Chapter 5

The studio was nearly empty by the time Ethan returned from the conference room, nerves still sparking under his skin. He’d tried to collect himself, splashed cold water on his face, breathed through the lingering adrenaline but Dante’s parting words clung to him like static.

We’ll talk more privately.

He hadn’t been able to think about anything else.

Now, long past closing hours, the architectural studio felt strangely softer. The usual cacophony of printers, footsteps, clattering keyboards, and hurried conversations had faded into a hush broken only by the distant hum of lights.

Ethan pushed the door open quietly.

Dante was still there.

He stood at the central drafting table, sleeves rolled up, tie discarded, dark hair slightly mussed as if he’d run his hands through it too many times. A pool of warm, amber light hovered around him, catching the edges of his jaw and making him look almost unreal.

For a moment, Ethan simply watched him.

There was something intimate about seeing Dante this way, unpolished, alone, deeply focused. It stripped away the intimidating veneer he wore during meetings and critiques and revealed the man beneath: driven, intense, almost vulnerable in his concentration.

Dante didn’t look up. You’re late.

Ethan blinked. You were expecting me?

Dante marked a line on his blueprint with deliberate precision. You have revisions due to tomorrow morning.

Ethan swallowed. Right. The assignment.

Dante finally lifted his gaze.

There was no smile. No warmth. Just a quiet, charged awareness that made Ethan’s chest tighten.

Come here.

Ethan approached slowly, trying not to let his pulse show on his face. He could feel Dante’s attention tracking every step he took. When he reached the table, Dante gestured at the scattered sketches.

Put your updated concept here.

Ethan laid his drawing down, fingers brushing the edge of Dante’s drafting triangle.

He hadn’t expected the shock that went through him.

It was barely a touch skin grazing cool metal where Dante’s hand rested but Ethan felt it like lightning, a jolt straight through his arm. His breath hitched before he could stop himself.

Dante’s eyes flicked to his hand.

He noticed. Of course he did.

But instead of stepping back, Dante shifted closer, arms braced on either side of the blueprint, effectively caging Ethan between the table and his body.

Ethan froze.

Dante was close enough that Ethan could feel the heat of him, the faint scent of cedar and graphite and something warmer that had nothing to do with cologne. His presence was overwhelming solid, controlled, impossible to ignore.

Relax, Dante murmured, voice low.

Ethan tried. He failed.

Dante glanced at the drawing. This is better. More confident. But you’re still hesitating here.

He reached over Ethan’s shoulder, drawing a swift correction on the page. His arm brushed Ethan’s, just barely.

The contact was nothing but was also everything.

Ethan inhaled sharply.

Dante didn’t comment on it but he didn’t move away either. If anything, he seemed more focused, more attuned, as though Ethan’s reactions were another layer of data in an equation only Dante understood.

You’re tightening your lines because you’re trying too hard to be perfect, Dante said. Architecture isn’t about perfection.

Ethan managed, then what is it about?

Dante looked at him again, it's about intention, he said softly and honesty. Even when it’s uncomfortable.

Ethan tore his gaze away, staring at the page until the lines blurred. I’m trying.

I know, Dante said. That’s why we’re here tonight.

The sentence landed with a weight Ethan couldn’t quite decipher. It wasn’t criticism. It wasn’t praise. It was something more personal.

Before he could ask what Dante meant, the older man lifted another sheet Ethan’s bolder version and laid it beside the first.

This one, Dante said, fingertips tracing the air above the page, is emotional.

Ethan blinked. Emotional?

Dante nodded. You’re designing something you feel before you understand. That’s rare.

His voice came out unsteady. I don’t know what I’m feeling.

Dante didn’t answer right away.

Instead, he reached for a pencil, and Ethan watched in fascination as Dante began sketching over Ethan’s bolder concept not correcting it, but building onto it, extending his curves, echoing his shapes..

Their lines intertwined on the page, merging into something neither of them had drawn alone.

Ethan’s throat tightened.

I don’t usually draw like this, he admitted quietly. I don’t know what came over me earlier.

Dante didn’t pause. You stopped filtering yourself. That’s all.

And you think that’s good? Ethan asked.

Dante finally set the pencil down. You’re asking the wrong question.

Ethan’s breath caught. What’s the right one?

Dante studied his face, gaze lingering on his eyes, drifting to his mouth, then back again with a kind of restrained intensity that made Ethan’s heart pound.

How does it feel, Dante asked quietly, to create without fear?

Ethan opened his mouth voice barely a whisper I don’t know.

Dante leaned closer, Ethan felt the faint brush of his breath against his cheek. Try again.

Ethan’s pulse thrummed in his ears. He could barely think with Dante this near.

Dante reached out slowly, almost unconsciously and adjusted the collar of Ethan’s shirt where it had slipped askew. The movement was small, professional, perfectly innocent.

Yet Ethan felt it everywhere.

Dante froze when his fingers brushed Ethan’s collarbone. The contact was brief accidental but the effect was instant.

Heat shot through Ethan’s body so fast it left him dizzy.

Dante withdrew his hand, but only a fraction. His jaw tightened almost imperceptibly.

Neither of them spoke. Neither of them breathed.

Silence pooled between them, thick, charged, humming with something neither of them dared to name.

Ethan swallowed hard. Dante?

Dante closed his eyes for the briefest heartbeat, as if fighting something he refused to let surface.

When he opened them again, he stepped back too quickly, too sharply.

We should focus, Dante said. His voice was controlled; too controlled. We have work to finish.

Ethan felt the loss of proximity like a cold rush.

Right, he whispered.

For the next several minutes, they worked in near silence. Ethan tried to concentrate on the sketches, on Dante’s notes, on anything except the echo of that brief touch.

But he was painfully aware of every movement Dante made.

Confusion tangled with curiosity, curiosity tangled with something warmer, deeper, more dangerous. It made it hard to hold the pencil steady. Hard to think. Hard to be normal around a man who made the air feel different just by standing in it.

By the time they finished drafting the final layout, Ethan’s nerves were a live wire.

Dante gathered the sketches, aligning them neatly. We’ll review these tomorrow afternoon. I’ll send you the meeting time.

Okay, Ethan said, voice softer than he intended.

Dante didn’t respond right away.

Instead, he looked at Ethan for a moment there was nothing shielding that gaze. No professional mask. No distance. No restraint. Just intensity.

Ethan’s breath hard.

Dante stepped closer again just enough to make Ethan’s pulse stumble.

And then, in a low voice that felt almost too intimate for the quiet room, he said:

Ethan, do you have any idea what you’re doing to me?

Ethan’s heart stopped.

Dante seemed to realize the weight of his own words.

His expression shuttered closed off but far too late.

Before Ethan could speak, before he could move, before he could even breathe

The studio door swung open.

And Marcus stood in the doorway.

Staring at them. Eyes narrowing. Voice cold.

What, Marcus said slowly, is going on in here?