Chapter 4 #2
Georgia sat back on her heels, still kneeling between my legs. She looked at my hip, then up at my face. Her expression softened. The judgment vanished.
For the first time, she wasn't looking at the Ice King. She was looking at another prisoner.
"You're just like me," she whispered.
The words hung in the air.
"I am nothing like you," I defended instinctively. "I am disciplined. I have a plan."
"You're trapped," she countered gently. "You're dancing for your dinner. You're hiding your pain so the person holding the checkbook doesn't cut you off. That's exactly what I've been doing for twenty-one years."
She reached out again. This time, I didn't stop her.
She placed her hand over the injury. She didn't press. She just let her palm rest there, the heat seeping through my sweatpants into the knotted, screaming muscle.
"I can fix it," she said.
I looked at her. "What?"
"I can't cure a tear with magic," she said, her voice gaining strength. "But I can manage it. Deep tissue release. Active isolation stretching. Icing protocols. Taping. I can keep the joint mobile enough to play without snapping the tendon. I can get you to the draft."
"You're a student," I said skeptically.
"I'm the top of my anatomy class," she shot back, a flash of the brat returning. "And more importantly, I'm the only physio you can trust. Because if you go to a private clinic, the paparazzi will find out. If you go to Doc, he has to report it to the GM—my father."
She was right. Goddammit, she was right.
She was the only person in the world who could help me, and she was the one person I wasn't supposed to have.
"And what do you want?" I asked, my voice guarded. "You don't do charity."
"No," she agreed. "I don't."
She took her hand off my leg and sat back, crossing her arms over her chest. The negotiation had begun.
"I need a place to stay," she said. "Not a night. Until the end of the semester. I need this room. I need food. And..." She hesitated, biting her lip. "I need the Boathouse."
"The Boathouse?"
"The lock is broken. It's freezing. I need a space heater, I need lights, and I need you to make sure campus security doesn't patrol that sector."
"You want to set up a studio," I realized.
"I need to paint," she said fiercely. "If I'm going to survive this, I need to paint. It's the only way I stay sane."
I looked at her. I saw the desperation in her eyes, mirroring my own.
She wanted to paint to survive. I wanted to play to survive. We were two drowning people clinging to the same piece of driftwood.
"And the debt?" I asked. "You said you needed cash."
She flinched. "I'll handle the debt. I'll pick up extra shifts at the coffee shop. I just need... I need the basics covered so I can breathe."
I ran the calculation. It was insane. It was dangerous. It was perfect.
"Okay," I said.
She blinked. "Okay?"
"You stay," I said. "You live here. You eat my food. You use my heat. And in exchange, you treat my hip. Every morning. Every night. You tape me before games. You ice me after. You keep me on the ice until draft day."
"Deal," she said quickly.
"Not yet," I interrupted, leaning forward. The pain spiked, but I ignored it. I needed to establish the hierarchy. "There are conditions."
She narrowed her eyes. "Of course there are."
"This isn't a sorority sleepover," I said, my voice dropping to that low, vibrating register. "If you live here, you are part of my routine. My routine is sacred. No parties. No guys. Especially no quarterbacks."
She scoffed. "Jealous much?"
"Possessive," I corrected. "I don't want your drama bleeding into my focus. If you live under my roof, you follow my schedule. Up at 6:00. Lights out at 11:00. You eat what I eat. You keep this place spotless."
"You want a maid and a physio?"
"I want order," I said. "And one more thing."
"What?"
"No lies," I said. "If you are in trouble, you tell me. If your father calls, you tell me. If you are hurting, you tell me. We are allies now, Georgia. Allies don't have secrets."
She swallowed hard. I could see her throat work. She was twisting the silver ring on her thumb—her tell. She was hiding something about the debt, I was sure of it. But for now, she nodded.
"No lies," she whispered.
"Good."
I held out my hand.
She looked at it. It was large, scarred, and calloused.
She reached out and placed her small, manicured hand in mine.
Her skin was soft. Her grip was surprisingly firm.
As our skin touched, the current that had been buzzing between us since the first night surged. It wasn't a spark; it was a connection. A circuit closing.
