He nods once.
I don’t ask for help. I don’t need it. I make the walk out with the towel slung low around my hips, find my jeans, shirt, underwear, and socks strewn across his plush carpet. I dress quickly, not bothering with the socks, shoving my feet into my boots and running a hand through my still-damp hair.
When I straighten, Silas is leaning in the doorway of the hall. Shirtless. Barefoot. Still watching me.
There’s something quiet and claiming in the look. Something that makes my chest tighten in a way I donothave time to unpack.
“Thanks for the hospitality,” I say lightly, giving him a grin as I reach for the door. “I’ll leave a five-star review.”
He doesn’t laugh or smile. Just studies me like he’s memorizing something.
“You don’t have to go.”
I pause. My heart leaps into my throat, and I swallow it back down.
Glance back at him over my shoulder. “Yeah, I do.”
His gaze drops to my still-wet hair, lingers on the bruises he left across my neck and shoulder that he can see through the mesh of my shirt, and rises again. “You’re sure?”
“I’m sure,” I say. Then add, with a flash of teeth, “But hey—ten out of ten. Would let you boss me around again.”
His brow lifts, slow. But he doesn’t stop me. Doesn’t ask for my number. Doesn’t say see you around.
And I walk out the door telling myself that’s exactly what I wanted. Even if a small, traitorous part of me already wants to look back.
I hate mornings.
Like… viscerally.
They feel like a personal attack. Especially this one, with the sun barely over the damn horizon and the group chat going off at six-fucking-thirty like that’s a normal, acceptable hour for human activity.
Ty bangs on the bathroom door while I’m brushing my teeth, still half-asleep and moving like molasses. “Bro, you’re gonna make us late. You know we can’t be late.”
“Then leave without me,” I mumble, foam and all. “I’m not your mom.”
“You wish you were my mom,” he calls back. “She’s a MILF.”
I rinse and spit, rolling my eyes so hard it almost gives me a headache. “You have issues.”
Fifteen minutes later, we’re jogging across campus toward the field, Ty and Will both grumbling beside me like it’smyfault they didn’t leave earlier. Will flips me off dramatically, his bag slamming against his back with every step.
“My legs are sore, and it’s your fault,” he huffs. “You couldn’t take your dick appointment on literally any other night?”
“It wasn’t an appointment,” I mutter. “It was spontaneous and meaningful.”
Ty snorts. “You didn’t even know his last name.”
“Details.”
Truth is,I’ma little sore too. A slow burn between my thighs that flares every time I take a longer stride. Not a complaint—more like a memory, tucked under my skin, echoing in all the right places.
And then I see the field.
The team’s already out there, spread across the turf, running drills. A few cones. Some shouting. The clatter of cleats on synthetic grass.
Andhim.
Silas.
