Chapter Text
Life in the small village of Naboo was a far cry from what Padme had always wanted for herself, however, with war raging on in the country, reaping its bloody harvest among soldiers and civilians alike, she knew that going back was the safer choice.
Here, even though every passing day took her further away from her dream of being the first person in their family to finish university and escape the clutches of poverty, she at least had the comfort of going to bed at night without the fear of waking up in the morning, only to find her home in ruins and her family dead.
For here – a place so insignificant in its nature, in terms of both economics and military potential, that the bigwigs of the bustling capitol had long since stopped to bother marking it on their maps – the days were ever quiet and the nights peaceful.
Or at least so they had been until tonight...
Tonight, a pair of violent hands ripped her from her slumber and heedless of her modesty or her cries, hauled her down to the living room, where the rest of her family was already huddled in a perfect row on the floor with guns pressed to the back of their heads.
„Look what I’ve found!” the man holding her fast in his merciless grip shouted as he closed in on his cronies. „This one, even all blubbery, doesn’t seem so bad. You think Vader will let me take her for a spin, before we blow their brains out?”
„I mean... if you ask nicely” one of them replied, flashing his tobacco-stained teeth in a grin, making it more than clear that there would be no shortage of other takers, and, as if on cue, the whole group erupted into laughter – a sound that only surged when, in the spirit of ‘good fun’, their buddy decided to give her a small foretaste of what he had in store for her.
And although Padme knew that it was in her absolutely best interest to just endure it, feeling his hand slide in between her legs, the urge to flee proved to be far more powerful than reason.
„Uh, uh, uh. Stop acting like brat, baby, or else daddy will be forced to bend you over his knee and teach you a thing or two about manners” he tutted, yanking her right back to himself the second he felt her recoil from his touch, whose rapidly mounting intensity seemed to almost challenge her to struggle, to fight, as if it would only make the ultimate act of conquering her all the sweeter...
„Leave my daughter alone, you sick bastard! She has nothing to do with this! None of them has!” her father jerked in the grip of the goon holding him at gunpoint, apparently unable to bear the sight of the little display of affection any longer and by doing so – fortunately or not, depending on the perspective – diverting her captor’s attention toward himself.
„I’m afraid that’s not how this works, Ruwee” he stated, uttering her father’s name in a way that left no room for doubt that this was, in fact, not their first meeting. „You knew what you were bargaining for when you borrowed that money and now that you’ve failed to pay it back, well... we both know how this night is going to end for you all, so I see no reason why this little cutie couldn’t give an honest man a bit of pleasure before she goes”
A satisfied smirk brightened his features at the blend of defiance and absolute terror that flashed in her eyes at what he said – or rather cooed – as, with the rest of his fingers firmly biting into her cheeks, he took a moment to trace her lower lip with his thumb, before, at last, shoving her to the ground to join the others.
„Tell the boss they’re ready to receive him” he called out over his shoulder and – apparently more interested in her than checking if his command was followed – after nudging her chin up with the tip of his boot, added: „And you, sweetheart, I will hopefully see later”
No, no, God, please if you’re listening, I’m begging you – don’t let that happen. She repeated over and over in her thoughts, desperately clinging onto hope that, by some miracle, her prayers would be answered and, at the very least, her body would already be cooling by the time that bastard laid so much as a finger on her.
However, as he finally backed away and the physical connection they shared was replaced by the feeling of the chilling steel of a gun pressing against the back of her head, she understood that she did not have what it took to fight for it.
To bite, and scratch, and scream, and trash, until she was deemed not worth the trouble and put out of her misery.
There were simply too many things she still wanted to do, places she wanted to see, experiences she wanted to live through for this to be the end. It couldn’t be. It just couldn’t.
„Greetings, Ruwee. Ready to pay up?” darkness incarnate – or at least so he looked in his pitch-black coat and the equally dark fedora crowning his head from where she knelt on the floor – asked, as, having appeared seemingly out of nowhere, he crossed the threshold of their home; his voice as cold as death itself and yet, inexplicably, kindling a strange kind of warmth within her, one that almost bordered on soothing.
„Vader...” her father choked back a breath. „P-please, just give me another month and I promise I’ll –”
„I don’t want to hear any more promises, old man” he snarled, the unmistakable threat of impending violence, should another word be spoken, lacing his tone, effectively shutting him up. „I’ve tried to be patient with you. Offered extension after extension... But you’ve squandered every chance I gave you. And now your time has finally run out”
A few of his goons chuckled as the unmistakable clicks of safeties being switched off rang through the room like a judge’s gavel striking the bench to deliver a final verdict, while the man himself slowly started to make his way down their little row, taking his time to look over every person he passed as if he wanted to sear their image into his memory before they vanished from this world forever.
„So, when in just a moment you and the members of your family will each have a gaping hole soaring through your skulls, splattering your blood and brain matter across the floor where your lifeless bodies will sprawl, please remember that none of this would have happened if you had only –” he broke off abruptly, just as his heavy boots came in her periphery and when she hesitantly raised her gaze to see what about her could have possibly rendered him speechless, she found herself staring into a pair of familiar blue eyes.
~ 6 months earlier ~
„Okay, so a venti, quad-shot latte macchiato with three pumps of caramel syrup, light caramel drizzle and extra cold foam comes up to...” Padme trailed off, as, with the hope that her heavily sleep-deprived brain wouldn’t cause her to mix anything up, she punched all of the ridiculous modifications into the system „10.95 plus tax. Will that be cash or card?” she asked with a practiced smile, her eyes fixed on the black-clad young man on the other side of the register, who, apparently, had turned up at this small café on the outskirts of Courscant at the crack of dawn just to make absolutely sure that she wouldn’t have it easy on her very first solo shift.
