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The look he gives me suggests he doesn’t believe that for a second. Good. He shouldn’t.

His thumb continues tracing the edge of the band before stopping on the second clasp hidden beneath the metalwork. I watch realization dawn on him, his eyes narrowing. “Ciaran.”

Ah, hell.

“This is paired.” His mouth falls open. “You made us matching medical bands?”

“They don’t look like medical bands.”

“They’re matching.” Rowan keeps studying the metalwork, looking so determined to find additional evidence that I’m half convinced he’d put the thing under a microscope if he had one. “They’re very expensive matching medical bands. And what does paired mean?”

I sigh. “It means if your heart rate spikes, I get notified.”

He just stares at me. “You want to monitor my heart rate?”

“Only the important parts. I was already tracking your location through your multi-slate, mouse. This just tells me whether you’re panicking while you’re wandering off and making terrible decisions.”

Rowan’s mouth falls open. “That is not normal.”

I shrug. “I’ve never claimed to be.”

He rolls his eyes, muttering something under his breath while turning the band over in his hands again. Then his expression softens. “I’m never taking this off.”

I grin. “That was the plan.”

I lift his wrist and fasten the band into place, my thumb brushing across the inside of his pulse point before letting go. The silver catches the last of the evening light.

It looks like it belongs there, and the thought has something warm unfurl in my chest.

Yeah. Definitely belongs there.

“Nobody could explain how a working-class kid from Düren ended up with a Noctis scholarship that shouldn’t have existed anymore,” I say. “At first, that was all it was. A job.”

Rowan watches me for a moment. “And then?”

I huff out a laugh. “Then you showed up. Terrified, completely out of your depth, and still arguing with people twice your size. After that, I kept seeing you everywhere. In the conservatory. In practice rooms. Playing the Noctis like it was the only thing keeping you together. You were so handsome it took my breath away.”

Rowan’s smile gentles, and there’s something there, something precious, something that shows he knows. He knows. Because he feels it too. “And that was enough?”

“No.” I squeeze his hand. “But it was enough to make me start paying attention. The Orlov ban meant the timing was bad. Even Sola acknowledged that. Everybody who cared about that situation was already looking over their shoulder. You were unlucky, or lucky, I guess. So beautiful⁠—”

“Is that why you came to the pool?”

“Yeah.”

Fuck me, seeing my mouse for the first time in that water, glaring at me like I was the enemy while I kept finding excuses to come back for more…

“You were magnificent, Rowan.”

He holds up a hand. “So you came because you had to spy on me. And here I was thinking you were interested⁠—”

“Oh, I was, baby. Still am. Always will be.”

A flush creeps across his cheeks. “So you liked me.”

I huff. “Liked you? Oh no, mouse. There were many things I felt when I was around you, but liking you didn’t quite fit the bill.”

I’m obsessed with you.