried to convince myself I wasn't fond of the given nickname, the truth was much different. Nothing had ever made me feel this special.

I'm sorry to disappoint you but I haven't.

I responded as quickly as I could, not wanting him to wait for me anymore, considering that he had sent the message 3 hours ago.

I didn't wait long, probably because he already had his phone with him.

You're breaking my heart.

I shook my head, still with the same stupid smile plastered on my face.

Only after I stopped dreaming of our next encounter did I realize that I still haven't responded to Lena's text. Feeling extremely guilty, I quickly read it.

Hey T, I guess that you're busy, but I just wanted to ask you if you want us to go have a drink tomorrow? Only if you're free, of course.

She was never the one to call you 10 more times if you hadn't answered the first time. I loved that about her, she was always so understanding, probably the only rational one in our group, the world didn't deserve her.

Feeling euphoric more than ever, I immediately called her. She let me wait for quite some time before she picked up and answered me with her sleepy voice.

"Rise and shine, sleepy head," I happily said. If she hadn't been as polite of a person as she was, she would've screamed at me at that moment, breaking my eardrums in the process.

"For God's sake, Tara! Do you even know what time it is?" I could clearly hear the irritation in her voice.

"I definitely do, but I'm not so sure about you," I laughed at my own words, no matter how stupid that was.

"Ha ha ha, so funny, T. How is it possible that you haven't ever tried to be a stand-up comedian?" she didn't find it funny, considering that that was one of the rare times she used sarcasm.

"That's my second option if my plan to rule the world ever fails," I stated proudly.

"I'm sure it won't," she used it twice already? I was starting to think that I was talking to Sarah instead.

"You are hurting my feelings," I tried to sound sad, however, I failed miserably.

"Yeah, I probably would if you had any, to begin with." Normally, I would feel insulted, but she was right. "But, let's get on the track. I guess you called me because you had finally read my message?" She didn't sound angry at all, she was rather curious.

"I have a perfectly good explanation, but yes. How about we meet each other at the same place as always, in an hour or so?" I didn't know why hadn't said the name of the cafe, probably because I had thought it would be more poetic this way.

"Tara, since when is an hour enough for you to get ready?" she had a point.

"True, then I'll see you in two hours. Bye!" I hung up and jumped out of my bed so I could get ready for the day as soon as possible.

-

"Hello, my dearest friend!" the moment I approached Lena in the cafe, I hugged and squeezed her in my arms, thus she looked at me confused and a bit suspicious. She was probably weird out by my exaggerated happiness.

"What's going on with you?" she smiled and asked me.

"Why does it have to be something? Maybe I'm happy because it's a nice and sunny day," I sat on my chair in front of her. There weren't many guests in the cafe, so Lena picked one of the bigger tables, probably out of habit. We had been to this place, along with Emma and Sarah, many times before.

"It's February," she gave me a look and I rolled my eyes in return. "Come on, talk, what is going on?"

"Well, I guess I kinda-" I stopped, waiting for the waiter to put the frappe Lena ordered for me down. "-met someone," I finished, avoiding her gaze.

"Met someone? Who? When?" if she hadn't been interested before, she sure was after I said that. She placed her elbows on the table and put her head in her hands.

"Remember Saturday night when we went to Dionis?"

"Yeah, of course. What about it?" she sounded weird, like she wasn't really keen on remembering that night. Normally, I would catch her mood-swings pretty fast, but I didn't even have to try hard this time. Although I badly wanted to ask her what was wrong, I didn't, I decided to let her come to me when she is ready.

"So I maybe, sort of, met the guy there and we saw each other a couple of times since," I told her, not so sure. Only when I said out loud, what was going on, did I realize how absurd it sounded.

"Tara, how well do you even know him?" she asked me, concern written across her face. She had always been the mom of the group. She took care of us and the stupid shit we tended to do. That made it ten times harder to tell her all this, as I didn't want to disappoint her with my next sentence.

"I guess not that well, L. The only thing I'm certain about is that he looks unbelievably good and that he doesn't like ketchup. Who the hell doesn't like ketchup?" I smiled warily trying to ease the tension and let her know that everything is fine, yet I wasn't so sure I succeeded. It probably was a good thing I had left out some minor details.

