I can feel the heat rise up my neck, panic clawing up my throat because the more he defends me, the more he ruins me.
“Kyle, please—” I start, but it comes out strangled.
He shakes his head as if he can’t even hear me. “You shouldn’t have to take that crap, Alycia. You’re the one keeping this team’s image clean. You didn’t?—”
“Enough.” Cooper’s voice cuts through him like a blade.
The entire room goes still. Even the cameras stop clicking for a beat, the silence louder than any roar. Kyle freezes mid-step, jaw tight.
“Outside,” Cooper says, his tone calm in a way that’s infinitely more dangerous than yelling.
“Guess we’re making headlines today.” Cole exhales, tension bleeding into a wry grin that fools no one, nudging Kyle’s arm. “Come on, kid. Let’s go before you say something the media can turn into a hashtag.”
“Not helping,” Beau mutters from behind him, the weight of his stare landing squarely on me. There’s no judgment there, just quiet understanding, like he’s already pieced together the entire story with no need to hear it.
“She did nothing wrong,” Kyle says again, softer this time, but somehow it hits harder.
I wish he’d stop saying it. I wish he’d stopcaring.Because every word is one more nail in the coffin of everything I’ve worked for.
“Office. Now,” Cooper says again, leaving no room for argument.
Cole grabs Kyle by the elbow, murmuring something low that doesn’t stop him from looking back at me one last time. His gaze burns straight through me—equal parts apology and promise—and it takes everything in me not to reach for him.
Then the door shuts, and the noise from the press starts back up like a hive kicked open. I can feel the judgment and speculation, as if the story is writing itself in real time.TimberwolvesPRintern involved with Hendrix brother. Another PR disaster for the Timberwolves. The scandal of the century before the season even starts.The thought makes me dizzy.
Cooper’s temper will be bad, but the league’s whispers will be worse. My mother tells anyone who’ll listen that I’ve finally found my place. And now, because of one fake date and a very real kiss, I might lose everything. The worst thing is that a part of me doesn’t regret it. I still remember the way he looked at me that night, like I was something he wanted to keep, not just chase.
The sound of the door creaking open rips me out of the thought. Kyle’s back again. Shirt clinging to him, probably from nerves and the weight of everything he just risked. He crosses the room in three long strides. “Are you okay?”
Something in my chest twists hard, sharp enough to steal my breath. He’s standing there, looking at me like my panic, my job, and my entire future are things he could fix if I’d just let him. But he can’t. Not when this internship is the only thing I have left of the career I spent years clawing toward.
“I’m fine,” I lie, even though my voice shakes.
“You don’t look fine.”
“Because you just made it worse. Youthink protecting me helps, but it doesn’t. You’re you, Kyle. You can walk into a fire, and they’ll call it passion. I walk in after you, and they call it reckless.”
His jaw tightens, and something flashes across his face—guilt, anger, something heavier than either. “You really think that’s all you are? Collateral?”
“Don’t make this harder,” I say, voice breaking.
“I’m not trying to make it harder,” he says, stepping closer. “I’m trying to make it right.”
The way he says it—fierce and full of something I don’t dare name—makes my eyes sting. I want to believe he could make it right. That I could be the girl who met a guy in an elevator and went on a date, then another, and another, until maybe it turned into something real. But that can’t be us.
“You don’t understand,” I say, the words trembling out of me. “I need this job. You have an entire career waiting for you, no matter what happens. I have one shot. One.”
He opens his mouth like he’s going to argue, but the pain in my voice must stop him because he just looks at me. “You’re not expendable to me.”
The words knock something loose inside me because, for one dizzying second, I believe him, and it feels like I’m falling. I hate that he looks at me like I’m something he could choose, even if it costs him everything. Because if he means what he just said, if I let myself mean it, too, then everything I’ve built stops mattering.
“You can’t say things like that.”
“Why not?” He blinks, as if the words sting.
“Because I need to survive this, Kyle.” My voice trembles, but I don’t stop. “And I can’t do that if you keep making me feel like I’m the only one in the room when you look at me.”
His hand twitches, like he wants to reach for me but knows he can’t. “Alycia?—”
