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I freeze, my medical band pulsing harder against my wrist while my fingers tighten around the rail. But I don't look away.

We should go. Now. And never return. But it's like my feet are frozen to the ground.

"Dama?"

"I'm here," he says, but he feels far away.

"We should go."

"Yeah."

But before either of us can move, Ciaran drives Adrian down with another brutal hit that sends him collapsing into the dirt. The crowd erupts as guards push into the ring to pull people back and drag Adrian away, but Ciaran barely spares any of them a glance.

One of the guards hands him his multi-slate while another starts undoing the wraps around his wrists. Ciaran strips the tape free with his teeth, shoves the slate back onto his arm, and starts walking straight toward the rails.

Straight toward me.

Lucan shifts smoothly into Damaris's path when he tries to reach me, stopping him just long enough for Ciaran to climb out of the pit and reach us.

He looks wrecked in the worst possible way. Sweat glistens along his throat and brow while his chest still heaves from the fight. Blood stains his knuckles. His hair is damp and pushed back from his forehead, and he still carries that same wild energy from the ring, like he hasn't fully come down yet.

He looks dangerous. He looks ridiculously handsome.

Shame hits right behind it. I just watched him beat a man bloody, and I'm standing here noticing how good he looks.

Ciaran stops in front of me with a crooked smirk. "He deserved it. Did you hear the way he was talking about you?"

Beside me, Lucan grins. "I did promise your date a good show."

Ciaran spares him a glance. "Thanks for welcoming my date in my absence. I'll take it from here." Then he offers me his arm like none of this is strange at all. "Can I buy you a drink, little mouse?"

15

CIARAN

"You almost killed him."

The private booth sits tucked into the far corner of the lounge, hidden behind smoked glass and dark wood panels. The noise from downstairs reaches us only in distant bursts now, softened by the heavy walls around us.

Across from me, Rowan looks up from the drink the server placed in front of him. He still looks tense from downstairs, shoulders tight beneath his button-down while his fingers stay curled too firmly around the glass. His cheeks are still flushed from the heat of the pit, freckles scattered beneath the low gold light. Soft golden hair falls into his eyes every time he looks down, and fuck, those eyes are impossible to read when he's trying this hard to hide what he's feeling.

Cute.

"Nah." I lean back into the booth. "Voss bruises easy."

"Ciaran."

"What?" I grin. "He pissed me off."

Rowan's eyes narrow. "Because of what he said?"

"Partly."

"What's the other part?"

I let my gaze drag across his face, then lower to the way he shifts against the booth. His shoulder rolls beneath the fabric of his shirt, and I'm back at the pool, watching water slide down his chest. The way he went tense the second he realized I was looking, those huge eyes still too wide from downstairs.

"He was paying too much attention to my date."