"You're a smart girl," she began. Something told me that she was about to give me one of her lectures. "However, when it comes to guys, I'm not sure whether there was a more careless person in the whole world. Please be cautious, you can't go out just like that with someone you met at Dionis. How many times have you even seen him?" she put emphasized the name of the club. She was the one who was against us going in that particular one, due to the known fact that the so-called underground did their business there.

"Twice, and we are meeting again today," she shook her head at my response. She probably wasn't satisfied because I was moving too fast with someone I met three days ago.

"Describe him for me," she ordered me. If that was some ordinary situation, I would've probably said something regarding the tone of her voice, but at that moment I didn't dare to.

"Dark hair, dark-brown eyes, tattoos all over his body - not that I have seen them with my own eyes, I just guessed. Don't look at me like that!" I raised my hands in defense when I saw her frown.

"Tara, I'm just worried about you, I know about the-" I interrupted her, veering off-topic. I was aware of what she wanted to say but I didn't want to talk about it with her, or anyone else for that matter.

"Enough talking about me. Now, please explain to me what is going on with you?" I knew that it had been hypocritical of me to ask her that. Minutes before I hadn't wanted to pressure her into telling me, but right after she had done the same to me, I changed my mind. I knew that the thing she wanted to talk about would trigger hidden feelings I didn't want to face at the moment, so I had to do something.

"Nothing T, really. I'm just in a bad mood, that's all," she let out a breath that pretty much made it clear that the situation was much more complicated than I had imagined.

Right when I was about to interrogate her even more, the opening of a cafe door could be heard and afterward entered the people we hadn't really expected to see, so we quickly exchanged glances.

"You'll have to talk about it at one point," I warned her quietly, letting her know that the discussion was far from over. She, not so thrilled, nodded her head, and then, moment after, Emma and Sarah made themselves comfortable on the chairs at our table. Victor, Stephan, and Luke brought some chairs there too, so they could have a place to sit. Fortunately, only Stephan sat next to me, as he was trying to avoid Emma who was seated next to Lena.

"I'm offended," Emma said the moment she put her expensive, branded purse on the table for everyone else in the cafe to see, and by everyone I mean two other guys that were on the other end. She was looking at me with such intensity that, if looks could kill, I would've already been six feet under.

I got closer to Sarah, who was also seated next to me and whispered:

"She is on her period or Victor-craziness kicked in?" I subtly asked, not taking my eyes off Emma.

"Both," she responded shortly and paled a little when Emma shifted her gaze to her.

"We are dead."

"Most likely."

We would've probably carried one with our, not so subtle anymore, conversation regarding Emma, but she interrupted us, coughing and repeating what she had previously said. I spent so much energy trying to stop myself from rolling my eyes. I adored her, but she could be a bitch sometimes, especially when she had joint diseases, how we liked to call it.

"I'm well aware that you won't give up, so I decided to spear myself the trouble. So then, why do you feel offended?" I asked her half-heartedly and she left some unarticulated sound that was probably supposed to represent triumph. I was definitely about to regret this.

"It's nice of you to ask," she started, I had to roll my eyes this time. "Imagine a situation like this: You lay in your bed, bored out of your mind, waiting for your friends to contact you and spear you your misery. At one point, one of your best friends-" she looked at Lena. I cursed, knowing what she was about to say "Would send you a message and you would be so happy, thinking she was worried about you. But, as you read it, you realize that the message wasn't meant to be read by you. She has already agreed to go out with your other best friend," she finished, crossing her hands.

"Do you think that more dramatic person than you even exists in the world?" I asked her, annoyed with her attitude.

"Now you are insulting me, too?" she shockingly asked me

"I give up!" I raised my hand in defeat, my mood already drastically changed.

"Is it possible that you always make a scene like that?" Victor popped in our conversation. I had no better explanation for his behavior than that he was a masochist. He was playing with a ticking bomb.

"You stay out of this," she glared at him.

"Here we go again," Stephan muttered and Luke nodded his head. No one was ready for yet another one of their fights.

