I actually really liked this, so I hope you do too. Tell me what you think!
The first time she sees him, he's sitting alone in the rain.
On a bench under a lamppost, he appears to be waiting. The false light casts dull shadows across his face, highlighting one side and isolating the other. His heavy wool jacket must be getting soaked, she thinks to herself, but he makes no move to escape the rain.
She can't stay at the window, she's got samples to analyze, and so she misses the black car pulling up with the soft hiss of tires against road. She misses the man climbing into it.
...
The second time she sees him, he's walking quickly through a market.
She's there, trying to pick up some eggs and milk for tomorrow, and it's been months since that first sighting, but she recognizes him in a heartbeat. He looks the same; ruffled dark curls, and for a second his eyes meet hers and they're the most intricate swirl of colors she'd ever seen.
She thinks of the finest art. Of Van Gogh using dipped brushes to create the galaxy and she thinks even that masterpiece couldn't compare.
Then they flick past her and onto a man he's tailing and her breath returns to her lungs.
...
The third, he's in an alleyway, arguing with a man.
Her heart sinks, because she's seen this all before, in the people on her table, in the stories of their families. There's a wild, desperate look in his eyes, and his hands are shaking until he shoves them back into his coat pockets. There's dirty scruff on his neck, and she can piece all the clues together.
He turns his head with frustration, and his eyes connect with hers. He stares at her, fury coloring his expression, until he breaks it with one last mutter to his companion. He stalks away, flipping his collar up to shield from the biting wind.
...
The fourth, she's at the window again, and he's standing at the side of the road, looking at her.
Her breath is fogging up the frigid glass, and she swipes at it quickly with her white sleeve before she realizes he's gone.
...
The last time she sees him, he's laying in front of her.
Mike Stamford is chatting amiably next to her, about some stuffy bloke who wanted her to check out this body, when she pulls back the sheet and her breath catches in her throat and she recognizes those cheekbones. Those curls. Those graceful hands. Those still, shut eyes.
Clinical hands immediately located the telltale familiar bruises between his fingers, in his elbow, between the toes; it confirms what she already knows.
It's not until later, when she's penciling in the paperwork with the old adage of drug overdose, that she learns his name.