Willow's POV
The thought didn't leave me. It settled somewhere deep in my mind, quiet at first, almost easy to ignore, but the longer I let it sit there, the heavier it became, pressing against everything else until it was impossible to push away.
I tried to convince myself that what had happened in the alley had nothing to do with my past, that it was something separate, something I could understand if I looked at it from the right angle, but no matter how I twisted it, no matter how many explanations I tried to create, it always led me back to the same possibility, the same conclusion I didn't want to accept.
What if it was him?
Not the man from the alley, not the one whose presence still lingered in my thoughts in a way I couldn't explain, but someone else entirely. My father. I hadn't thought about him like this in years, not in a real way, not in a way that made my chest tighten or my thoughts spiral, because thinking about him meant remembering everything I had worked so hard to leave behind. It meant acknowledging that the life I had escaped could still reach me, that it had never really let go.
But now, with someone watching me, someone who knew my name without me ever giving it, the past didn't feel as far away as it used to.
It felt close, closer than it had any right to be after all this time, and the realization of that settled deep into my chest in a way that made it hard to breathe.
I walked to the shower, letting the warm water run over me as I tried to calm down. The last few days, I hadn't been sleeping well, and the exhaustion was starting to catch up with me. If this really was one of my father's men following me, then I needed to rest while I still could. Still, I couldn't ignore the possibility of having to run again.
Just in case, I packed a small bag with everything I might need—passports, money, documents—anything important.
Maybe I should have changed my name again, disappeared completely, but the truth was, I needed something to remind me of what would happen if I wasn't careful enough. If I let my guard down, I would end up back with my father, and I knew exactly how that would end.
He wouldn't forgive me for what I had done. I would be punished, probably beaten to death for bringing shame onto him. The man I was supposed to marry was likely already married by now, maybe even to one of my stepsisters, and the thought alone made something twist inside me.
I forced myself to focus, to steady my thoughts as I placed the bag near the door, ready in case I had to leave without warning. Only then did I allow myself to go to bed. My mind wouldn't quiet easily, thoughts circling endlessly, but eventually, after what felt like hours, exhaustion pulled me under and I finally fell asleep.
The next morning, everything felt different, even though nothing had actually changed. The city moved the same way it always did, people passing by without looking twice, conversations blending into background noise, life continuing as if there wasn't something wrong beneath the surface.
I followed my usual routine, forcing myself to act normal, to keep everything steady and controlled, but it felt like I was just going through the motions without really being part of them. Every step I took carried a quiet awareness, every movement slightly more careful than it needed to be, like I was constantly anticipating something I couldn't see.
Every reflection I passed, I checked, my gaze lingering just long enough to make sure there was nothing there that shouldn't be. Every shadow made my chest tighten just a little more, my instincts reacting before my mind could catch up, and every time I turned my head, I expected to see him somewhere near.
Or worse, someone sent by my father, someone who knew exactly who I was and where to find me, someone who had been watching longer than I realized. What if they catch me and forces me back to my father. This time he wouldn't hesitate to kill me for humiliation.
By the time I reached the café, my nerves were already stretched thin, the quiet anxiety from the night before settling into something sharper, more constant, something that refused to fade no matter how much I tried to ignore it.
I told myself it was nothing, that I was letting fear také control of something I didn't even understand yet, but that didn't stop my eyes from scanning the room the moment I stepped inside, searching for something out of place before I could stop myself.
Everything looked normal, exactly as it always had, unchanged and familiar in a way that should have reassured me. But instead, it only made the feeling worse, because the contrast between what I saw and what I felt didn't match.
I moved through my shift the same way I always did, taking orders, making drinks, keeping my voice steady even when my thoughts weren't. The routine should have grounded me, should have given me something to focus on, but it didn't fully work this time.
A few times, I caught myself staring at the glass of the front window longer than necessary, watching the street outside instead of focusing on what I was supposed to be doing, my attention drifting without permission.
I didn't see anything.
But that didn't help.
Because the feeling was still there, constant and quiet, like something waiting just beyond what I could prove.
