The Game We Weren't Playing

Chapter 8: The Game We Weren't Playing

Aima's POV

My phone buzzed in my hand, and behind me, Dom's footsteps stopped.

I was still on the stairs, holding the roll of tape he had just given me. I looked down at the screen. Oh gosh! It was James texting again.

"Please, Aima. Five minutes."

"Is that him?"

Dom was three steps below me, still in his training kit, with the towel round his neck. He had come up the stairs without a sound. His eyes were fixed on my phone, and his face had gone hard.

"It's nothing," I said, and pushed the phone into my pocket.

"It's his name on your screen at midnight." He climbed one step closer. "That isn't nothing."

"I haven't answered him."

"Have you read them all?"

"Why do you care?" My voice shook, and I hated it. "This is a fake relationship. You made the rules yourself. Rule three. Remember?"

"I remember."

"Then why are you angry?"

"I don't know!" he said, louder than he meant to. He pushed his hand through his hair. "I don't know, Aima. I keep seeing him in that press room, looking at you like he still owned you. I wanted to hit him. And I have no right to want that."

The stairwell went very quiet. I could hear a tap dripping somewhere, and my own heart.

"No," I said softly. "You don't have the right."

"I know."

I turned away, because I couldn't look at him and think straight. "I'm getting the gloves you told me about. They're in the store cupboard."

I pushed open the door at the top of the stairs. It was a small room with shelves of basketballs and cones on every side, and one bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. I reached up to the top shelf for the box of gloves.

I heard the door click shut behind me.

I turned around. Dom was standing against it, his chest rising and falling fast. The cupboard was so small that there was almost no space between us.

"Tell me to leave," he said, low.

I should have. I knew exactly what to say. It was only three words.

"Don't go," I said instead.

He kissed me.

It wasn't gentle. It was the kind of kiss that had been waiting for days, in every look and every argument. His hands came up to my face. My back hit the shelf, and a ball rolled off and bounced across the floor. But neither of us looked.

I held on to his shirt with both hands. I had been kissed before, by a boy I loved for six years, and it had never felt like this. This was not sweet or careful. This was like touching a live wire and not wanting to let go.

"Aima," he said against my mouth. It sounded like a question.

"Yes," I whispered. "Yes."

He lifted me against him, and I wrapped my arms around his neck. Somewhere, a stack of cones fell over. We laughed, just once, breathless and shaky, and then we stopped laughing.

His mouth moved to my jaw, then my neck. My skin was burning. His hands were rough from the court and so careful at the same time, as if he thought I might break. I pulled him closer, because I didn't want him to be careful with me. I wanted to forget every cold door and every cold word.

I wanted to feel chosen, even if it was only for tonight.

After that, I stopped thinking. There was only the heat of him, and my heart pounding in my ears, and his voice saying my name over and over. Time went soft and slow. The whole world shrank to one small room with a swinging light.

Later, I don't know how long, we were sitting on the floor with our backs against the shelves. His jacket was around my shoulders. My hair was a mess. Dom had his head tipped back against the wall, eyes closed, breathing hard.

I stared at the ceiling and tried to remember how to be a person.

"That wasn't in the rules," I said.

He let out a shaky laugh. "No. It wasn't."

"We didn't plan it."

"No."

The silence stretched out. Dom opened his eyes and looked at me, and for a second I saw something so open in his face that it frightened me. It looked like hope.

That was when I panicked.

I knew what came next. If I let him say it, if he said it was real, I would believe him. I would give him everything, the way I gave James everything, and I would be left with nothing again.

"We should be careful," I said quickly. "This is all part of the game, isn't it? The cameras, the jacket, all of it. We got carried away. It's the deal. That's all."

I watched the hope leave his face. He sat up straight and put his guard back on, piece by piece, until he was Captain Isaiah again.

"Right," he said. His voice was flat. "A game. Of course."

"Dom—"

"No, you're right." He stood and picked up his towel. "We got caught up in the act. It won't happen again."

"Good," I said. It came out cracked.

"Good," he said.

He reached out his hand to help me up. I took it, and neither of us let go quite as fast as we should have.

"Just so we're clear," Dom said quietly, not looking at me. "None of this was real. Not the kiss. Not any of it. It's a game, and we both know the rules."

"We both know the rules," I agreed. It felt like swallowing glass.

Behind him, the door was open a few centimetres.

I had not heard it open.

There was a shadow on the floor in the gap. It was the shadow of a person, standing perfectly still in the dark corridor.

My blood turned to ice.

Then the shadow turned, and I heard footsteps, quick and quiet, walking away.

Someone had been there all along.