Chapter 8

Kaleena

The dashboard clock reads 11:40 p.m. when Raiden kills the engine half a block from my old apartment.

Rain drums against the roof of his black SUV. I don't reach for the door handle. Instead, I pull my small pocket sketchbook and a charcoal pencil from my damp backpack, tear a blank sheet loose, and click the overhead dome light on.

Raiden turns his head against the leather headrest, his storm--gray eyes narrowing. "What are you doing, Donovan? Your boxes are getting soaked on that porch."

"I told you in your kitchen," I say, flattening the paper against the center console. "I write the rules before we take one step onto that lawn. Otherwise, drive me back to the subway."

His jaw clenches before he leans an elbow onto the console, crowding my space with the warm scent of cedarwood and rain. "Fine. Write fast. Rule one is mine."

"I said I write the rules," I snap, hovering the charcoal tip over the paper.

"And I'm providing the roof and the jersey," he counters, his deep voice dropping into a low rumble. "Write it down: Rule 1: In public, we're real. Every time someone is watching, you act like you can't get enough of me."

My chest tightens as I scrawl the line across the top. For the cameras, I tell myself silently. Just a show to wreck Elijah's head.

"Then the second one is mine," I say, pressing the dark charcoal into the page. "Rule 2: In private, we're not. The second the door closes or we're alone in this truck, the act drops. You stay on your side, and I stay on mine."

"Agreed," Raiden says without blinking. "What else?"

"I'm just getting started," I mutter, my pulse picking up as I start the third line. "Rule 3: No kissing unless a camera is pointed at us."

Raiden reaches over, his large, warm fingers closing directly over the back of my hand to guide the pencil across the paper. My breath hitches at the jolt of heat where his calloused palm presses against my skin.

"Add three words," he murmurs, his gaze dropping to my parted lips. "Or a threat."

"What kind of threat?" I breathe, pulling my hand free even as I write the words down.

"Elijah, Hayley, or anyone trying to call our bluff," he says smoothly. "If someone tries to test whether this dynamic between us is real, you don't pull away when my mouth is on yours."

"You wish," I mutter, though my stomach flips as I move to the fourth line, letting the ache of the last three hours sharpen my voice. "Rule 4: No lies. Not about anything that matters. You already hid those texts with Elijah from me until I was on your floor. If we do this, you don't lie to my face."

Silence stretches inside the cab.

"Did you hear me, Blackwood?" I look up from the paper. "No lies. Initial this one right now."

For one full beat, Raiden doesn't move. His eyes lock on the fourth line, his jaw tightening until a muscle jumps in his cheek under the dim dome light. I notice the pause instantly----a tiny crack in his armor----before he takes the pencil and scrawls his initials beside the words.

"Why did you hesitate?" I ask, narrowing my eyes at him.

"I didn't," he says flatly, handing the charcoal back. "Keep going."

I file that one--beat hesitation away in my mind and write the fifth line. "Rule 5: Nobody touches my sketchbooks. Ever. You already tore my drawing in half once, and Hayley stole my journal. My art is off--limits."

"Nobody touches your sketchbooks," he repeats quietly, with zero mockery in his tone. "Rule 6 is mine, and it's non--negotiable. Rule 6: You sleep in the guest room, lock on your side."

A bitter laugh escapes my throat as I write it down. "Trust me, you don't have to worry about me sneaking into your bed, Captain. I'm glad you want a deadbolt between us to keep me away from you."

Raiden stares out the rain--streaked windshield, his knuckles whitening on the wheel. He doesn't correct me, though the rigid set of his shoulders looks less like a guy keeping a nuisance out and more like a guard sealing a door so no one on earth can reach her.

"And speaking of names," I add, writing line seven, "Rule 7: You don't call me 'Donovan' in front of people, and I don't call you 'Captain.' If we're supposed to have chemistry, you can't bark my last name like I'm on your penalty kill."

"Then what do you want me calling you?" he asks, leaning in until his face is inches from mine over the console. "Kaleena? Or should I stick to mine?"

Heat floods my neck so fast my ears burn. "Kaleena works fine."

Before I can write another word, Raiden takes the charcoal pencil from my fingers, pulls the paper toward himself, and presses the tip down for the eighth rule. He writes in heavy block capitals, bearing down so hard that on the final letter of NOBODY FALLS IN LOVE, the charcoal tip snaps clean in half with a sharp crack.

My heart stutters against my ribs. I stare at the broken black lead on the console, then up at the fierce, locked expression on his face.

"Good," I whisper, my throat dry. "Because falling for my bully is the last mistake I'd ever make."

Raiden picks up the broken stub of charcoal between his thumb and forefinger and writes one last line at the bottom, his handwriting smaller now.

"Last one," he says, his voice dropping quiet over the rain. "Rule 9: Either of us can end any moment with one word----'Enough.' No questions. If it gets too loud or too close and you want out, say the word and we leave. Understand?"

I stare at him under the yellow light, thrown off guard by the sudden care buried beneath his control. "I understand."

