28. Adrian
Nicky had snuck out of our room before I woke up. No note. No text. Just an empty bed and the faint smell of his shampoo lingering in the bathroom.
After our not-so-hate sex, I had showered and gotten into my own bed. Separate. Deliberate. Because the alternative was wrapping myself around him and falling asleep with my face in his hair and that was definitely not something you did after hate fucking.
So I'd created the distance. And then he'd widened it by disappearing before dawn.
Fine. Whatever. We had a competition to focus on.
Today, I wore head-to-toe red. Love. Passion. Anger. All three seemed appropriate.
My shirt was loose and embroidered with crystals in a jagged pattern, like lightning frozen mid-strike.
Unbuttoned to my sternum, paired with red pants that hugged my legs.
The colour offset the pink hair nicely. I added a silver body chain that draped across my exposed chest because if Nicky was going to pretend last night didn't happen, I was going to make damn sure he spent the entire competition looking at what he was pretending he didn't want.
In Japan, I always felt more like an idol than a skater, so I played up the part.
I smudged black eyeliner along my lash line and blended it out until my eyes looked smoky and sultry.
Dabbed soft pink blush across my cheekbones and the tip of my nose for a dewy, almost innocent flush.
Pressed a berry lip stain into the centre of my mouth and let it blur at the edges, bitten and soft.
The overall effect was pretty but dangerous.
Let them stare. Let them whisper. Let the judges clutch their pearls.
I was going to give them something to remember.
We were corralled together in the green room and I tried my best to ignore Nicky. Emphasis on tried.
He was in dove grey and charcoal, his hair slicked back in his usual competition style. Pristine. Composed. The golden prince ready for his coronation. I had an adverse reaction to this version of him—too polished, too perfect, too pleasing.
Last night was my version of Nicky. The side only I got to witness. Where he was snarky and combative. Where he pushed back and bit out opinions he'd never voice in daylight. Where the golden prince cracked open and something real spilled out—messy and desperate and alive.
We had collided like two stars consuming each other. All heat and gravity and the kind of destruction that left nothing behind but light.
This morning's Nicky was a stranger. Polished smooth. Every edge filed down. The mask back in place like it had never slipped.
Like I hadn't woken up alone to an empty room and a closed door and felt something I refused to name.
And then I'd found him in the lobby. Tucked into a corner with Théo Beaubien, heads bent together, voices low. And something hot and ugly twisted in my chest. He couldn't get out of my orbit fast enough but he had time for a cozy little heart-to-heart with his ex.
I didn't do this. Not with skaters. Don't shit where you skate—that had been my rule since seventeen, when I'd watched two ice dancers implode their partnership and their careers over a messy breakup. I hooked up outside the sport. Kept things clean. Kept things separate.
And then Nicolas fucking Fontaine had to go and ruin everything by telling me to kiss his ass in a voice that made me want to do a lot more than that.
It was just getting it out of my system. Scratching an itch. That's what I told myself as I laced my skates. One night. One mistake. We'd finally snapped and now it was done. I could go back to finding him mildly irritating instead of distractingly beautiful.
The lie sat heavy in my stomach.
◆◆◆
Théo skated first in our flight.
I watched from the tunnel out of professional curiosity. Know your competition. Know what you’re up against. Know exactly how much better you need to be.
He was in deep blue—almost black under the arena lights—and from the opening crossovers I could tell something had changed.
The Théo I remembered was a machine. Flawless technique, textbook execution, all the emotional warmth of a tax return.
The kind of skater who could land every jump and leave the audience adequately impressed and completely unmoved.
This Théo was different.
There was something in the way he moved now that hadn’t been there before.
Not fire exactly but depth. He was actually letting himself react to the music instead of just hitting the beat.
Whatever Miller was doing in Chicago, it was working.
The choreography breathed in places it used to just exist.
Not that I would ever tell him that. I would sooner eat my skate guards.
The crowd loved it. Standing ovation before his final spin, which was annoying but deserved. Théo sat in the kiss and cry, composed as ever, Miller beside him looking quietly satisfied. His scores came up: 104.67. First place. It wouldn’t last long.
I rolled my neck until something cracked and stepped back into the shadows.
Beaubien was better than he used to be. Good for him. Genuinely. The comeback kid, rebuilt and refined and ready to prove Renaud wrong.
But I didn’t come all the way to Osaka to finish second.
◆◆◆
My turn.
The ice was mine the moment I stepped onto it. I didn't bow to the judges. Didn't smile for the cameras. Just found my opening position—head down, arms loose, weight settled into my blades—and let the arena fall away until it was just me and the music and the story I was about to tell.
The first notes hit—dark and driving, a remix I'd fought Renaud for three weeks to approve—and I launched into my opening quad Lutz.
Landed clean. The impact rattled through my bones and the crowd roared and I was already moving, already setting up the next element, feeding off the noise like it was oxygen.
Triple Axel out of a back crossover, no telegraphing, just explosion—up, around, down, the landing so solid I could feel it in my teeth.
Into a step sequence that ate up the entire diagonal, footwork so fast and intricate the technical panel would need slow motion replay to catch it all.
I let the sound fuel me. The quad flip came next—the one I'd been drilling for months, the element that separated me from the field—and I threw it with everything I had.
Higher than I needed to. Angrier than I should have.
The rotation was vicious and tight and I landed it like I was trying to crack the ice open.
Every jump bigger than the last. Every spin faster, tighter, more aggressive. I skated like I was furious—because I was. Angry at Nicky for leaving before dawn. Angry at myself for caring that he left. Angry at the whole fucking universe for putting me on an impossible path.
The choreography asked for seduction and I gave it something rawer.
That knife's edge between passion and violence.
The place where wanting someone and wanting to destroy them became the same impulse.
I arched my back through a slow Ina Bauer and made it filthy.
Hit a combination spin that accelerated until the arena blurred and came out of it with my arms spread wide, chest heaving, daring the judges to tell me that wasn't art.
Let them score that.
When the music cut, I was breathing hard and the arena was on its feet and I knew before the scores even came up.
108.12.
First place.
◆◆◆
Nicky skated last.
Grey and charcoal under the lights, he looked like a winter prince stepping onto a frozen lake.
The opening was strong—a beautiful spread eagle into his first jumping pass, the triple Axel landing clean with a gorgeous exit.
His spins were textbook. His step sequence hit every beat with the musical precision that had made him a national champion.
Then the quad Salchow.
I saw it the moment he left the ice. The axis was off just slightly.
He fought for the rotation, landed it, but his blade skidded on the exit and he put a hand down.
The triple toe loop that was supposed to follow never came.
He turned it into a solo jump and moved on like nothing had happened but his shoulders had tightened and I could see the ripple effect move through the rest of the program.
Every element after that was careful. Guarded.
He was skating not to fall instead of skating to win.
The artistry that made him special—the thing that separated Nico Fontaine from every other technician on the circuit—had retreated behind a wall of self-preservation.
He hit every remaining element but there was nothing behind it.
No breath. No risk. No moment where the audience leaned forward in their seats.
His scores came up: 93.34.
Fourth place.
From across the arena, I watched his face. The carefully constructed mask that didn't quite hide the devastation underneath. Renaud was already at his side, mouth moving close to his ear, probably delivering a measured dissection of the botched Salchow that would feel worse than shouting.
Something in my chest tugged.
I told myself it was satisfaction. The thrill of competition.
But it felt a lot like disappointment.