Chapter 15
Closing In
Sage
The flowers are gone, but the scent won’t leave. It clings to the air, to my hair, to the inside of my nose like a ghost that doesn’t know it’s dead. Every time I breathe, I swear I can still catch a trace of Grayson’s cologne—sharp, expensive, suffocating.
I grip the knife tighter, slicing through carrots like they’ve offended me. The rhythmic chop should calm me—it usually does—but my hands won’t stay steady. The knife slips once, catching on the board with a sharp crack that makes me flinch.
Leo’s voice drifts from behind me. “You always prep like you’re about to fight a war?”
I force a laugh that doesn’t sound like me. “It’s just meal prep.”
He leans against the counter, arms crossed, fresh from the gym. His hoodie is half unzipped, hair damp from a shower, that familiar mix of sweat and soap cutting through the phantom cologne still haunting me. His gaze flicks from my trembling hands to my too-tight jaw.
“What’s going on?” he asks, softer this time.
“Nothing.” I switch knives like that’ll fix the shaking. “I’m fine.”
He doesn’t move, but I can feel him watching. The silence stretches, heavy and full of questions I don’t want to answer. Finally, he exhales through his nose, the sound low and resigned. “Right. Because you always nearly slice your thumb off when you’re fine.”
“I said I’m fine, Leo.” The words come out sharper than I mean. I toss the carrots into a container, the lid snapping too loud in the quiet kitchen.
He doesn’t bite back, which almost makes it worse. He just mutters something under his breath and grabs his keys from the counter. “I’ll be late tonight. Team meeting.”
The door shuts before I can respond.
The sound echoes longer than it should. I stare at the half-chopped vegetables, my chest tight, the scent of his cologne already fading into the one I can’t escape.
I press my palms flat on the counter to stop the shaking. It doesn’t work.
By the time I get to work, I’ve practiced my smile so much my cheeks ache. The café hums with its usual chaos—steam hissing, espresso grinding, music too loud for a Monday morning. Familiar, safe noise.
Maya’s already behind the counter, hair in a messy braid. She pulls a tray of croissants from the oven. “Morning, sunshine,” she says, grinning. “You look like you slept in a blender.”
“Thanks,” I say, slipping on my apron. “That’s the look I was going for.”
She laughs, but it softens when she really looks at me. “You okay? You’ve been spaced out all week. I called your name, like, three times before you even looked up yesterday.”
“I’m fine,” I lie, reaching for a stack of to-go cups. The motion feels mechanical—grab, stack, straighten—but my hands still tremble.
Maya tilts her head, lowering her voice. “You’re not still letting Grayson get under your skin, are you?”
The name hits like a glass shattering in my chest.
I snap the last cup onto the stack. “I’m over him.”
Her brows lift, but she doesn’t push. “Good. Because the last thing that man deserves is real estate in your head.”
“I said I’m over him,” I repeat, sharper this time. My throat tightens around the words. I busy myself wiping the counter, scrubbing the same spot long after it’s clean.
Maya studies me for another beat, then sighs. “Alright, alright. I’ll shut up. But if you start blending your smoothies with rage again, I’m staging an intervention.”
I manage a weak smile. “Deal.”
She moves off to help a customer, and I take a breath that’s supposed to steady me. It doesn’t. Because no matter how much I want to believe I’m over him, the way my pulse jumps at the sound of his name tells a different story.
And the worst part? I can’t tell if it’s fear or something darker—something that remembers him before he became the monster I had to run from.
On my break, I sit in the alley behind the café with my phone balanced on my knee and a lukewarm latte beside me.
The city hums on the other side of the brick wall—sirens, traffic, the muffled rhythm of someone’s music from a passing car.
Normal life. Safe life. The kind I’ve been building piece by piece.
Until my thumb scrolls too far.
The headline stops me cold. Leo Voss: Playing Sloppy Off the Ice Too?
The article’s from Puck Whisperer. The same site that went after him last week.
There’s a photo of Leo at practice, shoulders hunched, expression unreadable.
The caption below might as well be poison: Sources say Voss has been crashing with a female acquaintance after losing his condo to water damage. Distraction much?
My stomach turns. Even without my name, it feels like someone’s aimed a spotlight straight into my life. Female acquaintance. Distraction.
God, I can practically hear Grayson’s voice saying it, all smug and poisonous—I told you, you make men weak.
The memory hits so hard I have to put the phone down. My hand shakes as I set it beside the cup. I breathe through my nose, slow and deliberate, counting heartbeats.
The screen dims, but the headline burns behind my eyelids. I can’t shake the thought that someone fed them this. Someone who knew.
The flowers. The text. The smell.