It was sometime in the afternoon when it happened again. I was carrying a tray to one of the tables near the window, my attention split between the order in front of me and the tension sitting in the back of my mind, when something shifted.
It was subtle, almost impossible to notice if I hadn't already been looking for it, but I felt it immediately, that same change in the air that had followed me for days now, the same quiet awareness that made everything inside me go still.
My steps slowed slightly, just enough to feel the difference, just enough to make the moment stretch longer than it should have. My gaze lifted without thinking, drawn toward the glass before I even understood why, as if something inside me already knew what I was about to see.
And then I saw him.
This time, it wasn't just a shadow or a shape I could dismiss. He was there, clear enough to recognize, standing across the street again in that same still way, like he didn't belong to the movement of everything around him. My breath caught as I focused on him, my fingers tightening slightly around the tray as my heart began to race, faster and harder with every second I didn't look away.
He hadn't come closer, but he hadn't stayed away either, and this time there was no doubt, no question, no way to convince myself it wasn't real. For a moment, everything else faded, the sounds of the café dulling into the background as my attention locked onto him completely.
I couldn't see every detail from that distance, but I didn't need to. There was something about him that felt unmistakable, something I had already recognized before I even understood it.
It was him.
The man from the alley.
My chest tightened, a mix of fear and something else I couldn't quite name settling uncomfortably in my stomach, something deeper than panic, something that didn't make sense but refused to be ignored. If it was him, then that meant this wasn't random, wasn't coincidence, wasn't something I could explain away anymore.
And if it wasn't random, then there had to be a reason.
The thought hit me harder than anything else, sharp and immediate, because there was only one answer that made sense, only one explanation that fit everything I couldn't explain.
My father.
A cold wave of realization spread through me as the possibility settled in fully, unavoidable now, impossible to ignore. If someone had found me, if someone had been sent to watch me, to follow me, to learn my routine without me realizing it, then it wouldn't be a stranger acting on his own.
It would be him.
It would always be him.
My grip tightened further, my breath uneven now as panic began to rise, slow but steady, creeping into every part of me. I had been careful. I had done everything right. I had stayed quiet, stayed hidden, stayed out of reach for years, building something separate from everything I had left behind.
So how had he found me?
A voice pulled me back suddenly, the customer in front of me speaking, and I blinked as the moment broke apart, reality rushing back in too quickly. I realized I had stopped moving completely, frozen in place without even noticing.
I forced myself to continue, setting the tray down with slightly unsteady hands before stepping back, my focus already shifting toward the window again, drawn back to the same place.
But when I looked, he was gone.
Just like before, without a trace, without explanation, leaving nothing behind but the certainty that he had been there.
The rest of the day passed in a blur, my thoughts circling the same questions over and over without finding any answers. By the time my shift ended, the fear had settled into something heavier, something harder to ignore, something that pressed against everything I had tried to build for myself. For the first time in years, I felt the past reaching toward me again, threatening to undo everything I had created.
I stepped outside carefully, my eyes scanning the street almost immediately, my body tense as I searched for any sign of him or anyone else who didn't belong. There was nothing, just the city moving the way it always did, people passing by without noticing anything unusual.
But that didn't mean anything anymore.
Because now I knew that if someone wanted to find me, if someone had been looking for me long enough, then they already had.
That night, I locked every door, checked every window, and still couldn't shake the feeling that it wasn't enough.
I sat on the edge of my bed, my hands clasped together tightly as my thoughts spiraled, each one heavier than the last. If it was my father, then this wasn't just someone watching me.
This was the beginning of something else, something I had spent years trying to avoid, something I knew I wouldn't be able to escape a second time.
He wouldn't just watch. He would také control. He would decide, just like before, just like he always had.
A quiet, familiar fear settled deep in my chest, one I hadn't felt in years but recognized instantly, the kind that didn't fade, the kind that stayed and waited.
The kind that told me I was running out of time.
And the worst part wasn't just the thought of being found by him, wasn't just the possibility that everything I had escaped was about to catch up to me.
It was the realization that I didn't know which scared me more.
Being found by my father—
Or the man who was already watching me.