The door opened almost too quickly; it opened with such ease that I didn't even have time to worry about a breaking and entering charge on top of losing my social work certifications.

Instead, I followed Luca in the house, my hand itching to hold his.

The smell of cigarettes immediately entered my nose, strong enough that even as a smoker it bothered me. Luca took his cellphone out and turned the flashlight on, prompting me to do the same.

Quiet. It was too quiet in this house.

This house was messy. Couch cushions were thrown around the living room, and the TV was still turned on to Fox news.

"I'll check the upstairs, you check the kitchen," Luca silently ordered, his eyes turning soft. "If there's any problems, you yell for me. Understand?"

I nodded, nervously gnawing at my bottom lip.

The walk from the living room to the kitchen was short, albeit hazardous. Empty sets of luggage blocked the pathway, immediatly making me grateful that Luca wouldn't see the bottom of my ass pop out from my skirt as I took a large step over them.

I didn't know what I was looking for when I finally reached the kitchen, just that there had to be something. My first stop was to the stainless steel refrigerator, a trick I learned from school a while ago. Check the expiration on the milk; see if it's bad or not. That'll tell you if groceries are being restocked constantly or if they're being neglected. The expiration date was three days old, but the milk wasn't curdled. Whoever lived here must of just left.

That's when I saw a neon green note, water stains on it. I picked it up and raised an eyebrow. Gibberish?

"Luca! I found something!" I shouted, peeling the note off the fridge.

A few moments later he was dangerously close behind me, taking the note out of my hands. "G S I V V?"

I shrugged and turned to face him, our bodies centimeters apart. "I don't suppose you have an expert to decode this?"

He grinned. "I have an expert for everything, Chaya."

The proximity of our bodies was now enough to cloud my judgement. Seemingly it was clouding his too, because as my gaze met his, his eyes turned black; hungry. Without my consent, my lips began to part. It wasn't until his head began to lower, and something hard hit my thigh that I realized what was happening. "Are you for real right now?!"

He smirked, his lips next to my ear. "You should know it's bigger than that, Cai."

Against my better judgement, I looked down to his waistband - a gun.

He was a yard away from me in mere moments, his laugh infiltrating the house. "It's empty. Let's go."

I rolled my eyes, hoping the heat from my cheeks would disappear before he looked at me again.

We made our way back to the car, the air around us silent besides a rap song playing in the background.

What was that house? More importantly, what (or whom) was Luca looking for that he needed a social worker?

"Luce?" The driver looked into his rear view mirror. "This car has been following us since we left the house..."

Luca barely had time to look over his shoulder before the windshield was being shattered. "Duck down," he ordered calmly, take the gun out of his waistband and pulling the hammer back.

"What the fuck is going on Luca?"

"Gonna need you to breathe and relax, Cai," he replied back, shooting back out of the broken windshield.

I felt powerless as I slipped down the seat, trying to get my body as close to the floor as possible. I hated feeling powerless; feeling weak. I had only practiced shooting once in my life when I was seventeen, but I wasn't terrible then...

"Get off the highway, Samuel. Pretend like you're going to Canarsie."

The car swerved, but the loud bangs I was becoming accustomed to didn't stop. "Luca, you're going to run out of bullets soon..."

He simply laughed. "Not in this car." He shot one more time, the only difference was I heard the audible swerve of a car losing control. "My house."

I swallowed my panic and raised my head over the head seat, no longer seeing a car following us or the police. "Jesus fucking Christ, Jesus fucking christ..."

"You might wanna text your roommate and tell him you won't be coming back tonight," Luca said as he put the gun's safety on and put it back in his waistband. "You can blame it on me."

"I would never let anything happen to you, Chaya!" My best friend, my roommate, was now screaming at me. "Understand that."

"I was waiting in Central Park for hours! You just randomly show up two hours late - at night - drunk as shit. I can only do so much."

He rolled his eyes. "I wouldn't let anything fucking happen. You're being dumb."

We finally pulled up to Luca's house. A tall brownstone in the neighborhood of Bushwick, I was in awe. "When did you get this?"

"I've gotten a lot of things since I left," he replied as he got out of his car.

"Holy shit.."

We walked into his house and the inside was even more beautiful. With a grand staircase right in front of me and a living room that looks like it's never been touched to my right, I didn't know where to go first.

"Let's get drunk," Luca spoke as he lead me to his kitchen. "Strictly business, of course."

I don't know how I was going to keep things strictly business, but the only thing on my mind tonight was to get drunk.

hi! pls vote/comment/etc because my dumb ass physically made the note in the story and for some reason I'm extremely proud of myself lmao. Ps a playlist will be out soon if anyones interested/has any songs they think would be a good fit :* thank you for reading bbies!