He kisses me.
It’s gentle at first, exploratory, the way he always is on the ice—testing, assessing, adapting. My body answers before my brain catches up. The taste of salt from the popcorn lingers between us.
Then something inside me clicks. The kiss deepens, tilts, catches fire. My fingers curl in his hoodie. His hand moves to my waist, pulling me closer. The warmth of his body seeps into mine, grounding and dizzying all at once.
He murmurs against my mouth, “God, you taste good,” and I make a small sound I don’t recognize as my own.
Kyle pushes me into the cushions, settling between my legs. I can feel him against me, and I wonder if this is something I want. The movie’s forgotten. The world shrinks to this couch, this breath, this heartbeat under my palm. When his hand slips beneath my shirt, heat flares down my spine. For a moment, I let it.
Then—like a knife through fog—a memory cuts through: Magnus’s mouth on mine, the scrape of teeth, the command in his voice when he saidNot yet.
The comparison hits like a slap. I pull back, heart hammering.
“Wait,” I breathe.
Kyle freezes, blinking. “What’s up?”
“I—um. I think I just… need a second.”
His jaw flexes, just barely. He leans back, runs a hand through his hair. “Sure. No pressure.”
The words are right; the tone’s too tight.
“I’m sorry,” I start, but he waves it off.
“Don’t apologize. I get it. We’ll take it slow.” He tries to smile, and it’s almost convincing. “Next time I’ll cook less wine into the sauce.”
That earns a laugh out of me—thin, but real.
We finish the movie in comfortable silence, the kind that pretends the interruption never happened. He doesn’t touch me again, and I don’t reach for him. When the credits roll, he stretches, yawning.
“It’s late,” he says. “You good to drive?”
“Yeah.”
He walks me to the door, lingering under the porch light. The air’s cold enough to bite, and for a moment we just stand there, two people pretending they’re not thinking about what almost happened.
“Thanks for tonight,” I say.
He smiles. “Anytime, Hale.” Then, softer: “Drive safe, okay?”
“I will.”
He leans in and kisses me again—brief, chaste, sealing the evening like punctuation. Sweet. Predictable. Safe.
I slide into my car, start the engine, and glance at my phone out of reflex. One new notification:Story viewed by magnus.flint.
My pulse stutters. He saw it.
The drive home is a blur of quiet streets and streetlights smearing across the windshield. The kind of drive where thoughts fold in on themselves until they’re just static. I replay the night—Kyle’s laugh, his hand on my waist, the taste of his mouth—and then, like a reflex, another memory overwrites it: Magnus’s voice low in my ear,Mine.
By the time I reach my condo building, my nerves are tight. I pull into my usual spot in the underground lot, kill the engine, and sit there a moment trying to breathe the night out of me.
Then I see him.
Magnus.
Leaning against the entrance of the condo like he belongs there.
