جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 80

The university dining hall was an absolute powder keg ready to blow. Portia Felize Mineses lay crumpled on the slick tile floor, sobbing dramatically into her designer silk sleeves while a crowd of hundreds of students gasped and pointed their recording phone cameras. Portia’s cold blue eyes flickered with instant calculation behind her wet, dark lashes, her delicate porcelain hands trembling against the linoleum as if she were a wounded victim clinging to life.Cassandra "Cassy" Amore Del Fierro stood motionless just feet away, her heart thumping a rapid, steady rhythm against her ribs. Heat flushed across her skin under the harsh glare of a hundred phone lights, but her heart-shaped face remained chillingly composed. She didn't blink. She didn't back down.Before Cassy could press the final button on her tablet to broadcast the unedited live stream evidence onto the massive dining hall projector screens, the heavy oak doors rattled against the wall with a thunderous echo that shook

High above the packed, roaring university arena, Cassandra "Cassy" Amore Del Fierro stood pressed against the thick glass wall of the private analyst booth. Her hazel eyes, sharp behind her sleek wire-frame designer glasses, scanned the glowing screens of her tablet where her custom tactical playbook flashed in bright neon lines. Her pulse hammered a frantic rhythm in her throat, a cold sweat breaking out across the palms of her hands as she looked down at the icy floor below.Down on the rink, the three captains of the Golden Trio stepped onto the ice for the national championship qualifier. The atmosphere in the stadium was electric, but the energy radiating off the three men was suffocating and lethal.Before lining up for the opening faceoff, all three athletes halted in unison. One by one, their heads snapped upward, locking their glares directly onto Cassy in her glass booth.Elijah Castanier’s ice-blue eyes dilated behind his clear visor, a sudden surge of scorching heat flushi

The penthouse felt like a tomb.Rain slammed against the windows, blurring the city lights outside. Inside, the heavy air felt impossible to breathe. Cassy stood frozen in the middle of the room, trapped in her wet hoodie and jeans, dark strands of hair clinging to her neck from her messy ponytail.Elijah sat on the couch with an ice pack pressed to his bruised ribs, a dark mark swelling along his jaw. His ice-blue eyes stared blankly at the floor. Near the kitchen, Chase leaned against the wall with his arms crossed tight, the usual spark in his amber eyes completely gone and a bloody cut splitting his eyebrow. By the glass, Karius stood stiff as a statue, a deep purple bruise on his neck right above his silver dog tags.Nobody said a word.Cassy’s heart hammered against her ribs. Looking at Elijah’s tight fists, Chase’s forced quiet, and Karius’s locked jaw, a cruel truth hit her. Their hockey dreams were falling apart. Every mark on their bodies was proof of the war they were fight

Chase Castillo’s dark chuckle echoed off the damp tile walls of the empty locker room, sharp and dangerous as a jagged blade. He held his smartphone higher, tilting the glowing screen directly toward Portia Felize Mineses’s pale face.Portia’s cold blue eyes locked onto the active recording screen. The red dot in the upper corner pulsed steadily while the white timer numbers ticked past six full minutes.Her pupils dilated into wide black circles. A harsh, frantic hitch caught deep in her throat, her chest heaving as all the color drained from her skin in a single second."N-no..." Portia stuttered, her voice stripping away every layer of her polished elegance, leaving only pure, unadulterated horror. "Turn that off! Give me that fucking phone, Chase!""Why would I do that, Portia?" Chase asked, his amber eyes glittering with a lethal, mocking heat. "You gave a hell of a performance. It’d be a total crime not to share it with your audience."Portia screamed, a sharp, hysterical noise

The high-performance weight room at the back of the campus athletic complex was bathed in bright overhead halogen lights, humming with the steady rhythm of heavy breathing and shifting iron plates.Cassandra Del Fierro sat on a high leather training bench in the center of the private floor. Her long, dark chestnut brown hair fell in a thick, silky ponytail over her shoulder, and her sleek wire-frame designer glasses caught the glow of the digital strategy charts pulled up on her tablet. Even dressed in a fitted black tank top and tailored athletic pants that showed off her slender waist and soft curves, she looked like a queen surrounded by her guards.To her right, Elijah Castanier stood towering over her. His jet-black hair was immaculately styled, his ice-blue eyes piercing as he rested one large, warm hand directly onto the curve of her hip. His thumb stroked slowly over the thin fabric of her shirt, his touch intensely possessive. To her left, Karius Hidalgo rested his massive 6’