And then I heard the soft hiss of another shell cutting through water.
Liam.
He pulled up beside me, maybe ten feet away, his burgundy and white shell rocking in the chop. He didn’t look over. Didn’t acknowledge me at all. Just settled into position, his jaw tight, his knuckles white around the oar handles.
But I looked at him.
I couldn’t help it.
His shoulders were relaxed, but his body was coiled tight like he was holding something back. Sweat beaded at his temples despite the cold. His eyes stayed fixed straight ahead on the far end of the course, like I didn’t exist, like last night never happened.
God, he looked—
I cut the thought off and forced my gaze forward.
This wasn’t about him. This was about me. About proving I could handle the pressure, staying clean and technical and—
Stop.
I gripped my oar handles tighter and tried to steady my breathing. In through my nose, out through my mouth.
Control what you can control.
But the thing I couldn’t control was sitting right there, close enough to touch, and I wanted—
What did I want?
Crush him.
To prove that this rivalry didn’t matter, and to show him I was better, cleaner, more disciplined. I was a Harrington and that was better than anything he’d ever be. And that whatever happened at Brackett Lake... meant nothing.
Good.
Two thousand meters to prove that whatever happened between us was over.
I could feel a fire building as I stared down the river.
The official’s voice crackled over the loudspeaker.
“Lanes are set. Single sculls, this is the final race.”
My heart hammered so hard I could feel it in my throat.
On the Kingswell side, the bleachers had gone quiet. Across the river, Riverside’s crowd fell silent too. Even the wind seemed to die for a moment.
The official raised the flag.
“Ready.”
Every muscle in my body coiled tight.
Liam’s shell rocked slightly beside me.
The only sound was my own heartbeat pounding in my ears and the soft slap of water against the hull.
“Row!”
We exploded off the line at the exact same time.