"Well maybe if you stopped terrorizing people, I wouldn't have to interfere," Victor said angrily.

"I'm terrorizing someone?" she furiously looked in our direction "Am I terrorizing you?" she asked us.

"No, no, not at all," Sarah said and Lena hysterically shook her head. I just watched the situation unfold craving popcorn so I could enjoy this even more.

"You see?" she asked Victor arrogantly after she moved her gaze towards him, yet again.

"Psychological torture is torture nonetheless," he said, spitting facts.

"Like you would know," she tried to provoke him.

"To be fair, you could definitely give me some classes."

They went on and on, staring at each other like they want to chop their heads off.

Having in mind that the rest of the guys hadn't felt comfortable watching this, Stephan cleared his throat and tried to veer off-topic.

"So, why don't we go out this weekend?" he asked all of us, however, Emma and Victor were still at each other's throats, and Lena zoned off, so that left the final 4.

"You know I'm always in, bro!" Luke said and slapped his shoulder the way guys normally did. I rolled my eyes at that. I'm surprised he didn't have STD, considering what kind of activities he engaged in most of the time.

"What about you girls, what do you think?" this time, he directed his questions at Sarah and me.

We exchanged glances and, agreeing on our decision, I shifted my gaze back to Stephan and shrugged my shoulders.

"I don't see why not," he smiled satisfied with my answer.

"Sarah, you willingly agreed to go to a club? I need to prepare myself for a zombie apocalypse," Victor tried to provoke her, however, he provoked the wrong person. After she heard what he said, Emma hit his head with her purse.

"Don't you ever talk like that to my friend," she spat at him. But I wasn't really sure if he even registered her words, as he was trying to soothe the pain in his forehead.

"You had it coming," I told him with a smile that somehow offended him.

"Tu quoque, Brute, mi fili?" He asked me shocked. I just shrugged my shoulders.

"Okay, let's not start anything yet again. For the first time in so long, we agreed to go out together, we don't want to ruin the mood, do we?" Stephan as the peacemaker he was, stopped our potential argument.

After the situation cooled off, we carried on with our normal conversation. We spend almost the whole day there, ordered countless times, right until security kicked us out.

-

"What are you doing here?!"

My heart almost stopped beating at the sight I encountered the moment I stepped into my apartment. Mateo was sprawled across the sofa in my living room, reading a book as that was the most normal thing to do. I stared at him with a shocked expression. My jaw fell to the floor and my eyes were about to pop out. The purse that had previously been clutched to my hips, was on the floor, stuff that was inside scattered around. I was shaking so hard I wasn't able to compose myself.

"Crime and Punishment? I didn't think that you are a type of girl that read this kind of book," he commented and kept on shuffling through pages like I wasn't standing paralyzed 9 feet away.

Normally, I would call him out on his misogyny, but I was too occupied in trying to stop myself from having a panic attack to care.

"Mateo, how the hell did you get in?" I couldn't even raise the tone of my voice.

That seemed to catch his attention. He finally took his gaze away from the damn book and, like he was in slow-motion, he put it on the table and switched to a sitting position.

"Baby girl, I don't want to hear curses coming out of that perfect mouth of yours ever again, it doesn't suit you," he said, watching me with his cold, dark eyes.

I shivered out of fear, but I didn't want to back down this time.

"Mateo, answer my question," I demanded.

He took a breath and painfully slowly got off the sofa. I had this strong urge to run away from there when he started walking towards me, but I stood my ground, not moving an inch.

A whole eternity later, he finally approached me. He was so close to my face that it made it ten times harder to concentrate on the fear and fury I should've felt as a result of his behavior. However, I could only think of this huge desire I had for him. I wanted him to kiss me again, but for real this time.

"Only after you promise me to never do that again. I can assure you that you wouldn't like the consequences, nor would I want you to find out what they are," the warm breath that left his mouth was in such contrast to his cold voice that made people's blood freeze. He slowly raised his hand, tucking a stray hair behind my ear. I almost leaned into his touch, but somehow, I stopped myself. Then again, nothing could escape his calculated eyes. Understanding my intention, he caressed my cheek with his strong, rough, manly hand. I could feel electricity running through my veins by his mere touch. I closed my eyes craving for more.

