Chapter 15
MILA
“Give us the tea. Who is he?”
Naomi’s voice cuts through Mila’s daydream like a splash of cold water.
She blinks at her from behind her laptop screen, caught mid-stare into the nothingness of her desktop calendar. “Excuse me?”
Naomi, sleek in wide-leg trousers and a cropped blazer, arches an eyebrow and saunters into Mila’s office with a travel mug of coffee and drops into the plush visitor chair. Her long auburn hair is styled in immaculate waves, lipstick sharp, mood nosy.
“You’ve been staring into space for a solid five minutes with your ‘I got kissed’ face. So. Details.”
Mila exhales and leans back in her chair. “I do not have an ‘I got kissed’ face.”
Naomi sips her coffee. “You absolutely do. I’ve seen it once before, and it was when we went to that conference in Montreal and you hooked up with that bartender. The one with the jawline that could cut steel and a vocabulary of four words.”
“That man had a PhD in body language,” Mila mutters.
Naomi wiggles her eyebrows. “Exactly. So? Spill.”
Mila hesitates. She might be back in her office in Toronto, high above the city’s endless sprawl of glass, concrete, and traffic, but her mind hasn’t quite caught up with her body.
The skyline outside is crisp and cold, the autumn sun flashing off the CN Tower in the distance. But none of it registers.
She’s still in the dark.
Still in Hartford.
Still pinned to the slatted wall of a cedar gazebo by a man she didn’t recognize but somehow felt known by.
Her phantom. Her man in black.
The scent of him still lingers somewhere in her memory, woodsy and spiced and delicious. The way he’d looked at her, like he already owned every part of her before they’d even touched.
She had planned to get something done today.
Follow up on a couple of community sponsor leads.
But Naomi’s not going to let this go. And honestly.
..she kind of needs to talk about it. She doesn’t want to tell Natalie and risk freaking her out.
Her best friend is far too responsible to understand Mila’s thirst for the man in the dark.
She sighs, dragging a hand through her hair. “Something happened in Hartford.”
Naomi gasps. “Tell me it was a hockey player.”
“I don’t know. Possibly?” Mila admits. “He was in a costume.”
Naomi’s eyes light up like it’s Christmas morning. “Oh my God. Was it weird? Like a furry thing?”
“It wasn’t weird, it was...mysterious. And hot.” She leans forward, whispering. “He was dressed all in black. Suit, cape, half-mask—think Phantom of the Opera meets tall, dark, and sexy. He didn’t tell me his name.”
Naomi’s mouth drops open. “You made out with a stranger in a mask at a Halloween party?”
Mila makes a face. “It was...more than that.”
Naomi stares, stunned into rare silence. “Well, damn.”
“I know.”
“Was he a good kisser?”
Mila looks down at her hands, cheeks flushed. “He kissed me…like he wanted to ruin me. Slowly.”
Naomi fans herself with a stack of post-it notes. “Oh my god, you’re so lucky.”
Mila ducks her head, fiddling with her rings, the memory replaying whether she wants it to or not.
“You’re thinking about him again,” Naomi says.
Mila doesn’t deny it.
“You have no idea who he was?”
“He knew Natalie’s name,” she murmurs. “He said it like he knows her. And he—God, he made me feel more wanted in ten minutes than Richard did in months.”
Naomi’s expression sharpens. “Ugh. Richard. I’m still in denial that you were with that walking bundle of red flags.”
“Richard made everything feel like a transaction. Like our being together was a calculated decision,” Mila says. “But this...this was different. There was heat, and power, but there was also restraint. Like he was holding back...barely.”
“So you’re going to find him, right?”
“I did try,” Mila shrugs. “Part of me wants to find out who he was. The other part...maybe I don’t want to know.”
“Why not?”
“Because what if I find out and it ruins it? What if he’s married? What if he’s eighteen? What if he’s someone like Tristan ‘the Flea’ Fleischer?”
Naomi nearly chokes. “That guy? No. You would’ve smelled the ketchup fumes.”
Mila laughs, but it fades quickly. “What if it was Theo?”
Naomi tilts her head. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
Mila sighs. “It’s not. I like Theo. But he’s...quiet. Nervous. He can barely get through a conversation with me. And this man—whoever he was—he didn’t hesitate.”
“Enough talk,” Naomi says, pulling out her phone with purpose. “We’re solving this.”
Mila blinks. “Solving what?”
Naomi’s already got the Whalers’ website open, scrolling with the intensity of someone tracking a package.
“You’ve got access to the roster. You’ve seen the guy’s build. We can eliminate the wrong heights, body types, vibes, accents, nasty teeth. We’re gonna CSI this shit.”
