The café buzzed softly with life.
Steam hissed from the espresso machine behind the counter, and conversations floated around Ryunosuke like fog—present, but indistinct. The clink of ceramic cups. The low murmur of jazz playing through the old ceiling speakers.
He sat in the corner booth, elbows resting on the worn wooden table, staring down at his phone like it might change if he looked away long enough.
His tea had gone cold. He hadn't touched it.
He hadn't opened his sketchbook, either—a rarity.
Instead, the screen of his phone glowed back at him.
A search bar, filled and refilled.Again and again.
"BMW E30 325iX resale LA 2020"
"Who owns Unit 3C Hill & 7th Parking Garage"
"Navarro Holdings LLC Downtown Los Angeles"
Each query brought new tabs, new dead ends. Company directories. Property tax records. Press clippings.
None of it should matter.
And yet—
He couldn't stop digging.
The memory of the car lingered too vividly. The chipped bumper. The cracked leather. The sun-faded sticker—Mr. Sunny-Side—still grinning from the glove box. It had been his father's.
No doubt.
But it wasn't supposed to exist anymore.
Amelia had sold it two years ago. He remembered the late-night conversation. The tears she tried to hide. The silence that followed.
The car was gone.
And now, it wasn't.
His hand trembled slightly as he scrolled again.
Click.
A PDF inspection record.Hill & 7th Garage, two years old.A list of commercial tenants.
Unit 3C: Navarro Holdings LLC.
The name sat there, small and unassuming.
But Ryunosuke's chest tightened the moment he read it.
He copied it, opened a new tab, and searched:
Victor Navarro.
The first result was clean and polished—likely curated.
A business profile.
Victor Navarro is a Los Angeles-based investor and silent partner in a range of high-end hospitality projects, real estate developments, and boutique ventures.
There was a photo.
A man in his forties. Trim. Elegant. Wearing a dark suit with a navy tie, his hands folded neatly on a glass table.
Sleek haircut. A smirk that didn't reach his eyes.
Ryunosuke's stomach dropped.
It wasn't recognition.Not exactly.
But something in that photo—it tugged at him.
Like a dream he couldn't fully remember.Like something he'd seen once through a window.Like the moment before déjà vu kicks in.
He enlarged the photo.
Stared into the man's face.
There was nothing overtly menacing about him. Not in the traditional sense. If anything, he looked... efficient. Controlled. The kind of man who knew the temperature of every room he entered and adjusted accordingly.
Ryunosuke sat back slowly, the name echoing in his mind like a whisper passed through a tunnel.
Navarro.
Why did it feel like a warning?
He looked down at the tea he hadn't touched.
Then at his sketchbook.
His fingers hovered over it for a moment—uncertain.
Then he flipped it open.
A blank page greeted him.
He raised his pencil.
Started slow.
The lines came first—the garage ceiling, the industrial lights, the polished concrete floor. Then the rows of parked cars. The E30—every detail etched from memory.
It emerged on the page like it had been waiting for him.
But he didn't stop there.
In the far right corner, under the shadow of a support beam, he began to sketch a figure.
A man.
Leaning against the car.
The face blurred—on purpose.
But the posture was clear. Hands in his pockets. One leg bent slightly. Head tilted, just so.
Watching.
Always watching.
He added just one detail.
The smile.
Too calm.
Too certain.
Like someone who already knew the ending.
Ryunosuke stared at the page for a long time, unmoving.
The café noise around him faded until all he could hear was the soft scratch of pencil against paper.
He didn't know what was waiting for him down this path.
But he knew the name now.
Victor Navarro.
And somehow, that changed everything.