“Why?”
“Because he trusts how you see the ice.”
“That’s not the real answer.”
“It’s part of it.”
“What’s the rest?”
I looked at him across the table, at the guarded set of his mouth, at the need he hated showing and could not fully hide.
“Because I knew you would take care of it.”
He inhaled once, slow and unsteady.
No praise had ever hit him like that. I knew it with a certainty that made my chest tight.
For a moment neither of us moved.
Then Tiny barked from my office down the hall, deep and offended, probably because someone had closed a door between him and possible snacks.
The sound broke the room just enough.
Jace let out a breath that almost became a laugh. “He always like that?”
“Worse.”
“Figures.”
I opened the door.
He gathered his notebook, but he did not leave immediately. He stopped beside me, close enough that I could smell cold air on his hoodie and the faint bite of soap from the showers. Close enough that if either of us shifted wrong, it would become something neither of us could explain.
His eyes met mine.
There was no confusion in them now.
Fear, yes. Guilt. Want, sharp enough to be a problem.
But not confusion.
I kept my hands at my sides.
He did the same.
“Eat dinner,” I said.
His mouth parted, then closed. He nodded once.
“Set an alarm for tomorrow before you leave the parking lot.”
“I will.”
“Not when you get home. Before.”
Another nod. “Okay.”
He walked out.
