The dangerous part was that he wanted to be guided.
And I wanted to be the man he trusted with the command.
Chapter 17
Chapter 17
JACE
I woke up before my alarm.
That never happened.
For a second, I lay there staring at the hotel ceiling, suspicious of my own body. My phone was on the nightstand, facedown because I’d put it there after Declan told me to sleep. Water bottle empty beside it. Door locked. Suit jacket hung over the chair instead of dumped on the floor. Shoes lined up near my bag.
Evidence.
That was what it felt like. Evidence that I had followed instructions after midnight and not argued myself into something worse.
I should have felt embarrassed.
I should have been crawling out of my skin over how fast I’d obeyed him, how simple it had been, how much relief had punched through me when his text came in with one word.
Sleep.
Instead, I felt calm.
Not happy. Not fixed. My brain was still my brain. It started moving the second I realized I was awake, practice schedule, breakfast, media availability, Vanessa’s Aspen text I hadn’t answered, whether I had packed extra socks, if I’d left my headphones in the plane seat, the way Declan’s voice had sounded when he said I’m not going to touch you tonight.
But under all of it was space.
Like someone had taken the whole disaster pile in my chest and put labels on three boxes.
Red.
Amber.
Green.
I rolled onto my side and grabbed my phone, then stopped with my fingers around it.
No texts before morning.
He hadn’t said that. He’d said not to text again tonight. It was morning now. Technically.
My thumb hovered over the screen.
This was how it happened. Loopholes. Technicalities. My brain loved a technicality when it wanted something. It could build an entire legal defense around a word choice while the reasonable part of me sat in the corner holding its head.
I put the phone back down.
Then immediately picked it up again to check the time.
6:11.
Team breakfast at eight. Bus at nine-thirty. Morning skate at ten-fifteen.
Plenty of time.
