“You don’t have to walk me in,” I say, voice hushed like the truck is a church.
“I’m not walking you in,” he says.
I exhale, some small, stupid disappointment pricking at me.
Then he unbuckles his seatbelt.
“I’m walking the same direction,” he adds, and pushes his door open.
My heart trips over itself.
We climb out. The night closes in around us, colder now that we’ve left the cocoon of the cab. He falls into step half a pace behind me, a solid presence at my shoulder as we cross the short stretch of asphalt to the entrance.
The motion sensor above the door flicks on, bathing the concrete in harsh white.
I fish my keycard out of my pocket with fumbling fingers. It’s stupid, how aware I am of him so close behind me. Of his heat, his size, the quiet way he waits without crowding. Dad’s voice from the phone call ghosts through my head:If you ever feel off, call me.
I am literally standing here with the human live wire he warned me about, and my phone stays in my pocket.
I swipe the card. The lock clicks, a clean, mechanical sound.
“You lock your door?” he asks, same words as the parking lot, same steady tone.
I huff out a breath that’s not quite a laugh. “Religiously,” I say. “Coach-approved.”
His mouth twitches. He steps closer, just enough that his shadow merges with mine on the cinderblock wall. His taped hand lifts, bracing on the doorframe above my head as he leans in.
Not pinning. Not caging.
Just… there.
Heat rolls off him in waves. The cotton of his hoodie brushes the back of my shoulder, barely, and every nerve I have lights up.
“Good,” he says quietly.
The word lands low in my chest again, heavy and dangerous and grounding all at once.
I tilt my head up, because he’s too close not to. The movement brings my face a breath closer to his, my hood slipping back just enough that cold air kisses my neck.
His eyes are right there. Sharp, green, focused entirely on me.
The world narrows—buzzing light, cold concrete, his breath ghosting warm over my mouth.
I don’t mean to, but my gaze drops to his lips.
His jaw tightens. His fingers curl against the metal above my head, tape scraping faintly.
“Addison,” he says, my name rough around the edges.
It feels like a warning and a question.
My pulse is a roar in my ears. I don’t step back. I don’t step forward. I just… hover. Suspended in the inch of space between us, in the possibility of what would happen if I closed it.
Every instinct I’ve grown out of trauma screams at me to move away from danger. Every echo of my dad’s voice sayslive wire, blast radius, don’t stand this close when it arcs.
But looking at him—at the bruise on his lip, the tape on his hand, the way he’s holding up the doorframe so I don’t have to—I realize something terrifying.
I feel safer here, in the radius of his danger, than I do anywhere else.
