Chapter 12 Luke
TWELVE
LUKE
Riot’s packed.
The kind of packed that makes your shirt stick to your back and your drink vanish in seconds because you’re either dancing and need something to quench your thirst or dodging elbows and spilling it all over.
Lights flash, bass thumps, and the air smells like sweat, vodka, and every type of bad decision imaginable.
Perfect.
Daniel laughs as I spin him, both of us stupid with adrenaline and zero rhythm. We’ve been out here for two songs already, and I’m finally starting to feel the static in my chest burn off.
“Are we already pretending I’m your fake boyfriend or what?” he yells over the music, grinning.
“Obviously,” I shout back, rolling my hips with extra flair. “Gotta make them believe you’re obsessed with me. If we can pull it off here, my parents are a piece of cake.”
“Pretty sure half the room already does.”
I smirk, leaning in just enough to press my forehead against his, laughing breathlessly. We’re close. Flushed. From the outside, it probably looks real.
It’s not.
And that’s what makes it easy.
Daniel’s not looking at me like I’m glass. He’s not trying to fix me or figure me out. We’re just… two guys burning off the week. No strings or emotional subtext, just the beat between us and the strobe lights overhead.
But then a prickle down my spine has me glancing around. I stiffen. My gaze lifts, as if it knows, and finds exactly what—who—I hoped wouldn’t be here tonight. Across the room, a pair of whiskey brown eyes pin me in place.
Silas Gray, my fucking obsession.
He’s standing off to the side, his shirt tight across his chest, sleeves rolled up—similar to how I first saw him. Except his expression is unreadable. The drink in his grip he clearly isn’t drinking. And to top it all off, his eyes are locked on me as though I just kicked his puppy and smiled.
Daniel follows my stare, then whistles low. “Uh-oh.”
I snap my attention back to him, heart hammering and those irritating fucking butterflies resurrecting themselves because they also have stupid instincts when it comes to him.
“It’s fine,” I lie. “Let him watch, maybe then he’ll understand what he’s missing.”
“Jesus,” Daniel mutters. “You really have a death wish. Only I’m pretty sure I’m the one in the cross-hairs of this one. Shit, you didn’t say he was possessive."
I laugh, shrugging his words off, and keep dancing. But my skin is buzzing now. And it’s not from the music.
It’s from him.
I keep dancing.
On purpose.
I exaggerate it a little—extra sway of my hips, a lazy roll of my shoulders—just to prove to myself that I can.
That he doesn’t get to ruin this. Daniel laughs and spins me again, and I let my head fall back, eyes closed, pretending I don’t feel the weight of that stare burning into my skin from across the room.
Tall. Dark. Brooding.
Coach Gray does not belong in Riot. He didn’t belong here the night I first met him, and he doesn’t belong here now.
And yet.
By the third song, my throat’s dry, and the tequila’s finally caught up to me. I lean in close to Daniel’s ear. “Bathroom break.”
“Same!” he shouts back. “Water first or I’m gonna die.”
We split without ceremony—him veering toward the bar, me slipping through the crowd toward the hallway that leads to the bathrooms. The music dulls as soon as I step out of the main room, bass fading to a distant thrum through the walls.
I barely get two steps down the hall before the air changes. Before a shadow falls over me and a hand plants against the wall beside my head.
I stop short.
Silas is suddenly there—too close, too big, filling the narrow hallway like he owns it. He smells like whiskey and something clean underneath it, and it hits me straight in the chest.
I look up.
Way up. Was he always this tall?
He’s towering over me, one arm braced against the wall, the other hanging loose at his side like he hasn’t decided what to do with it yet. His jaw is tight. His eyes are dark and furious.
Dangerous.
“So,” I say lightly, because apparently I have a death wish. “Did you follow me, or is this a coincidence?”
His gaze drops to my mouth. Then back to my eyes.
“You enjoying yourself?” he asks.
The question is flat.
I shrug, forcing myself not to lean back, even though every instinct is screaming to give him space. “Looks like it, doesn’t it?”
His nostrils flare. “Who is he.” Not a question, more of a demand.
I smile anyway. “A friend.”
His jaw flexes again, muscle jumping. “You don’t dance like that with friends.”
“Maybe you don’t,” I say. “Some of us are multi-talented.”
Silas leans in closer, lowering his voice. “You think this is funny.”
I tilt my head, meeting his stare head-on. “I think you benched me for being ‘injured,’ and now you’re glaring holes through my fake boyfriend as though you have the right. You don’t, by the way.”
Something flashes across his face. “Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?”
“Pretend,” he snaps. “Pretend you don’t know exactly what you’re doing.”
My pulse kicks up, loud in my ears. “And what exactly am I doing, Coach?”
Silas’s hand curls into a fist against the wall. He steps in just enough that my back brushes the opposite side, the hallway suddenly very, very small.
“Playing with fire,” he says.
I swallow.
“Funny,” I whisper. “You’re the one who walked into Riot knowing I come here.”
Silas’s eyes darken—heat simmering into something volcanic.
His fist shifts against the wall, knuckles white, and his whole body goes taut, like he’s holding himself back with every ounce of control he has left.
Then he growls.
Low. Rough. Unmistakably possessive.
The sound coils around my spine and lodges somewhere deep in my chest, shattering every ounce of chill I was pretending to have. That is hot.
