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He risked a glance.
Her hands rested in her lap, flexing once, like her body hadn’t quite come down from the fight either.
He dragged his gaze back to the road.
“Good session,” he said, because silence felt worse.
“Mm.”
He almost laughed.
That edge was still there. In her hum. In the way she sat just a little too still, like she was holding something in place.
He knew the feeling.
The truck rolled through town, headlights cutting across near-empty intersections, the air outside cold enough that the windshield fogged faintly at the corners.
He cracked his window, the rush of cold air cutting through the heat, sharp and immediate.
“It … was a mistake,” she rasped.
He adjusted his grip on the wheel, then adjusted it again, like that would settle anything. He could still feel it — her wrist in his grip, the give of her when she’d come into him, the exact place his hand had settled at her waist like it belonged there.
“Which part?”
She huffed. “This … friendship thing.”
Ronan could feel her looking at him now. Didn’t need to turn his head to know it. That slow, steady burn he’d been holding in check since the gym flared hotter.
He braked at the intersection, the truck idling.
For a second, he kept his eyes forward.
Then he looked.
Even in the wash of streetlight and shadow, her gaze held the same intensity that burned through his body.
“Then you need to stop looking at me like that.”
Her breath caught. She dropped her eyes.
He dragged his gaze back to the road and drove, jaw tight, barely registering the turns he’d taken dozens of times before.
The tension in the cab didn’t ease, only coiled tighter. Every small shift — her hand moving, the whisper of fabric, the uneven catch of her breath — felt amplified. By the time he turned into her driveway, restraint was hanging by threads.
He killed the engine. The truck went still.
He stared straight ahead a second too long, grip locked on the steering wheel, knuckles blanching under the strain.
Then she moved. Just enough to turn toward him.
That was it. That was all it took. He turned, too.
His hand came up, cupping her jaw, thumb sliding along her cheek like he’d already decided this hours ago and was only catching up to it now.
“Ronan—”
His mouth found hers.
