"Damn right."
We share a look. The kind that requires no additional language because the history between us provides a vocabulary that spoken words cannot improve upon. Playground alliances and shared snack packs and the specific, enduring bond that forms between two kids who were told they did not fit the mold and chose to build a different one together.
He claps his hands against his knees, breaking the moment with the decisive energy of a man who has processed the emotional content and is ready to transition into practical matters.
"So. Unpack and then go get food? I am starving. The campus dining hall does not open until next week, but I spotted a ramen place two blocks from the south gate that looked promising."
"Fuck yes." The enthusiasm erupts from me with a force that is proportional to both my hunger and my relief. "I could eat a horse. Or a hockey team. Or a horse-sized hockey team."
"Noted. I will inform the ramen chef to prepare accordingly."
We move with the synchronized efficiency of two people who have been unpacking in each other's presence since they were old enough to carry their own bags. He grabs two of my suitcases from the hallway. I grab the remaining two. Jeffrey offers a final nod of departure, his brown eyes carrying the quiet satisfaction of a man who has delivered his charge into the care of a trustworthy companion and can now return to the Holloway estate with his duty fulfilled.
"Thank you, Jeffrey." I pause at the door, meeting his gaze. "For everything."
The words carry more weight than their syllable count. Fourteen days of intercepted mail and corroborated lies and envelopes produced at exactly the right moment. A lifetime of parking lot patience and protein bars in the glove compartment and the silent, unwavering presence of a man who has been more family than my family's name suggests.
He inclines his head.
"Always, Miss Holloway."
The door closes behind him, and I turn back to the suite that will be my home for the next four weeks. The common room is small but functional. A couch, two armchairs, a kitchenette with a coffee maker that makes my pulse spike with gratitude. Two bedroom doors branch off from the central space, each one leading to a private room just large enough for a bed, a desk, and the dreams of whoever occupies it.
Jace is already hauling luggage toward one of the bedrooms, his lean frame moving with the quiet competence of a person who treats efficiency as a love language.
I watch him for a moment.
This is real.
I am at Valenridge University. In a dorm suite with Jace Nakamura, a person I trust more than most blood relatives. One week from orientation, four weeks from the season that will determine whether an Omega belongs on professional ice or whether I have been chasing a ghost for fifteen years.
And somewhere on this campus, in a building I have not yet located, a man with broken glasses and hidden muscles and a cedarwood scent is doing exactly what I am doing right now: unpacking his bags, settling into unfamiliar space, preparing for a future that scares him as much as it excites him.
Pretend you don't know me.
Fine, Archie. I'll pretend.
For now.
I grab my remaining bags and head toward the unclaimed bedroom, a grin spreading across my face that I cannot contain and do not try to.
Because orientation is next week. And the ice is waiting. And for the first time in years, I am walking toward a door that has not been closed before I reach it.
Who else from my past will I get the privilege of meeting on the other side?
CHAPTER 9
Ghosts I Made
~SAGE~
Jace and I are cutting through the east wing corridor when the ponytail catches my eye.
Not the ponytail itself. Ponytails are unremarkable. Half the women on this campus wear their hair pulled back in some variation of the style, and I have never once registered the detail as significant on a stranger's head.
But this ponytail has a twist at the end.
A specific, deliberate, signature twist that loops the elastic band through the final inch of gathered hair and tucks the tail under itself, creating a small, neat knot that prevents flyaways without requiring a second band. A twist that was invented by a girl at a sleepover when she was nine years old, demonstrated to me with the patient intensity of a child teaching nuclear physics to a golden retriever, and repeated every single morning of every single school day for the next seven years until the girl who invented it vanished from my life and took the twist with her.