What if it isn’t a coincidence?
A gust of wind rattles the lid of my cup, and I jump like it’s a gunshot. My pulse won’t slow.
Maya pokes her head through the back door. “Hey—your break’s over. You good?”
I force a smile that doesn’t come close to reaching my eyes. “Yeah. Just—reading something stupid.”
“Then stop reading it.” She grins. “Come on, we’ve got a line out the door.”
I tuck my phone away, but the words crawl under my skin, burrow deep.
Because if someone knows Leo’s here—if someone knows I’m here—then maybe I haven’t outrun anything at all.
By the time I get home, the sky’s gone slate-gray and heavy with the promise of rain. I can feel the pressure of it in my temples. Leo’s sprawled on the couch, half-watching game footage, still in his compression shirt and joggers. He looks tired—more than that, he looks worn.
He glances up when I drop my bag by the door. “You’ve been twitchy all day,” he says, voice low but laced with concern. “Something happen?”
I freeze for a beat, trying to keep my tone light. “Just a long shift. Too much caffeine, not enough patience.”
He doesn’t buy it. “You sure? You look like you’re about to sprint out of your own skin.”
I busy myself in the kitchen, pulling out ingredients I don’t even remember deciding to use. “I’m fine, Leo. You hungry?”
He frowns but doesn’t push right away. “Always.” He leans back, eyes still on me. Watching. Waiting.
I dive into the routine—pan sizzling, vegetables chopping, oil humming. The motions are my armor. I talk to fill the space, rattling off ingredients and their supposed benefits. “Quinoa for endurance, turmeric for recovery, magnesium for—”
“—sleep. Yeah, I know,” he cuts in, half-smiling. “You’ve told me about ten times.”
“Then you’re finally listening.”
“I always listen.” His tone softens. “Especially when you’re trying too hard to sound normal.”
That stops me cold. I flip a piece of chicken too fast, the oil spitting up and catching my wrist. The burn is instant, sharp. I hiss and drop the spatula.
Leo’s off the couch before I can blink. “Hey—” He grabs my hand, pulls me toward the sink, runs the cold water full blast. His touch is gentle but firm, anchoring.
“Hold still,” he murmurs. The chill hits, numbing the pain, but my pulse spikes for an entirely different reason now.
We’re too close. His breath brushes my temple, and for a second the world narrows to that single point of warmth where his fingers hold mine.
“I’m fine,” I whisper, even though my voice shakes.
He looks at me like he doesn’t believe it for a second. “You don’t have to be.”
The words almost undo me. I pull back too quickly, water splattering the counter. “Dinner’s burning,” I say, though I can’t see straight enough to tell.
Leo hesitates, then nods slowly and steps away.
The air between us crackles with everything unsaid.
After Leo steps out to grab ice from the corner store, the apartment goes too quiet. The kind of silence that hums in your bones. I rinse the burned pan, anything to keep my hands busy, but the unease won’t fade. It sits under my skin, pulsing.
A knock startles me. Quick. Sharp. Two short raps.
“Leo?” I call, drying my hands. No answer.
Another knock—lighter this time.
I cross to the door, heart thudding, and peek through the peephole. The hallway’s empty. Just the soft flicker of the overhead light.
For a second, I think I imagined it. But then I see it—a small box on the mat, wrapped in brown paper and tied neatly with string.
Every muscle in my body goes rigid.
I unlock the door with shaking fingers and crouch, pulling the package inside. No return address. No note. The paper smells faintly of cedar and something else—something that makes my blood run cold.
Grayson’s cologne.
My hands tremble as I tear the paper open. Inside, nestled in black foam, is a sleek set of knives. The same brand I used to have in our old kitchen. The same one he’d bought me when we were still playing house and pretending everything was fine.
My throat closes. I can’t breathe.
The largest blade catches the light, glinting against the countertop. A single white card rests beneath it. No message. Just a symbol—two intertwined initials. His.
I stumble back, pressing a hand to my mouth.
He knows where I live.
He’s been here.
The door handle rattles behind me and I jump, heart in my throat. Leo’s voice calls softly, “Sage? You okay?”
I swipe at my eyes, shove the box into the cabinet under the sink, and force my voice to steady. “Yeah,” I say, too quickly. “Just dropped something.”
He steps inside, cold air following him, a small bag of ice in his hand. He looks at me for a moment too long, brows pinched, like he knows something’s off.
“Everything good?”
“Perfect,” I lie.
He nods slowly, but doesn’t push. The sound of the fridge door opening fills the space.
When I glance toward the sink, a drop of water runs down the cabinet door—right where I hid the box. It trails slowly, like a shiver I can’t stop.