Chapter 7 - The Encore

Sunday evening, Ellie explodes back into the apartment like she's running late for war.

"Change your clothes," she announces through Mia's half-open door, already tearing through her own wardrobe. "The Blade has a dress code and we are not showing up looking like grad students."

Mia opens her closet. She reaches for a camel turtleneck and dark jeans, which is when Ellie appears in the doorway, takes one look, and physically blocks her hand.

"Absolutely not." She disappears and returns thirty seconds later holding a forest-green velvet dress. "Christmas party, last year. I never wear anything twice—it's yours tonight."

The fabric is cool and smooth in Mia's hands. Fitted bodice, elegant square neckline, an open-back panel.

"Ellie, it's a bar visit, not a gala—"

"Trust me." Ellie is already steering her toward the bathroom. "Go."

When Mia steps out, Ellie goes quiet for a full three seconds.

The velvet traces every line of her—the narrow waist, the curve of her back, the pale column of her throat. The hem falls just at the knee, which somehow makes her legs look endless.

"You've been hiding all of that under turtlenecks," Ellie finally says. "Criminal. Genuinely criminal."

Mia tugs the neckline up a fraction. "Is it too much?"

"Black heels. Now. We're not negotiating."

Ellie drops to one knee and starts buckling them on before Mia can object.

"Same size as me, perfect. Okay." She stands back. "I have never been more proud of my own wardrobe."

They face the hallway mirror together—Ellie in a wine-red halter dress, red lip, gold hair pinned up. Mia in deep green velvet, bare-backed, dark hair loose.

Completely different and somehow perfect beside each other.

"The whole bar," Ellie says, linking their arms, "is not ready."

***

The Blade sits at the end of a quiet lane in the city's fashion district, a queue out front that Ellie bypasses entirely through the staff entrance.

Inside, the main floor opens into something larger and more considered than the exterior suggests.

Ellie installs Mia at a corner booth with a clear sightline across the floor.

"Best seat in the house. I'll be back, just need to check in and say hello to a few people." She's already moving. "Don't go anywhere."

Mia orders a beer and takes in the room.

The crowd is exactly what she expected—stylish, loud, sharply dressed.

The signed Raiders jersey above the bar catches the light. On the far wall, last season's championship photo: the whole team, arms raised.

She pulls out her phone and opens her family group chat. The photos from last night's performance have already accumulated a stack of replies.

You were magnificent, tesoro. Her mother. So proud. Are you eating enough? Have you made friends?

She clearly has friends. The one filming had very good angles. Her father, which is high praise from him. If you need anything, call.

Mia smiles at the screen.

The homesickness comes quietly, like it always does.

She's still scrolling when the bar shifts.

Not loudly—just a subtle realignment, the way a room reorganizes itself around certain presences.

A group of men come through the main entrance, large in the particular way, and the staff move to receive them with practiced ease.

The Raiders. Of course.

Mia watches them cross toward the roped VIP section without particular interest.

She'll be working with them in a matter of days. She can afford to be relaxed about it now.

Then her gaze catches on one figure settling into a corner of the VIP area—slightly apart from the others, a black shirt with the sleeves rolled to the elbow, the particular stillness that stands out in a noisy room.

Elias.

She looks back at her phone.

***

The VIP section is loud and warm and Elias wants to be anywhere else.

He's on his third whiskey, which isn't fixing the problem.

His right shoulder has been quietly announcing itself all evening, and his fingers drift to it without his permission, pressing in slow circles.

Danny mentioned the new physio again today.

Which meant Anderson had sent him as a warning shot. Elias had said nothing and spent the rest of training hitting the boards harder than necessary.

He knows the shape of his own resistance.

A female team physio two years ago who mistook access for invitation. A male physio before that who let his shoulder deteriorate for six weeks while pursuing a private consulting deal.

He has reasons for not trusting anyone who comes at him with a treatment table and good intentions.

Tyler materializes beside him, arm around a woman in a silver dress, visibly delighted with himself. "She says she can do the splits right on your lap, Elias. Consider it."

Elias's gaze moves to the woman—politely, briefly. She's beautiful in an entirely obvious way, looking at him like he's something to be won.

But then his mind throws up an image he hasn't earned—the airport escalator, the rehearsal stage, the faint flush at the tips of Mia's ears when she'd caught herself staring.

Damn.

He can still place the exact scent of her hair. Something light and warm, there and gone, the kind of thing that shouldn't stick.

It stuck.

"Come on, Elias." Tyler steers the blonde toward him with one arm. Her perfume arrives before she does—heavy, deliberate, the kind designed to be noticed. "You're the one everyone's watching tonight. Might as well enjoy it."

"Enjoy yourselves," he says, and stands.

He moves through the edge of the VIP section toward the outer floor, needing air and distance from the noise. His eyes drift across the main room without intention.

And stop.

Corner booth. A woman sitting alone, slightly apart from the crowd's orbit, head bent over her phone.

Mia Conti.

He doesn't move immediately. He just looks, which is already more than he usually allows himself.

She's completely still in the middle of all this noise, face soft in the glow of her screen, entirely unbothered by the room around her.

The same quality he noticed at the airport, that composure that doesn't perform itself.

She's smiling at something on her phone.

He wants to see her face more clearly.