登入Benito~I sat on the edge of the bed in the small room I rented above the corner shop and stared at the floor until the light from the window shifted across it. The guilt had been sitting in my chest for days now and it was getting heavier. Every time I checked my phone and saw another message from the number I was not supposed to answer I felt it press harder. I had started this. That was the part I could not push away no matter how many times I told myself the money had been necessary.Theo’s father had found me weeks earlier. I still remembered the first meeting clearly because nothing about it had felt normal. He had sent a short text with an address and a time. No name. No explanation. Just the location of a quiet café on the edge of the industrial area where the tables were far apart and the staff did not linger. I almost did not go. Then I thought about the hospital bills that kept arriving and the way my mother had stopped answering the phone when the collection agencies calle
Coach~I closed the folder when Theo sat down and kept my hands flat on top of it. Sponsors had started asking questions. They wanted to know if the new signing was going to become a problem before the season even began. I had answered each of them the same way so far, but the answers were starting to feel thin.Theo looked calm enough. He always did when something was wrong. I had watched him long enough to know the difference between a quiet day and a day when he was holding things in. Today was the second kind.“We need to talk about some emails that have been going around,” I said. “Anonymous ones. They claim you have been involved in inappropriate conduct. No details that hold up, just enough to make people wonder. A few of the sponsors have already seen versions of them and they are asking me if the stories are true.”He did not look surprised. That told me more than anything he might have said. I waited a moment to see if he would fill the silence. He stayed quiet, so I kept go
Theo~ I woke up later than usual and reached for my phone on the nightstand. The screen showed a few messages from teammates and one from Noah asking if I wanted to meet for lunch later. I opened my banking app out of habit to check if the last deposit from the team had cleared. The balance looked normal at first, but when I tried to move a small amount to my everyday account the screen flashed red. Transaction declined. Card frozen. I stared at it for a few seconds and tried again. Same message. Both cards were locked. I sat up in bed and opened the insurance app next. A notice sat at the top of the page saying the policy on my car had been cancelled effective immediately. No reason given beyond non-payment. I had set the payments to come from the same account that was now frozen. My phone plan was next. The provider had sent an email overnight saying the line would be disconnected in twenty-four hours unless the outstanding balance was cleared. Everything pointed to the same sour
Noah~The soft grey light of early morning filtered through the half-drawn curtains of the hotel suite, painting thin stripes across the tangled sheets and the ruined mattress that still sagged on one side from the night before. Theo slept heavily beside me, one arm flung across my waist, his breathing deep and even, the faint purple mark I’d left on his throat rising and falling with every slow inhale. I watched him for a long moment, memorizing the way sleep smoothed the usual tension from his face, before the phone on the nightstand began to vibrate against the wood.I reached for it carefully, not wanting to wake him. The screen lit up with a single word that made my stomach tighten.Mom.She never called this early. Not unless something had shifted. I slipped out from under Theo’s arm, pulled on yesterday’s jeans and a soft black sweater, and stepped into the sitting room, closing the bedroom door behind me with a quiet click.I answered on the third ring. “Mom.”“Come to the re
Theo~I couldn't think. I grabbed Noah and headed to the one place I needed to calm down. The hotel room door slammed shut behind us as Noah’s back hit the wall before I could even think, my hands fisting in his shirt as I crowded him, mouth crashing against his in a kiss that tasted like adrenaline and barely-leashed fury. We’d barely made it inside. The drive from the venue had been silent torture—his thigh pressed against mine in the back of the car, the way his fingers had dug into my knee every time the driver took a turn too sharp. We needed to calm down. That had been the plan. Clearly, the plan was fucked.“Fuck, Theo,” Noah growled into my mouth, biting my lower lip hard enough to sting. His hands shoved under my jacket, pushing it off my shoulders. Fabric hit the floor. I didn’t care. I grabbed his hips and spun us, walking him backward toward the king bed that dominated the suite. My blood was on fire. Every inch of me ached to pin him down, to remind both of us who we we
Noah~I was so stunned at his statement and I wanted nothing but to kiss him right there but now was not the time. The room still carried the weight of everything that had just been said when Theo’s father turned fully toward us. His eyes moved from our joined hands to our faces with the same cold assessment he had used earlier, only now the mask had slipped enough to show the disgust underneath.“Look at the two of you. Standing there like it’s something to be proud of. It’s disgusting.”The word landed hard. Theo’s fingers tightened around mine, but he did not pull away. I kept my eyes on the older man, feeling the heat climb the back of my neck, ready to answer, when the front door opened and my dad walked in carrying a grocery bag. He stopped short at the sight of all three of us, the bag lowering slowly to his side. He had no idea what had already been said, no idea how close the kitchen had come to cracking open completely, but he took one look at Theo’s face and then at the ma
Melody~By the third week of pretending I was fine, I was ready to admit I was terrible at it.Not out loud, of course. Out loud I was doing great. I went to class. Answered questions, held conversations. I even laughed a few times when people expected me to. From the outside, I probably looked com
Noah~I’d seen a lot of people try to fake control before.Athletes, especially. Hockey guys were the worst for it. All that chest-beating, loud voices and hard eyes, like if they looked confident enough nobody would notice they were falling apart inside. I had absolutely no idea why the fuckers co
Theodore~I should've fucking said no. That was the first thought that hit me when I saw the moving truck pull up but the second thought was far worse.Why is he actually here?I stood by the window of my dorm, arms crossed, watching like it was some kind of bad joke the universe was trying to sel
Theodore POVYou probably think it can’t get any worse than hooking up with a random guy after a win and then seeing him the next morning as the newest member of your hockey team.Try going home that same day and finding out your mom got a ‘fiance’ over the weekend.Try watching that same guy—same