We both sign the bottom. Raiden folds the sheet into his pocket and pushes his door open into the rain. "Showtime, Kaleena. Rule 1 starts now."

When we walk up the slick front path of my old apartment building, the porch light is blazing like a stage.

Standing on the wet lawn at the bottom of the steps are Miller and Henderson----two of Elijah's teammates----holding their phones up with the camera flashes on, recording the porch. At the top of the steps, leaning against the railing, stands Hayley. Beside her boots sits the last open box from my bedroom, holding my mother's silver locket, her pearl earrings, the cracked porcelain ballerina figurine from my shelf, and my silver frog charm bracelet.

Two steps below Hayley stands Elijah, hands jammed into his damp hoodie, staring at the ground.

When Raiden steps into the porch light beside me, all three heads snap toward us.

"Wait----is that Blackwood?" Miller mutters behind his phone screen. "And she's wearing his hoodie?"

"Keep recording," Henderson whispers back, zooming in as we cross the grass.

Before my knees can lock up, Raiden slides his large, warm arm firmly around my waist, pulling my hip flush against his side.

Rule 1: In public, we're real.

I tilt my chin up and look into Raiden's storm--gray eyes, forcing myself to look at him like I adore him----and it is alarmingly easy to lean into the solid heat of his chest while his dark gaze drops possessively to my mouth.

On the steps above us, Elijah goes rigid, his face draining to pale ash as he stares at Raiden's hand on my waist.

"Look who crawled back for her junk," Hayley calls out, playing straight to the two phone cameras on the lawn. "How much did you have to beg the captain for a ride, art girl?"

"Give me my mother's jewelry box, Hayley," I say clearly, staying pressed against Raiden's side. "You have no right to touch my mom's things."

Hayley nudges the cardboard carton with her boot. "Oh, you mean this tacky little box? Porch storage expired at midnight."

With a slow, vicious smirk aimed at the cameras, Hayley hooks her fingers under the box and tips it straight over the porch railing.

"No!" I gasp, surging forward against Raiden's grip.

Everything spills through the air and splatters into the black mud of the flowerbed below. My mother's locket, her pearl earrings, the little ballerina figurine, and the frog charm bracelet sink into the wet dirt.

The two teammates on the grass snicker behind their phones. Humiliation and grief claw up my throat as I whip my head toward Elijah on the steps.

"Tell her to pick them up, Eli!" my voice cracks. "That was my mother's locket!"

Elijah stares past my shoulder, his face blank stone. "It's just clutter, Kae."

Beside me, Raiden turns colder than the winter rain.

He releases my waist, walks up the bottom two steps until he is chest--to--chest with Elijah, and shoves him backward by the shoulders with brutal force.

Elijah's boots slip on the wet wood, and he crashes hard onto both knees at the edge of the muddy flowerbed.

"Pick it up," Raiden commands, his voice lethal in the quiet yard as he towers over him. "Every piece. With your hands. Right now."

"Back off, Blackwood----" Elijah starts, his palms in the mud.

"Leave one piece in that dirt," Raiden warns softly, "and I'll make sure you never step onto a sheet of ice again. Every piece."

I brace for a fistfight. Instead, Elijah lowers his head and obeys.

As I watch him reach into the black mud, a cold, knotty wrongness twists in my stomach. Elijah's hands are shaking so hard in the dirt that when he lifts my mother's locket and tries to click the sprung clasp shut to protect the photo inside, his trembling fingers fail three times in a row. He wipes the earrings and the ballerina on his own sleeve, placing them in the box. Last of all, he picks up the tiny frog charm bracelet from our childhood, holding it in his muddy palm for two full seconds like it might break in half before setting it gently on top.

Raiden snatches the box from the ground, tucks it under one arm, and wraps his other hand around my waist to steer me past the steps.

As we pass the railing, Hayley leans down into my space, pitching her voice so only I can hear it over the rain.

"Happy birthday, sweetie," Hayley whispers with a venomous smile. "Enjoy the hoodie."

A cold shiver runs down my spine until Raiden shuts me inside the warm SUV and pulls away from the curb.

"Are you okay?" Raiden asks, his knuckles still tight on the wheel.

"I'm fine," I mutter, pulling out my buzzing phone when a classmate texts me a link.

I tap the screen, and my stomach drops. The video Miller took on the lawn is already up on the campus feed. It has forty thousand views in nine minutes. Because of the camera angle from the grass and Raiden's oversized hood pulled low over my wet hair, my face is half out of frame, and there is no name in the caption----just Blackwood making his teammate kneel in the mud for his new girl.

"Forty thousand views in nine minutes," I whisper, staring at the screen. "At least nobody can see my face."

Then my thumb brushes the comment section, and the air freezes solid in my lungs.

Pinned right at the top of the feed----posted ten seconds ago from a blank account with no profile photo, no bio, and zero posts----sits a single comment:

Hi, Kaleena.

My hand trembles so violently the screen blurs. Rule 1 worked way too well----and whoever is watching from the dark just proved that hiding behind Raiden Blackwood won't stop them from seeing me.