„Do you accept Apple pay?” he asked back, his low bartitone the literal epitome of sexy, which although wasn’t that unusual among the frat boys that frequented this place, more often than not lacked the kind of effortless confidence audible in his voice that truly drew people in.
„Yeah, tap whenever you’re ready” she said, grazing wistfully at the shiny new iPhone he had already drawn from his pocket, that between all of the student loans she’d been forced to take out and her everyday living expenses she could only ever dream to afford.
„Ugh, shit...” he grunted, looking down at the screen with unconcealed frustration, before smacking the device a few times against the palm of his hand. „Something’s wrong with my phone”
„Don’t stress it. You’re the only one here, so I can wait. Unless... there’s another method of payment you’d like to use?” she offered with a distinct note of confusion in her voice, growing within her in direct proportion to the frown on the man's face, while he all but gawked at her as if she’d at least sprouted a third limb.
„I... honestly thought you were gonna ask me what it was, so I could say that it doesn’t have your number in it” he admitted, sheepishly raking his fingers through the crown of golden-brown waves atop his head, which she might have even allowed herself to find endearing, had she not had dozens like him flocking here every single day, throbbing for a quickie with the pretty girl from behind the register.
And he wasn’t even the most original of them all.
„Oh... Sorry for ruining your pick-up line then” she chuckled sweetly, counting that the lack of any additional follow-up on her part would be enough for him to get the hint and back off without her needing to reject him outright, which, as she knew all too well, could end in any number of ways, especially considering that they were here alone.
„No worries” he replied affably, for one glorious second making her believe that perhaps he wasn’t one of those guys that had gotten so used to getting their way that they simply couldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer and would actually just wait for his overly-complicated coffee and leave, however, as her luck would have it, that was when he had to open his mouth again. „You can still make up for it by giving it to me anyways”
„I’m afraid I don’t give that kind of information to poor flirts” she said, her voice carrying a much more decisive edge to it this time around, while her hand almost imperceptibly wandered to the taser she had been instructed to carry around in the pocket of her uniform in case a customer ever made her felt threatened or unsafe.
Which although the man in front of her hadn’t yet given her an exact reason to, there was just something about the way he stared her down with those piercing blue eyes of his as if she were a gift bestowed upon him by heaven itself, waiting to be claimed, that made her want to turn on her heel and run for the hills.
„How about just the first digit, then?” he proposed with an undeterred smile, having to press on purely for the love of the game at this point, because seriously...
„What on earth are you going to do with just one digit?”
„That is for me to worry about” he responded cryptically, having to know, as well as she did, that what he was asking for would still leave him with a billion possible combinations and yet looking so confident in his master plan, that it was practically impossible for her to resist the urge to entertain him.
„Suit yourself. Nine” she tossed out with a shrug, trying to come off as nonchalant as she could, lest she boost his already clearly over-inflated ego, with only the twitching of the unruly corners of her lips betraying that deep down she was dying to see what his next move would be, which even if he noticed, he thankfully made no comment on.
„Pleasure doing business with you...” he drawled, his gaze heavy with a sense of triumph and the kind of shamelessness that made her curse whoever was responsible for the V-cut neckline of her uniform, as he allowed it to drift down to the name tag pinned just above her right breast „Padme”
Her breath hitched in her throat at the sound of the low, throaty rumble she never thought existed outside of the X-rated movies, that his voice dropped to as he rolled the syllables around in his mouth.
„And for the record – I may be a flirt, but I’m far from poor” he stated, tucking a hundred-dollar bill he had pulled from his pocket into her tip jar and with no regard for his unreceived coffee order, she realized she hadn’t even began to brew, made his way to the door.
~ ~ ~
Ever since then, seemingly knowing exactly which days to find her working at that ludicrously early hour – when the rest of the sane world was still fast asleep and couldn’t interfere with his nefarious schemes – he returned to the café alongside a fresh, intricate coffee order once a week without fail to ask for more digits. And although, appreciating the unwavering determination he put into getting her number, after the third time he showed up, she was tempted to just give it to him altogether, she’d unfortunately grown far too fond of the sense of constancy – which she hadn’t even realized how desperately she needed in these uncertain times – that their little game of chase had brought her, for it to come to an end just yet.
Thus, she kept playing; every single week for the next six weeks excitedly waiting for the day she would get to see him walking through the door with that dashing smile of his that never failed to make her weak in the knees and find out what tidbits about himself he would share with her this time around.
She had already learned that he was a third-generation business owner, but other than mentioning it had something to do with finances and loans, he was pretty vague regarding the details of his work; that he used to race a lot back in the day, but having had his fair share of thrills, he had stepped away from it and now takes great joy in being just a humble spectator; and, of course, his name – Anakin – which although he claimed not to be a huge fan of, judging by the not-so-subtle way his breath hitched in his throat whenever she said it, it was pretty obvious that as long as it came from her lips he enjoyed the sound of it even a little too much.
However, in the seventh week the first bombs fell on Coruscant – the Republic’s capital city, previously thought by everyone to be untouchable – wiping a vast portion of it off the face of the earth and, at her parents’ urging, Padme fled to her hometown in the countryside, forgetting all about the handsome man she’d met at the café and the three final digits she never had the chance to give him, which, from then on, were to forever stand between him and reaching her.