“Does it?” I challenge, brushing another drop of coffee from my laptop’s edge.
He watches my hands without answering.
We’re still crouched—too close, knees almost touching, papers spread between us like some strange offering. Rain drips from his coat. My pulse hasn’t fully settled.
The pause stretches between us. Not awkward or forced. Just heavy—like something unsaid has settled into the space and refuses to move.
Then he rises, smooth and unhurried, and holds out his hand. An offer. An invitation.
I hesitate, my pulse ticking loud in my ears, every instinct weighing the cost.
Then I place my hand in his.
His grip is firm—warm, steady, grounding in a way that catches me off guard. Not tentative. Just… certain. Like he knows exactly how much pressure to use, how long to hold on before I start noticing the quiet comfort of it.
He lets go slowly, his fingers lingering for a heartbeat longer than necessary before retreating. His gaze flicks down the street, a quick scan of the end of the block, then returns to me like I was always the point.
“Let me make it up to you,” he suggests. “Over coffee?”
I draw my laptop closer to my chest, folding my arms around it as my eyes narrow. Suspicion comes easily to me. Trust does not.
“You apologize with caffeine a lot?” I ask.
One brow lifts, the corner of his mouth twitching—like he’s amused, but careful not to show too much of it.
“Only when I knock over someone’s entire academic trajectory.”
The line lands too cleanly. Too rehearsed. It’s not the kind of thing that slips out of someone’s mouth after a genuine accident. It lodges itself in my head and stays there, a splinter under the skin, needling every thought that follows.
What are the odds—really—that Iaccidentallyget knocked flat by the same man who was meeting with the dean the morning after I tried to fake-kill William Scott-Evans?
No. I don’t believe in coincidences.
So who is he? And more importantly—what does he want?
His timing is wrong. His presence feels deliberate. Like a move made one step too late to look innocent and one step too early to be careless. If he expects me to swallow this as bad luck and clumsiness, he’s underestimating me.
Transparency would be nice. Answers even more so.
A coffee won’t kill me. Probably. And if it doesn’t, it might give me something far more important—clarity. The kind that forces hands.
“Fine,” I say at last, the word leaving my mouth softer than I mean it to.
He doesn’t move right away. He waits—watching, measuring—until I shift first. Only then does he fall into step beside me. Close enough that I’m aware of his presence, of the heat and the weight of him, but careful not to crowd me. He matches my pace as we descend the steps, our shoulders nearly brushing as we turn toward the coffee shop.
He wants - needs - this to feel ordinary. A coincidence. An apology extended and accepted.
Instead, it feels… set.
And even without knowing his name, I sense the moment locking into place—inevitable and quietly dangerous. The kind of thing that lingers. The kind of thing that stains.
Something that won’t wash off as easily as spilled coffee.
The café iswarm in that sleepy, late-morning way. It’s quiet, half-empty, the windows fogged with a thin film of rain. He holds the door for me without saying a word and waits just long enough for me to notice how still he stands when he stops moving.
It’s a practised stillness.
He orders black coffee without deliberation, like a man who has never once entertained the idea of sugar or cream. I fire off my order, then he waits for me to sit first, his posture effortlessly polite in a way that feels… calm. Perfectly tailored, like everything else about him.