"Tara-" he said my name in a way to remind me that he was still waiting for my answer. I muttered a shuffled "mhm", which, apparently, brought him joy because a moment later, he engulfed me in a bone-crushing hug. He held me tightly like he was afraid that I would escape his arms. I put my hands on his chest, resting my head in the crook of his neck. I needed to step on my toes to do that, but not because I was short, it was more due to the fact that he was almost like Hulk.

I don't know how long we stood there, but after a while, I composed myself and repeated my question.

"Mateo, you haven't answered my question," he inhaled and exhaled right after, almost as he was annoyed because I interrupted our little moment.

"Some old granny saw me waiting on the stairway for a long time. I guess she felt sorry for me, seeing as it was freezing outside, so she let me in. She had a key to your apartment for some reason, so I thought that the best thing is to wait for you inside," she pulled away, taking his arms off me. I felt disappointment rush through me. I already missed his hug. His body was so warm it almost made me burn, in a good way though.

"I knew I had made a mistake the moment I gave her the spare key," I told him, annoyed. He laughed hearing me say this, which made me even more nervous than before, his smile was that fucking beautiful.

"Why did you even do that?" he asked me, trying to hide how much this situation was amusing to him, not that he succeeded.

"Obviously because I have no brain," I screamed out of frustration. Apparently, he couldn't contain himself anymore so he burst into laughter. I gave him dirty look and started picking stuff that had fallen on the floor earlier.

"Why are you here, anyway?" I asked him while cleaning up.

"Well, at first I thought that we could go out for a meal, but I quickly changed my mind. It occurred to me that we could spend time at your place, watching movies or something. Where were you, now that we are at it?" he didn't sound as serious as usual, but I could sense a bit of dissatisfaction in his voice.

I froze for a moment, my hand left hanging in the air as I was about to pick up a lipstick. Fortunately, I composed myself on time and continued with what I was doing without him noticing.

"I was with my friends, we went for a couple of drinks but got carried away in the process," I purposely didn't emphasize the gender of my companions, what happened in the restaurant was enough proof that he wouldn't like that. On the other hand, I remembered the time he told me how much he hated liars, so I tried to manipulate the situation.

He nodded his head, whether because he believed me or because he didn't have the strength to have another argument with me, I wouldn't know, but I was glad.

"So, baby girl, what are we going to eat?" he asked me after I was done cleaning out my apartment. I sat next to him while he was yet again going through a book written by Dostoevsky.

"What do you mean?" I looked up at him feeling confused.

"You know, food, the thing you need so you could survive and all that," I rolled my eyes, but he didn't see me as he turned around to leave a book on the table.

"There's no need for sarcasm. What do you want to eat, I'll order," he frowned hearing me say this.

"But I want you to make me something," he had a cute, serious expression on his face. I stared at him for a bit but after a while, I burst into laughter. It was that bad that I couldn't stop for the next 5 minutes, I even started clutching my stomach because it was starting to hurt.

"What is it?" I could clearly see that he was pretty confused.

I wiped my tears away and tried to pull myself together.

"You-" I emphasized "Want me to make food for us to eat?" every word was said with such disbelief that I was afraid I would make him mad.

"I'll take that as the sign that you are not a very good cook."

"Not very good being an understatement," I commented

"How do you even survive on your own?" he looked so cute I wanted to pat him on the head and praise him for being a good boy. Despite that sudden urge, something told me that that wouldn't be such a good idea.

"I order?" there wasn't a valid reason for me to sound that insecure.

"You're hopeless," he shook his head with a smile plastered on his face. I shrugged my shoulders and looked at him trying to seem all innocent, making him laugh again. I adored his smile.

"So, princess-" he started but I interrupted him

"Changing nicknames, are we now?" I raised my eyebrow provoking him.

He put his arms around my waist and brought me closer to him.

"Yes, princess," he whispered softly near my ear, brushing his lower lip slowly against my cheek in such tenderness, I forgot what I was trying to do. "Now, tell me, what would you like me to cook for you?"

"Pancakes?" I asked him, smiling.

"Pancakes it is, then."