"I'm not staying long," she says, her voice distracted.
"You say that every time."
"I mean it every time."
"And yet."
She takes a bite of the wrap, her right hand stabilizing the laptop edge while her left brings the food up. The laptop holds steady. Her shoulder sits three inches from mine, close enough that I can feel the heat of her body through the fabric of my own hoodie. The hoodie is too big on her. The collar slips when she reaches for the water, and the line of her collarbone appears, pale and smooth, the dip at the base of her throat where the thin gold chain rests.
My breath catches for a half-second, sharp and sudden. I cover it with a drink from my Gatorade.
Her knee presses against mine under the table, light, accidental, and she fucking leaves it there. My jeans go warm where her knee meets mine.
Across the table, Dante is watching her. I catch it because my eyes are always on him, the same way his are always on the ice. His hand pauses with the coffee halfway up. His gaze tracks her the way he tracks film. Studying. Cataloging. His eyes drop to thecollar of my hoodie, to the strip of bare collarbone and the gold chain resting there, then snap back to her face. His hand lowers, and the cup settles on the table with a soft click.
Her knee on my left. His jaw locked across the table. My chest constricts. I swallow the Gatorade too fast.
"Dante," I say, because I need to see how this plays out. "Maya's been building a piece on the defensive breakdown from last Saturday's game. She found something in your neutral zone reads that Addison missed."
Maya's head snaps up from the laptop, her eyes wide. Her pen stops between her fingers and lands flat against the edge of the laptop hinge. "I didn't say you could—"
"Third period, right?" I turn to her, holding her gaze. "The weak-side rotation. You showed me the shot charts yesterday."
She gives me the look. The one that promises slow, creative violence.
"It's not finished."
"But the analysis is good."
"The analysis is always good."
I glance back across the table. Dante's posture has shifted. He's leaning forward. Barely. An inch. The coffee cup stays on the table, both his hands resting on either side of it now. His eyes are locked on Maya.
"She's the best hockey journalist at this school," I say. "Probably one of the best in the conference."
"Cole," Maya says. A warning.
"I'm stating facts."
"You're being weird."
Dante takes another measured drink of coffee. Sets the cup down with a soft click. His eyes move from Maya to me, a quick assessment, then back to Maya.
"The weak-side rotation," he says. To Maya. "What did you find?"
Maya turns her torso toward him, her shoulder rotating away from mine, but her knee stays pressed against mine under the table, and the pressure of it deepens as her weight shifts. Dante holds her gaze.
"Your forwards are cheating toward the strong side on zone entries," Maya says, her voice sliding into that cool, professional register. "When the puck moves weak side, there's a one-to-two-second delay before the backside winger rotates. Addison's running a standard one-three-one, but the timing is off by about half a stride. It's visible from above." She taps the edge of the laptop, her fingers steady.
"From the press box," Dante says.
"Yes."
A beat hangs there, thick and loaded.
"Sixty feet above the ice," he says, and the words aren't an accusation this time. They land differently.
Maya's pen stops between her fingers. Her jaw goes rigid, that same muscle jumping that I've watched since we were thirteen. She heard it. Dante heard it too. His mouth opens slightly, a fraction, like a word got caught between his teeth and he swallowed it back.
