He laughs — deep, warm, a little wicked.
“I like you already.”
I don’t smile.
But I don’t move either.
He orders a whiskey, neat. Drinks half of it in one swallow without taking his eyes off me. He doesn’t ask my name — not yet — but he keeps glancing at me like he’s already drafting the first line of a story he wants to pull me into.
“I’m Miles,” he says eventually, tapping his glass lightly against mine even though I haven’t touched it. “You look like you could use someone to talk to.”
I sip my soda and study him sideways. “You always this friendly?”
“Only with women who look like heartbreak in a dress.”
I scoff. “Does that line actually work?”
He leans in slightly, voice dropping to a low hum that borders on dangerous.
“Only when it’s true.”
God help me — I almost smile.
Almost.
Because for one brief, selfish second, I want to pretend Dax fucking Kingston isn’t etched into every scar I’ve ever stitched shut, every bruise I’ve hidden, every heartbeat I’ve wasted.
For just a moment, I want to pretend I could be the kind of girl who lets a stranger help her forget.
Before I can answer him—before I can decide whether I’m flattered or nauseous or simply exhausted by the entire theatre of men who think they’ve discovered something rare—the air shifts.
No, it doesn’t just shift.
It splits.
Like the atmosphere in the club cracks open, like the oxygen thins, like the whole Crimson Room inhales at once and forgets how to exhale.
My stomach tightens.
Because I feel him before I see him.
Dax.
He isn’t just here.
He’s storming.
A presence, a shadow, a force that moves through the room like gravity tipping to one side. I don’t need to turn around to know his eyes are on me, locked, burning with that ice-cold heat that feels like frostbite across my spine.
Fury wrapped in frost. Violence wrapped in silence.
“Miles,” I say slowly, not turning, not daring to look away from the bar because I know exactly what’s behind me. “You might wanna?—”
“—Hey, man. You good?” Miles interrupts, tipping his chin lazily towards the darkness that has formed at my back.
He doesn’t know.
He can’t know.
