I want to fuck her against that wall and ruin that perfect mouth.
Heat bites under my skin immediately. Hard and immediate.
She doesn’t retreat. She recalibrates. Adjusts her pace, her posture, the line of her shoulders—clean, precise, complete. Her presence carries no softness, no excess. And she doesn’t look back because she already knows exactly where I am.
That’s the part that sticks.
Pure attraction would be easier to shelve. This is sharper—recognition without permission, confidence without apology—and it irritates the hell out of me that she wears it like it costs her nothing.
I stay where I am. Let the space she carved out sit there between us, loud and deliberate. The realization lands a beat late: she walked away like someone who never expected pursuit in the first place.
The space she leaves behind presses inward instead of emptying.
I take two steps before I realize I moved at all, then stop again, teeth locking hard enough to feel it in my jaw. The hallway keeps flowing—noise, bodies, momentum—but none of it touches the pocket she burned into existence. That friction stays live, waiting.
I tell myself it’s timing. Proximity. Leftover adrenaline—ice still in my lungs, metal still in my blood. I repeat it until it almost settles.
Almost.
The problem is the precision of her exit. Distance wasn’t required to claim control. A reaction wasn’t required to confirm impact. She clocked me, adjusted, and left like the equation was already closed.
I don’t want someone who reads me that cleanly. I don’t want someone who operates without needing anything from me.
“Rossi?”
The voice cuts in from my left, casual, expecting engagement. I don’t turn. The strap of my gear bag digs into my shoulder, anchoring me in place by choice.
“Yeah?” The word lands flat.
“You heading to the rink?”
“In a minute.”
“You good?”
I breathe out through my nose, slow. “Define good.”
A pause. Then a shrug I hear more than see.
“See you there.”
Footsteps fade. The hallway absorbs him without resistance.
I stay put, irritation buzzing under my skin, sharp and persistent. Fuck. I roll my shoulders once, like movement might dislodge the disturbance instead of driving it deeper.
She didn’t ask for anything. That’s what keeps scraping. I don’t want someone who refuses to need me. And I don’t like that my system flagged it as something worth tracking.
Someone slides into my path—not a block, a claim. Easy. Practiced. Like he owns the lane I’m standing in.
“Gio.”
He uses my name like it still opens doors. I look up and find Rylan. Same relaxed posture. Same confidence that assumes history still carries weight. He smiles like we’re mid-conversation instead of planted in a crowded corridor I’m already finished with.
“What do you want?” I keep it bare.
He chuckles. “Straight to it. Missed that.”
I shift my weight, grounding. Whatever Zoë left behind sharpens, searching for a target.
