Page 121 of Rookie Rules

Luca had used Hale, Captain, and every joke available. Rowan belonged to the private man he kept asking to meet.

For one second Rowan looked stripped of title.

Then control returned.

"Good night, Luca."

Outside, the air carried late-October cold. Luca sat in his car with the campaign folder on the passenger seat and did not start the engine.

Boreal House wanted an answer in forty-eight hours. Claire would protect what she could. The offer might become work Luca could live with, or it might not.

That decision belonged to him.

Rowan's answer belonged to a different question.

Luca had asked whether his whole self mattered more than the safety of the version that sold.

Rowan had given him approval clauses.

For the first time since the corridor kiss, Luca did not search the refusal for proof of desire.

Wanting had never been the problem.

Being chosen was.

Chapter 19: The Ex Pattern

Rowan recognized Graham Ellis by the way he stepped out of a crowd without disturbing it.

Five years had changed the cut of his suit and added gray at his temples. It had not changed the measured attention he gave whoever was speaking, or the habit of holding a glass in his left hand so his right remained free.

The Wolves Foundation reception occupied the unfinished lobby of a new community rink. Donors stood beneath exposed beams while children from the neighborhood tested synthetic shooting tiles beyond a temporary wall. Rowan had spent forty minutes shaking hands, posing for photographs, and explaining why accessible ice mattered to Northstar Bay.

His right hip had tightened during the drive. He ignored it.

Graham stood beside the chief executive of Morrow Ridge, a regional logistics company funding the second sheet. His name badge identified him as corporate counsel.

Plausible. Professional. Entirely outside Rowan's preparation.

"Rowan," Graham said when the executive introduced them.

No surprise sharpened the name. Graham offered his hand.

Rowan took it. "Graham."

The executive glanced between them. "You know each other?"

"Old community-work circles," Graham said.

A private history became acceptable public fact without hesitation.

"Graham kept three of our early equipment drives from becoming tax problems," Rowan added.

"He remembers the romance of it."

The executive laughed. Claire arrived to collect her for a photograph, leaving Rowan and Graham beside a display of floor plans and sponsorship plaques.

"You look well," Graham said.