บททั้งหมดของ On Thin Ice With You: บทที่ 1 - บทที่ 10

The apartment door clicks shut behind her, and Mia exhales for what feels like the first time all day.Lemon cleaner, fresh wood, afternoon light pooling across pale oak floors—clean, quiet, nothing like the chaos she'd been bracing for.Then her gaze lands on the suitcase wheel, bent at a grotesque angle, the metal axle fully exposed. She crouches down and prods it with two fingers.Hopeless.The front door opens.A girl backs through the entrance carrying a tower of textbooks and a coffee cup balanced on top, blonde ponytail swinging. She freezes when she spots Mia, and the coffee sloshes dark across her sleeve that she doesn't even notice."Oh my God, you must be my new roommate!" She dumps the books on the entryway shelf and spins around, bright-eyed and completely unfiltered. "I'm Ellie Carter. Comm School. So happy you're finally here.""Mia Conti." She stands, smiling despite herself. "Medical exchange student. Nice to meet you, Ellie."Ellie's eyes land on the broken suitcase.

The Blade is already shaking when Elias pushes through the door.The bar erupts the second the team walks in—chanting, beer sloshing, the highlight reel from last night's win looping on every screen. The bouncer doesn't even check them. He just steps aside and grins."Elias does it all," someone shouts from the back."You mean he handles it all," Lucas fires back, waggling his eyebrows."Shut your mouth," Elias says, without heat.The team's usual table is already cleared and waiting—a long stretch of carved wood near the center of the room, engraved with past players' names. Elias's signature sits dead center, like it was always supposed to be there.Ben, the bar owner, appears with a full tray of beers before they've even settled in. "First round's on me. That shorthanded goal last night—God, Elias, it looked like you were showing off."Elias takes his glass, tips it back, lets the cold slide down his throat. A drop catches at his collarbone and he doesn't bother with it."I was," h

The civic plaza is packed to capacity, and backstage, Mia can feel it—the particular pressure of a full house, pressing through the walls like weather.Ellie is beside her, talking without pause. "ESPN is live, the mayor's front row, and—" she drops her voice, "—Richard Weston is here. Old money. Like, the old money."She doesn't finish the sentence because Marc is already pulling her away.Mia doesn't catch the significance. She's adjusting the tulle at her hip and focusing on her breath."Please welcome to the stage—performing classical Italian ballet, Mia Conti."The applause rises. She walks out into the light.A single spotlight finds her at center stage, following each step like it was made for her.She stands with her back to the audience, head slightly bowed, the ice-blue dress catching the light like moving water. The silk bodice traces her waist in a clean, precise line, and the layered tulle falls to the floor in perfect stillness.The crowd quiets—not gradually, but all at

"Whoa! Watch it, rookie!"A younger player, eyes glazed, stumbles blindly into Elias's side.The collision breaks Elias's gaze from the crowd. With a faint laugh, Elias shoves him back toward the center of the chaos."Find your center, kid," Elias's voice is a low rumble. "Or find the exit."A few booths away, Mia is fighting a different kind of battle. On the table in front of her lies a stack of medical summaries—the kind of dense, technical jargon that makes most people's eyes bleed.It's an absurd sight. In a room full of bodies grinding together under strobe lights, she is the outlier.She actually prefers being the "alien." It keeps the thirsty guys at bay.Checking her phone, she sees Ellie still hasn't returned from the dance floor.Mia sighs, tucks her notes away, and catches the eye of a passing server to ask for the restrooms. She needs cold water on her face to wash away the smudge of the day.The collision happens in the corridor near the bathrooms —dim lighting, warm air

Mia stands outside the treatment room door, knuckles raised to knock, and takes one breath.She knows who's waiting on the other side. The man from the escalator, from the rehearsal stage, from the bar corridor, from every inconvenient corner of the past three weeks.She pushes the door open before she can think about it further.Elias is sitting on the treatment table with his back to her, athletic jacket shrugged halfway off, hanging from his neck.His bare shoulders fill the room in a way that feels slightly unreasonable. He's pressing his left hand against his right shoulder, knuckles pale with the effort, head bowed so his hair falls forward across his face.Mia clears her throat.He turns. The moment he registers her face, something flickers behind his eyes—surprise, quickly recalibrated into something harder. "You?""Me," she says, and walks in, closing the door behind her.She's in her white coat, hair pinned back, badge clipped at her chest. Professional. Composed. Absolutely