She didn’t let go immediately. Her eyes searched my face, softer than they’d been when she left. “I booked the room. We can cancel if your schedule changes.”
“It won’t.”
“Okay.”
She stepped closer, fixed the collar of my hoodie where it had folded under my jacket strap, then smoothed the tie against my chest before handing it over. It was such a normal girlfriend thing. Intimate in public without being sexual. Familiar. Earned by time.
Across the entrance hall, Declan had stopped walking.
I felt him before I looked.
He stood near Tessa and Benny, travel coat over one arm, phone in his hand, gray eyes on Vanessa’s fingers at my collar.
He looked away almost immediately.
Not fast enough.
Something hot and ugly moved through me, not guilt this time. Recognition.
He didn’t like seeing her touch me.
Good.
Then I hated myself for thinking it.
Vanessa kissed my cheek. “Text me when you land?”
“Yeah.”
She left, and Roman’s gaze moved from me to Declan to the door Vanessa had used.
“Jesus,” he muttered.
“What?”
“Nothing I want to say in a hallway.”
Team travel had a special kind of chaos that usually helped me. Bags, buses, check-ins, security, noise layered over noise until my brain could surf it instead of fight it. Today every sound arrived with teeth.
At the airport, I forgot which pocket my ID was in three times. Milo talked nonstop about a documentary on deep-sea creatures until Brooks threatened to leave him at gate B12. Tessa handed me a folder with media notes, then took one look at my face and said, “Read the highlighted parts only or you’ll absorb none of it.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
“I’m too young and too tired to be insulted like that.”
On the plane, I ended up three rows behind Declan.
Close enough to hear when his phone rang before takeoff.
“Hey,” he said, voice low.
I knew immediately.
Olivia.
I stared at the safety card until the diagrams blurred.
“No, it’s fine,” Declan said. Warmer than he sounded with staff. Softer at the edges. “Did you make the connection?”
