Chapter 3 A FATHER'S LOVE

SIN

It was a sunny day at the library when his dad, the sheriff came looking for me;

"Angel Mark?

I tensed. He wasn't looking at me like others did-starving, teasing, curious. No. His eyes were calculated. Heavily weighted. Guarded in a way that had me thinking this wouldn't be one of those quick chats.

"Angel Mark?" he echoed, deep, determined voice.

My throat constricted. No one other than Steel ever called me that anymore.

"Yes, sir," I breathed.

He looked at me for an incredibly long time before nodding to the benches. "Walk with me?"

I walked alongside him, heart thudding.

We sat down, a silence drawn between us. He spoke finally, his words picked with care.

"See, my son matters to me. He's my son. Not biologically, but by choice. I saved him from a system that would have eaten him and spat him out. I've spent years ensuring he had a shot at something better than what he deserved."

I nodded, fingers twisting in my lap. "I know."

He sighed, his gaze out at the horizon. "He's got potential. Potential he doesn't realize. He's smart. He's a good friend. He could do something with his life, something good. But he's also self-sabotaging. He feels everything so deeply, so quickly. And then there's you..."

He turned to me then, his eyes sharp but not unkind. ".you're a distraction."

It was a hard word to hear, but I didn't budge.

"I don't mean it meanly," he continued quickly. "I see that you do care about him. And he cares about you, too. But the world doesn't stop turning because you two hit it off. He does have a future, Sin. A good one. And I can't let anything jeopardize it and him. Not even you."

I took a deep breath, pressing the pain down. He wasn't wrong. I'd thought as much late at night when fear crept in.

"You think I'll destroy him," I said softly.

I believe you'll steal his focus," the sheriff stated. "And he can't pay that price. Not now. Not when everything is laid out before him. Steel's heart is. dangerous when it becomes attached. He'd incinerate the whole world for you if you asked him to. And while that would sound romantic-it isn't. It might cost him everything.".

His words should have cut deeper, but all I felt... was comprehension. Because this wasn't jealousy. Or malice. This was love. Fear on the part of a father.

I sat there for a long time, then leaned forward to whisper, "So you want me to leave him."

The sheriff's jaw tightened. "I want him safe. I want him to be stable. If that means you are stepping back. then yes."

The sheriff's words hung in the air between us, heavier than the dropping sun.

I gazed at my hands, chipped black polish on my fingernails in small moons of abandonment. My heart wasn't racing the way I'd thought it would be. It was level. Sad, yes. But level.

Because I knew.

He wasn't attacking me. He wasn't speaking things to me that the rest of the world said. He wasn't telling me that I wasn't good enough because he was angry.

He was afraid. For his son.

And this fear, I knew.

"You love him," I said finally, speaking almost too soft.

The sheriff's jaw pushed forward, his eyes glancing away towards the horizon. "More than anything."

I nodded once, slowly. "Then I understand."

He blinked, surprised. "You... do?"

I smiled, small and genuine and tired. "Most people stare at me like I'm the problem. The danger. The temptation. You're not the first person to tell me I'll ruin someone's life. But you're the first person to do so because you want to protect him, not because you hate me."

His forehead furrowed, the sharp planes of his face softening. "Sin-

I raised my hand. "It's okay. You don't have to tell me. I understand Steel is everything to you. I see it in your eyes the way you look at him. And... you're right. He would destroy the world for me if I asked him. That frightens me too."

The sheriff took a breath, his shoulders relaxing by a fraction.

Silence between us, broken only by the drone of distant traffic and the cry of a bird in the fading light.

Finally, I said, "Do you believe that I care nothing about his future?"

The sheriff's gaze flicked back to me, more acute.

I didn't give him time to respond. "Because I do. I love him more than I love myself. Maybe too much. And the last thing I want, the very last thing I want, is to be the reason he loses what you've worked so hard to give him."

He looked at me then, really looked at me, as if weighing every single word.

"You're not like I imagined," he admitted.

I giggled softly, but too snappishly for what I'd intended. "People usually tell me that after I've already disappointed them."

He shook his head. "No. That's not it. I was expecting you to rant. To dig in. To tell me I had no conception of what I was saying."

I shrugged. "What would I do? You know him better than I do. You were the one who brought him up. You gave him something no one else could. Of course you're going to want what's best for him."

The sheriff rested back on the bench, his expression still. For a long time, neither of us spoke.

Then he leaned forward, speaking quietly, "I don't hate you, Sin. I want you to understand that. But when it comes to Steel, I can't play games. He's been burned enough. If you're going to be in his life, you have to understand the weight of it."

I swallowed convulsively, my throat closing down.

"I do," I said flatly.

I was awake that night, in my bed and looking up at the ceiling of my dorm room. Catalina slept before me, her headphones still emitting a soft glow. The sheriff's words rang in my mind.

A distraction.

He'd burn the world for you.

If you're in his life, understand the weight of it.

I shifted over, pressing my face into the pillow. I didn't cry-not because I wasn't in pain, but because the hurt was too intense to be cried out.

The truth was, the sheriff wasn't wrong.

Steel scared me sometimes. Not him, not what he was-but the intensity of what he felt. When he looked at me, it was like everything else in existence didn't matter any longer. That kind of adoration had the power to save me or kill us both.

And I didn't want to be the one to cause his tomorrow to go up in flames.

But here's the thing nobody tells you: when somebody like Steel chooses you, really chooses you, leaving isn't simple. It's not just closing a door. It's taking away a piece of you.

I thought about how his hand encircled mine. How his laughter burst open something inside me that I thought was dead. How he'd said, "I'm not going, Sin. Not unless you want me to."

How could I ever manage to tell him to?

The following morning, I bumped into him outside the studio, leaning against his bike as he always was, slouching black jacket loose, hair blowing in the morning gusts. His eyes twinkled at the sight of me.

"Hey, Angel."

My chest constricted at the name. I walked towards him, forcing my steps to be even.

You okay?" he asked, regarding me in that same way he always did, like he could see past the lie I was about to tell.

I swallowed. "Yeah. Just. exhausted."

He tilted his head, unconvinced. "Tired of me already?"

I tried to smile, but it wavered. "Never."

Steel wrapped his fingers around my hand, tracing his thumb across my knuckles like he'd done a million times before. "Then what is it?

I stalled, the sheriff's words echoing in my head. A distraction. Don't let him ruin his future for you.

But looking into Steel's eyes, I knew I couldn't say it. Not yet. Not when the prospect of pushing him away was like cutting off my own oxygen.

"Nothing," I breathed eventually. "I just... needed to see you."

And God, how his face softened at that... it nearly destroyed me.

Because I knew then. No matter what the sheriff said, as logical as it was, I wasn't yet prepared to let him go.

Not yet.

Perhaps never.

Later that evening, I sat alone in the courtyard, sketchbook in my lap. The sheriff's words still weighed heavily on me, but I remembered something Steel had told me.

"If I scare you off, I'll leave. But if it's them... I'll prove them wrong."

Maybe this was another test. Another voice trying to tell me that I wasn't good enough.

But with a difference. The others were from spite or indifference.

This was from love.

And that made it harder.

But as I outlined Steel's face to memory-the messy hair, the scar under his jaw, the way that his eyes always seemed to hold secrets-I knew something.

If I left, I'd be proving every rumor true. That I wasn't strong enough. That I wasn't worth risking.

But if I didn't.

If I stayed, then Steel would not simply destroy the world for me, perhaps we'd save ourselves.