Closer to the Fire

tell me how i'm suppose to breathe

Closer to the Fire

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 2,188

Chapter Warnings: Blood, Implied Rape, Suicide (Mentioned)

Pairing: Grace/Chato Santana

Summary: Grace Santana knew what she was getting into when she first laid eyes on the tattooed man they called El Diablo. Temptation's hard to resist and after all, who can say they fell in love with and married the Devil?

iii.

CHATO

They call him El Diablo.

And El Diablo never sleeps.

Often, he would go places by himself, not giving a fuck if he was protected or not. It was like asking for a bullet in his head, a death wish that would become his reality one day.

And maybe he did.

Maybe he was so fucking tired of being the goddamn Grim Reaper.

How'd you get your powers, Chato?

I died.

The neighborhood followed him because he made their lives better unlike Bloodletter.

But tonight, there was a pull that he couldn't explain. A diner, he realized. A place he had never noticed until tonight, despite him knowing this city as well as the tattoos on the back of his hand.

He begins to start coming there more often. No one ever talks to him and he never talks to them, ignoring all the rumors and whispers from the other locals who frequent there. They've heard the stories about him and what he can do.

And he doesn't give a fuck.

"Can I get you anything to eat?" It's her voice that jars him out of his usual routine - it's cheerful and he wonders, why would anybody be happy to see him? She must be talking to someone else.

He turns his head and takes the young woman in front of him. He doesn't recognize her so he figures she must be new here. The name tag resting against her chest pinned on her blouse reads the name of the waitress. Grace.

Her smile's beautiful, nearly as beautiful as the woman it belongs to. The warmth of her presence, it unnerves him. She looks as though she is the physical embodiment of innocence itself, although an unwanted glimpse into her soul proves otherwise.

He sees the suicide of her brother lingering in the back of her mind, feel the unwanted hands and touches of an old lover imprinted on her skin, feel the heat of the flames and the wailing dying screams of her friends as their house burned down to the ground.

Death surrounds her and yet she struggles to maintain cheerful, upbeat demeanor above it all. Her eyes reveal their curiosity as they dart to his tattoos, she's curious about him. Him, a monster who can conjure flames from Hell.

He knows the sight of the ink etched across his skin cast a dangerous image into the mind of those who see it, but she doesn't look at him like he's a monster though.

"Water's fine," he tells her and he stares out the window, a million of questions running through his mind.

Grace gives his water and a free pie and he sees the faint blush creeping into her cheeks as he dives into the pie, surprised of how good it tastes. He can't remember the last time someone has treated him like a decent human being. She makes him another and while she's in the kitchen, one man makes a crude comment of him sticking his "dick in her perfect ass", telling his friend that he'd wait until they were alone.