Page 154 of Heal Me, Love Me

His smile faded.

The good feeling I’d had a second ago slipped away fast. “What?”

“You’re not going to like it.”

“Who is it?”

He paused for a beat, then said, “Keaton Stafford.”

For a second, the words didn’t make sense. Not because I hadn’t heard him, but because Keaton’s name didn’t belong anywhere near the offer I’d been excited about just two minutes earlier.

“No.” I shook my head.

“It’s the offer.”

“I heard you.”

“Then take a minute before you start arguing with me.”

“I don’t need a minute.” I pushed the folder back toward him. “I’m not fighting Keaton.”

Grant didn’t reach for it. “You want to hear the whole thing?”

“Not really.”

“You should anyway.”

I stared at him, waiting for the part where this started making sense and already knowing it wouldn’t.

He leaned forward. “It works on paper.”

“Try again.”

“I know you’re friends, but you’re both undefeated, both coming off strong wins, and both sitting at one eighty-five. You’re close enough in build, you used to train together, and at a similar stage of your careers, but different enough in style for the matchup to sell without looking forced.”

Friends.

That was how Grant knew us, and even that was more than most people realized. He didn’t know about high school, Sacramento, or our breakup, or how Keaton’s name could still knock the air out of me six months after we broke up. He didn’t know Keaton wasn’tjustsomeone I’d trained with. But correcting him meant explaining, and I wasn’t going to do that. Not here. Not when the first good news I’d had in months had turned into this.

“It’s forced because someone had to know enough about us to deliberately put our names together.”

“Emotionally, maybe. Professionally, no.”

I let out a short laugh. “That supposed to help?”

“No. It’s just the truth.”

I pushed out of the chair and paced toward the door before turning back. “They know I trained at Titan?”

“They do.”

“And they know Keaton currently trains there?”

“Yes.”

My hand closed over the back of the chair. “Devon Marshall.”

Grant arched a brow. “What about him?”