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“You did more than that, and you know it.”

His stomach dropped. She said it clean, direct, the way she threw punches, no windup, no warning. He met her eyes and found them steady, the hazel dark, the gold flecks bright, and underneath the mask he could see the challenge. She wanted him to look away first. She wanted him to be the one who couldn’t hold it.

He lifted her chin. “You’re the one who kissed me. Kissed me and then turned around and said it didn’t happen, that nothing… that it didn’t happen.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“It didn’t.”

“Sloane.”

“It didn’t happen.” She crossed her arms. The grey shirt pulled across her collarbone, the line of her shoulder blade shifting beneath the fabric. “We trained. I showered. I came to breakfast. That’s the morning.”

“That’s not the morning.”

“That’s the version of the morning I’m going with.”

He stood. Carried his mug to the sink. She was close now, three feet, the corridor behind her, her body angled toward escape. He stopped. Kept the distance.

“Fine,” he said. “It didn’t happen.”

She blinked. She’d expected a fight. He could see it in the way her weight shifted forward, the way her shoulders had squared. She’d been ready to argue, to push, to throw his words back in his face until one of them stormed out.

He’d agreed. She didn’t know what to do with that.

“Good,” she said.

“Good.”

She turned toward the corridor. He opened the tap to rinse his mug.

“Chris.”

He glanced over his shoulder. She stood at the edge of the hallway, one hand on the wall, her profile sharp in the kitchen light. Her jaw was set. Her eyes were on the floor.

“Your coffee is too strong,” she said. “Nobody needs that much caffeine.”

“Nobody asked you to drink it.”

“I didn’t have a choice. You made the pot.”

“There’s a kettle. Make tea.”

“I don’t drink tea.”

“Then stop complaining about my coffee.”

She looked at him. The mask cracked. Not a smile, not yet, but the hint of one, the shifting beneath the surface, the micro-movements around her eyes. She caught it, pulled it back, pressed her lips flat.

“Tomorrow,” she said. “Five-thirty.”

“Five-thirty.”

She left. He heard her bedroom door close. Not a slam, because Sloane did not slam doors. A firm, controlled click—one that told him in no certain terms that she was in control.

He turned off the tap. Stood at the sink with his hands braced on the edge, the water dripping into the basin.

The scratch marks on his back stung under his shirt. Four lines, symmetrical, raked from shoulder blade to the curve of his spine. He’d seen them in the mirror after his shower, standing with his back to the glass, craning over his shoulder. The skin was red, raised, not deep enough to bleed but deep enough to last. Proof, scored into his body, that the thing she said didn’t happen had happened.