Page 40 of Ruthless Edge

Knox wanting me. Knox choosing me. Knox looking at me like I'm the only person in the room, with his hand warm at my collarbone and his eyes on mine and his voice low and sexy. This is what I wanted freshman year. This is the version of things I used to imagine before I understood what I actually was to him. Nothing. A nobody.

And that's the problem.

Because freshman-year Emma would never have gotten this. The Emma in this hallway exists because I spent three years changing my body, and Knox Carter is standing here being completely undone by a neckline he never would have noticed three years ago. Maybe he looked at me and saw a project to feel good about. Maybe now that the project is done, now that I'm acceptable, I finally get the version of him that was always behind the warmth and the attention and the coffee he remembered.

I never had this until he thought I was worth being with.

The thought is cold and it moves through me fast and it hardens everything.

I put my hand flat against his chest and push. Not hard. Just firmly enough to create space.

"Find another ex-fat girl to manipulate," I say.

The words land. I watch them land. Something changes in his expression that I don't look at for long enough to name because I'm already moving, already past him, already in the dining room before he can say anything.

"Emma—"

I don't turn around.

Owen looks up when I sit down. He reads my face. "You okay?" he says quietly.

"Fine," I say. "Tell me about your research proposal. The one you mentioned on Tuesday."

He studies me for just a second. Then he lets me redirect it, which I'm grateful for, which I'll remember.

Knox comes back to the table a few minutes later. He doesn't look at me. I don't look at him. The dinner continues and everyone is very polite until the check arrives and people say goodnight and disperse.

Owen walks me to my door. He's warm and uncomplicated and sweet about the whole bizarre evening. He asks if we can do this again sometime, a real date, one without the intervention of college hockey. I say yes.

I go inside.

Sitting on the edge of my bed, I don't think about the hallway. I don't think about his hand on my collarbone. I don't think about the little space between us and the way his voice dropped and what it did to me.

I think about freshman-year Emma. The girl Knox didn't choose.

I remember her. I was her.

Whatever happened in that hallway, it wasn't for her.

Chapter Eleven

Emma

I arrive forty-five minutes early to the charity fun run because that's what I do, and also because I need the time before other people show up to get my face under control. The "fun run" is really a muddy obstacle course involving foam tunnels, tire runs, rope crawls, climbing walls, and enough mud to guarantee nobody crosses the finish line looking remotely human.

Standing on the lawn in running shorts and a fitted tank top is a different experience than standing in a library or a conference room. The clothes I wear to study or to SAB meetings cover more and ask less of me. Workout clothes do not extend the same courtesy. I've spent three years in a gym and I know what my body can do now. I've made a kind of peace with how it looks, but that peace is easier to maintain in some contexts than others. Standing in a field while actual athletes stretch and warm up around me, all of them looking like they do this every day before breakfast, is one of the harder contexts.

I tell the part of my brain that's doing the comparing to find something else to do, and go check in with the volunteer coordinator.

"How are we looking on registration?" I ask.

The coordinator, a junior named Becca who has been running this event for two years, looks up from her clipboard with an expression I'd describe as pleasantly surprised. "We had a flood of last-minute signups yesterday," she says. "And two sponsors came through this morning that weren't in the original budget. We might be looking at the biggest fundraiser SAB has had all year."

"Seriously?"

"You'll want to look at the final numbers, but yeah. The last-minute push really worked."

I'm still processing this when I hear someone behind me.