“You’re being dramatic.”
Naomi grins. “I’m being efficient."
She turns the screen toward Mila. “Okay. Describe your masked mystery man. Go.”
Mila exhales, but she can’t help the slight smile that tugs at her lips.
“Tall. Like easily over six feet. Muscular. Black mask. Broad shoulders. Deep voice. Confident. Knew Natalie’s name. Flirted like a pro.”
“Not Jesse, obviously. Not Trayvon Carter. Not Pavel Pekar.” Naomi mutters, scanning the photos.
She scrolls and stops at Garrett Tall, the goalie. “This guy?”
Mila shakes her head. “Too tall.”
She scrolls again, stopping at JP Belanger. “Him?”
Mila squints at the photo of the young rookie. “His hair is too long. And JP has a chin dimple I didn’t feel under the mask.”
“I mean, impressive that you were doing facial topography while getting felt up in a gazebo.”
Mila kicks at her shin.
Naomi holds up her phone. “That narrows it down to maybe three guys, and one of them is Theo. So, obviously—”
“Obviously what?” Mila says warily.
Naomi gives her a look. One that says I’ve been waiting for you to catch up to your own feelings, dummy.
“I don’t chase anymore,” she says. “If Theo—or whoever it was—wants me, he can come find me.”
Naomi nods like that settles it. “Good. Let him earn it.”
It’s past midnight when Mila’s phone buzzes on her nightstand.
She’s in bed, wrapped in a worn sweatshirt, hair in a messy bun, bowl of her favorite guilty pleasure cereal balanced dangerously on her stomach.
A true crime documentary is flickering on the TV, showing drone shots of cornfields with haunting piano music, but she hasn’t been paying attention for the last twenty minutes.
Because she’s thinking about him again.
Her man in black.
God, she really has to stop calling him that.
The buzz comes again—one sharp vibration, like a tap on her shoulder.
Mila frowns and picks it up, expecting some late-night agency email or another group text from Jesse with too many emojis. He’d been messaging her non-stop, asking if she’d heard about the pitch.
Unknown Number
I hear you’ve been asking about me, Daisy.
Her stomach flips.
She stares at the message like it might vanish. But it’s still there. Blunt. Teasing. It has to be him, right? Who else would call her Daisy?
She swallows and types back before she can overthink it.
Depends. Who’s asking?
Three dots appear almost instantly.
Someone who’s been haunted by you since Halloween.
Thinking about that black dress. And what it looked like sliding up your thighs.
She sits up, the spoon clanging into the cereal bowl as her heart takes off like a starter pistol just fired. The sweatshirt feels too hot. Her bare legs tangle in the sheets. She glances at the door, as if someone might be standing there, reading the texts over her shoulder.
This is insane.
And she wants more.
How do I know you aren’t a stalker?
I prefer the term devoted admirer.
But I’m willing to get on my knees and show you if that’s more your speed.
A scandalized little squeak escapes before she can choke it back, and she slaps a hand over her mouth like that’ll help.
Who is this guy?
Her fingers hover over the screen. This is equally thrilling and a terrible idea.
You have a name, or should I keep calling you “creepy but hot”?
I liked the Man in Black.
Her jaw drops.
“What the hell,” she mutters to herself.
She hadn’t said that name aloud, had she? Not even to Naomi. That nickname lived exclusively in her own head.
Her heart thuds so hard she can feel it in her fingertips.
Seriously? Who are you?
That’s the thing, Daisy.
I’m nobody.
But I want to be yours.
She drops the phone on the comforter and lets out a high, strangled sound. Somewhere between a laugh and a curse and a full-body what the actual hell is happening to me.
She picks up the phone again, her fingers tingling.
You ghosted me that night.
You don’t get to kiss me like that and then vanish. Pick a lane.
The reply takes longer this time.
She stares at the screen, heart trapped in her throat.
I didn’t leave because I wanted to.
I left because if I didn’t, I wasn’t going to stop.
And you deserved more than what I wanted to give you in the dark.
Oh. Damn.
Just like that, her sarcastic armor cracks a little.
Not shattered, but dented. Warmed.
Her fingers tremble slightly as she types.
Then come find me in the light.
There’s no reply.
Mila sinks deeper into the pillows, her phone still warm in her hand, the ghost of his words lingering on her skin like a touch. The cereal bowl is long forgotten, the true crime episode playing in the background little more than a hum beneath the pounding of her pulse.
Her free hand trails down her stomach, her body thrumming with restless heat. She shifts beneath the covers, thighs squeezing together.
Whatever this is—whoever he is—he’s under her skin now.
And tonight, that’s exactly where she wants him to stay.