He leans in—not slowly, but as though something snapped—and I feel it before it happens. The heat of his breath. The shift in his posture. The split-second of hesitation that feels like gravity letting go.
He’s going to kiss me.
Right here. In the hallway. In the middle of a packed club with my friends just around the corner and a hundred reasons why this should never happen.
And maybe part of me wants it.
But the rest of me—the part still aching from how he fucked me against the lockers, then shut down, benched me for a non-injury, and how he looks at me like a problem and not a person—panics.
My heart jackhammers. My breath catches. And before his mouth can touch mine, I duck—quick, right under his arm—and stumble a step back.
“Don’t,” I breathe.
He freezes. I don’t know which one of us is more surprised.
His eyes flash—shock, hurt, something else—and he straightens slowly, dragging his hand down the wall like he needs it to keep himself grounded.
I back away another step, pulse in my throat. He doesn’t chase me. Doesn’t speak. He watches, still braced in the hallway like he’s afraid if he moves, something will break.
Maybe it already has.
I don’t wait to find out.
I turn and disappear into the bathroom, turning the lock with shaking fingers and brace both palms against the door like it’ll keep the whole fucking night from collapsing on top of me.
My lungs feel tight. My throat burns. What the hell was that?
He didn’t kiss me—but he almost did. And for one blinding second, I wanted him to.
Stupid. So stupid.
I press my forehead against the cool metal, trying to force my heart back into rhythm.
From the other side of the door, muffled music pulses like a second heartbeat—louder, faster, harder.
I suck in a breath and back away from the door, heading to the sink.
My reflection looks like a stranger. Flushed cheeks.
Wide eyes. Lips still parted as if they’re waiting for something that never came.
I splash water on my face. Again. And again.
“Pull it together, Maddox,” I mutter.
A knock rattles the door. I freeze.
“Occupied,” I call, voice flat.
There’s a pause.
“It’s me,” Daniel says. “Let me in.”
I blink at my reflection; I look like shit. “Go away.”
“You’ve been in there twenty minutes.” His voice is quieter now. “You okay?”
I close my eyes. Fuck. Had it really been that long?
“Yeah,” I lie. “Stomach hit weird. I’ll be out in a sec.”
Another pause.
“I’ll wait out here,” Daniel says finally.
I stare at the door, then look back at the mirror.
My eyeliner’s smudged, my eyes are a little red, and I look—wrecked. Not in the fun, post-orgasm way. In the emotional hurricane wearing glitter kind of way.
Awesome.
I swipe at the makeup under my eyes, muttering to myself. “This is not the vibe.”
Because I didn’t ask for this. Any of this.
I was perfectly fine with one-night stands and morning-after shrugs, if I even made it to the morning after. Normally, I’d be gone a few minutes post-orgasm. I was good with fun. Flings. Low expectations and high reward.
So really, fuck you, universe.
If you were going to give me a story, it could’ve been the airport confession and hot cocoa kind. Not the get railed by your coach and then benched like a broken toy version.
I grip the edge of the sink and let out a long, slow breath.
“Pull it together, Maddox,” I whisper. “You’re not the fall in love type.”
Even if he is older, growly, commanding—and infuriatingly thoughtful beneath it all. Even if he watches me with heat in his eyes, and I can imagine more than just the two times we’ve had together. Even if I can feel him at a soul level when he’s even in the same space as me.
That doesn’t mean anything.
It can’t. Because relying on anyone to bring me happiness isn’t a thing I ever plan on doing.
If the two people that should care about your happiness really don’t, how could a stranger turned lover ever do that?
Silas just wants me. Which would be fucking amazing if I could keep my emotions far, far away from him.
I straighten, forcing my shoulders back, wiping the last of the smudged makeup from under my eyes until I look like myself again. Or at least a version of me that doesn’t fall apart over men.
One-night stands don’t get to unravel me.
And Silas Gray is not the exception.
The door clicks open like nothing ever happened.
I step out, head high, expression smooth, lips tugged into a grin I don’t feel.
Daniel’s leaning against the wall, arms crossed. His brows lift the second he sees me, but he doesn’t say anything—just studies me with that annoyingly perceptive stare.
“Bathroom’s all yours,” I say lightly, brushing past him.
“Luke—”
“Nope,” I cut in, not slowing. “I need a drink. And a new song. And probably someone who’ll tell me I look hot without trying to lecture me.”
He snorts, following me down the hallway. “You always look hot. That’s never been the issue.”
I flash him a smirk over my shoulder. “Exactly. So let me go remind a room full of strangers.”
“Uh-huh.” Daniel’s voice is dry. “And this definitely has nothing to do with a certain six-foot-something emotionally constipated coach watching you like he’s ten seconds from committing a felony.”
“Didn’t notice,” I lie.
Daniel just rolls his eyes. “Right. And I’m a backup dancer for Beyoncé.”
But I’m already moving, already pushing back through the crowd, already grabbing a tequila shot from the bar and tilting it back before the music swallows me whole again.
If I dance hard enough, drink fast enough, flirt bright enough—maybe I won’t feel the gravity of those whiskey-brown eyes still burning a hole through my spine.
Maybe I won’t remember what it felt like when he almost kissed me.
And maybe, if I’m lucky, I won’t care.