I didn't let go. I held her hand, running my thumb over her knuckles.
"You realize," I murmured, watching her eyes, "that this means you belong to me until June."
Her breath hitched. Her pupils dilated. "I belong to the agreement."
"Semantics," I said.
I pulled on her hand, just a fraction. It unbalanced her. She stumbled forward, her chest bumping against my knee.
She gasped.
"We start now," I said.
"Start what?" she breathed.
"Treatment." I guided her hand back to my hip. "Fix me, Georgia."
She stared at me for a heartbeat, the air thick enough to choke on. Then, slowly, she nodded.
"Okay," she whispered. "Lean back."
I leaned back, closing my eyes, surrendering control for the first time in my life.
I felt her hands slide under the waistband of my sweatpants, skin on skin, hot and healing.
We had made a deal with the devil. I just wasn't sure which one of us was the devil and which one was the soul being sold.
But as her fingers dug into my pain, turning it into something bearable, I knew one thing:
I wasn't letting her go. Not until June. Not ever.
Later that evening
The domesticity of it was terrifying.
That was the thought that kept circling Georgia's mind as she sat on the floor of the living room, surrounded by anatomy textbooks.
It was 9:00 PM. The penthouse was dim, lit only by the architectural track lighting and the glow of the city outside. The wind was howling against the glass, a blizzard picking up strength over the lake, but inside, it was warm.
Toby was lying on the couch. He had a bag of ice strapped to his hip—Georgia’s doing. He was reading a playbook, his brow furrowed in concentration. He was wearing reading glasses.
Reading glasses.
The sight of the terrifying Ice King wearing tortoise-shell frames and looking like a sexy librarian was doing things to Georgia’s insides that she didn't want to examine.
She tried to focus on the diagram of the iliopsoas muscle in front of her. Origin: Transverse processes of T12-L5. Insertion: Lesser trochanter of the femur.
But her eyes kept drifting up.
To the way his chest rose and fell in a slow, steady rhythm. To the way his hand absentmindedly tapped a rhythm on his thigh. To the fact that they were sharing a space, breathing the same air, existing in a comfortable silence that felt... right.
It was a trap. She knew it was a trap.
Domestic intimacy was the most dangerous drug of all for a girl like her. Sex she could handle—sex was transactional, a game of power. But this? Sitting in silence with a man while a storm raged outside? This was how you got your heart broken.
"Stop staring at me," Toby said, not looking up from his book. He turned a page.
Georgia jumped. "I'm not staring. I'm... studying your biomechanics. For the treatment plan."
" You're studying my glasses," he deadpanned.
"They're hideous," she lied. "You look like a grandpa."
"They reduce eye strain," he said pragmatically. "And you're lying. You're twisting your ring."
Georgia snatched her hand away from her ring. "I hate that you noticed that."
He finally looked up, peering over the rim of the frames. His gray eyes were soft in the dim light. "I told you. I learn my opponents."
"Is that what I am?" she asked quietly. "An opponent?"
Toby looked at her for a long moment. The silence stretched, filled with the hum of the heater and the beating of her own heart.
He took the glasses off and folded them, setting them on his chest.
"No," he said, his voice rough. "Opponents are easy. I know how to beat opponents."
"And you don't know how to beat me?"
"I don't think I want to beat you," he admitted, the vulnerability of the statement hanging between them like smoke. "I think I want to keep you."
Georgia felt her breath catch.
He wasn't talking about the deal. He wasn't talking about the draft.
He reached out a hand toward her. It was an invitation.
Georgia hesitated. Every survival instinct she had screamed Run.
But she didn't run. She crawled across the plush rug until she was sitting next to the couch.
She rested her chin on her folded arms, right next to his shoulder.
"We're in trouble, aren't we?" she whispered.
Toby turned his head. His face was inches from hers. He reached out and tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. His fingers lingered on her cheek, his thumb tracing the line of her jaw.
It wasn't sexual. It was reverent.
"Yeah, Princess," he whispered back. "We're in deep shit."
And as the snow swirled against the glass, sealing them into their high tower, Georgia closed her eyes and leaned into his touch.
The deal was signed. The trap was sprung.
And she had never felt so happy to be caught.