Jason #2
Her phone pings on the counter. Then again. Then a long vibrate that feels like a warning.
She steps out with damp hair twisted into a clip, eyes already scanning. The color drains. “Tell me you didn’t post anything,” she says—triage, not accusation.
“I was asleep.” Not completely a lie. “What’s—”
My phone lights up with a siren chain of notifications: tags, mentions, three teammates, one ALL-CAPS from Julia. Riley curses—quiet, lethal. “Someone tagged the floor number.”
On her screen, a Story blinks: blurry hallway selfie with a stack of to-go coffees and the caption Crown level chaos—and, in the corner, the suite sign mirrored in gold: 1423.
“Perfect.” My jaw locks. The math happens fast—time stamps, follower counts, who screenshotted before it was deleted. The part that matters most hits last and hardest: optics hit her first.
“Okay.” Her voice goes clinical. “We didn’t break policy. They had one room left. Document it.” She flips to Notes so fast her thumb is a metronome. “Clerk’s name, time of check-in, power-outage excuse—write it down.”
“I’ll call downstairs. Get a statement—”
“No calls. No trail they can spin. Text Julia: need guidance. No wrongdoing. Temporary optics issue.”
Julia buzzes my phone: DO NOT ENGAGE. Cameras in lobby. Owner wants you invisible.
Riley exhales through her nose, steadying a shake most people wouldn’t see. “I’ll handle training room. You go out the service corridor and straight to skate.”
“And leave you to deal with this?” Heat spikes under my tongue.
“If someone has to take the hit for existing in a hallway, it won’t be you.”
“That’s not happening.” Too fast, too hard. I breathe. “We walk out together. No apologies for a roll of the hotel dice.”
She studies me, something soft and dangerous in her gaze. The phones keep vibrating like trapped bees. “Fine,” she says at last. “Together. Heads down. No comments.”
I grab a cap, shove it low. She shoulders her bag, checks mine like muscle memory. We move to the door, braced—then another ping hits, brighter, followed by a text from a burner number with a screenshot of the Story and a message that turns my stomach: Cute. 1423.
Riley’s face tightens. Something old and mean rises in my chest. “Change of plan,” I say, already toggling her app privacy. “We ghost the lobby. Service exit only.”
She doesn’t argue. She never does when rumors turn to risk. We turn toward the back hall, nerves wired tight as a trip line, the day already singed at the edges.
The service corridor smells like bleach and fryer oil.
Fluorescents buzz. We move fast—caps low, bags high, Riley one step ahead like she can outpace the internet on foot.
A housekeeper rounds the corner with a cart piled with towels; Riley thanks her, smile quick, then slides her badge over a gray door that spits us into the loading bay.
“Left,” she says, scanning for cameras. “Van loops the curb.”
I clock everything—dumpsters, a cameraman pretending to smoke across the alley, the gleam of a long lens using a car window as a mirror. I shift to block Riley. She swats my arm. “Don’t make yourself bigger,” she murmurs. “It’s a beacon.”
I bite back the urge to be a beacon anyway. The van noses in. We pile inside; the driver kills the dome light. Riley’s phone vibrates again—a swarm she squashes with three taps and a setting I didn’t know existed. Of course she knows it.
At the rink we split like we rehearsed. She cuts for the staff entrance. I take the player tunnel, hood up, breath fogging. The ice hits my lungs like menthol—good, clean. I lace on muscle memory and let autopilot drag me through warmups while the rumor fire tries to eat the boards.
First lap settles my head. Second trips something in my gut—heat blooming where cold should be.
By the third, my skin prickles under layers like I’m skating in wool.
I chalk it up to a bad night and keep going until my vision pulses at the edges like someone’s dimming the arena lights to my heartbeat.
“Hey,” a teammate calls as we coast to the boards. “You good, Maddox?”
“Perfect,” I say, and the word tastes wrong. I grip the dasher, stretch my back, and the stretch shivers straight through me—teeth to heel. Not pain. Not exactly. Something feverish that doesn’t care how tough I think I am.
Riley waits near the tunnel with a clipboard shield and a face the cameras can’t read.
Her eyes flick up, scan me once, twice, like a handheld MRI.
She starts to say something—then PR appears at her elbow with a frantic whisper and a phone with 1423 glowing on it like a curse. Her mouth tightens; the mask snaps on.
“Go shower. Hydrate. Back to the hotel,” she tells me, low enough for me alone. “I’ll catch up.”
I want to argue. I don’t. The chill clawing under my skin is getting teeth. By the time I’m in the van again, the leather feels hot and my palms are cold.
The suite is too bright when I unlock it.
I drop my bag by the couch and try to decide if Gatorade counts as dinner.
The room tilts in a way the city can’t be blamed for.
I sit. The sit turns into a slump. Sweat beads under my cap and chills chase over my arms like I’ve jumped into a lake in January.
Okay. Nap. Ten minutes. Then shower. Then whatever policy fire Riley needs stamped out. Simple.
I close my eyes. Heat licks the backs of them. Somewhere, my phone buzzes. I reach and miss by a county. The couch exhales around me; the world does a slow zoom, like a camera that doesn’t like the subject.
The bedroom door clicks. Soft steps. Her shampoo cuts the metallic taste in my mouth.
“Jason?” The trainer rides under the friend. “Hey—look at me.”
I peel my eyes open. Her face blurs, resolves, doubles, slides. I shiver hard enough my teeth knock. “’M fine,” I lie. It sounds like a foreign language.
Her palm hits my forehead and the sound she makes is small and lethal. “You’re burning up.”
“Just—cold,” I manage, right before the couch tilts. My stomach rolls. Heat punches, cold answers; the world tries to tear itself in half under my skin. The edges go soft.
“Stay with me,” she orders, already moving—ice bucket, towels, meds—every tool in her kit flying to her hands. A cool cloth lands on my neck; it’s a miracle.
My jaw can’t decide between clench and chatter, lands on both. I list; she palms my sternum and anchors me. “Hey. Here. With me.”
I drag my gaze up. Hair fallen from its clip, cheeks flushed with worry she’d deny to a firing squad.
There’s a damp crescent on her collar where I probably leaked ice water.
I hate that. I hate how familiar it feels to need her and how much more I hate the idea of her needing anyone and choosing me anyway.
“Sorry,” I mumble. The word fogs and dissolves.
“Save it.” Softer than the command pretends. Fresh cloth at my neck. “Ten minutes. If your temp doesn’t drop, we go.”
I nod. The suite pitches. She braces me through it, shoulder to mine, breath a measured four-count I try to match. It works—then doesn’t.
“Breathe with me,” she says, leaning in so close I can count the gold flecks in her green. “In for four. Out for six.” I follow her mouth, not the numbers. It helps—then doesn’t.
Behind her, the city makes a sound like weather. Maybe it’s the air unit coughing. Maybe it’s the internet foaming at the mouth. I don’t care. There’s the patch of cool on my neck, her knee pressed to the cushion by my hip, and the way her hand trembles once when she thinks I’m not looking.
“Riley,” I say because it’s the only word that lands. Question, plea, bad prayer.
“I’ve got you,” she answers, and something in my chest loosens enough to hurt different.
The room narrows to a straw. My peripheral vision grays. She says my name like a command and a promise. I chase the sound, miss the step, and the floor tilts one more time.
The last thing I feel is her palm at my jaw. The last thing I hear is, “Stay with me—” before the lights cut, clean and total.