Page 42 of Ice Queen

Shit.

This man is dangerous to my mental health.

CHAPTER 15

Markus

Mierda⁠*, this is a horrible idea.

The thought lands approximately four seconds too late, which is how long it takes for me to round the hood of my truck. My hand shakes as I reach for the handle. Maybe one day, I’ll think something all the way through before I let the fear of someone getting hurt take over and drive, but today is obviously not that day.

Way to go, Samuels.

My fingers drum against my steering wheel as a thousand things run through my mind like a ticker board. Things like, am I going to get distracted with her here, and if I do, how am I going to focus on the game? And if I can’t focus on the game, how am I going to prove that I belong on the team, that I am serious about being here and being “better”?

What happens when I have a nightmare? Will that freak her out? Will she think less of me, knowing I’m more broken inside than she’d have ever guessed?

I’ve never had someone, other than Maggie, in my personal space. No one’s ever stayed at my house. It’s not decorated. My mom loves to tell me it doesn’t look lived in. That it’s too cold, too desolate.

But she doesn’t know that’s how I look on the inside, too.

I drink myself to sleep sometimes, and I don’t even know how Kait feels about drinking. Is she one of those people who gets weird when alcohol is involved? Did her ex drink, and will that be some sort of trigger for her?

The longer we sit in silence, the more aware of it I become. It’s not the bad kind of silence, the kind I usually fill with music loud enough to silence the demons waging war in my brain. But it’s tense, almost like she’s running through every possible way this could go wrong, too.

The city moves past in a blur, the lights fly through the windows like shooting stars, and I’m suddenly hyperaware that this is the second time we’ve been in this very situation.

The first time, though, we were halfway across the country. Her hands are folded in her lap, though she’s picking at a fraying thread in her jeans with her pinkies, just like she did then.

It’s still me, carrying her away from danger, making executive decisions, but this time, I don’t know if that’s at my own expense or not.

My truck slows to a stop at a light, and the urge to say something hits hard. Her head is turned toward the window, an expression I can’t quite read coats her face, and her eyes stay focused on something, though I’m almost positive she can see me looking at her in my reflection in the glass.

But there’s a difference in how she holds herself now. Before, she did whatever she could to get as far away from me as she could. Now, she seems relaxed, minus the nervous fidgeting. She’s not trying to hide, she’s not running. And something about that makes me pause.

“Are you proud of yourself?” I ask.

Her head slowly turns my direction, her brows furrowed as she looks at me.

“The store, are you proud?” I clarify.

A soft smile plays on her lips before she softly bites down on it, and puck me sideways, the move sends a zap of electricity straight to the dormant organ hanging out in my chest. It’s nighttime, yet being next to her still feels like standing in the sun. A testament to how far she’s come since I met her.

“Yeah,” she whispers. “I am.”

Clearing my throat, I look back at the road.

“Good, that’s good,” I say, not sure where I was taking this conversation.

“You had a lot to do with that, you know?”

The light turns green, and I gently press on the gas. My head tilts to the side, eyes cutting to her a few times before I fully focus on the drive. “What do you mean?

“You told me to build a life that I was proud of.” I see her shrug out of the corner of my eye. “Every time I thought about quitting, I remembered those words. Although I’m not going to lie, I didn’t remember your name. Did you even tell me it that night?”

I gasp, she didn’t remember my name? Wait, did I even tell her my name? “I’m hurt, good to know I meant so little to you.”

She snorts. “You were “nameless silver eyes” for two years.”