Page 31 of Ignition

My hands let go of her wrists and dropped to my sides, and her fingers whispered off my chest, falling loose in front of her, before she worried them into knots.

“You might wanna stop ignoring me, then,” I said, like I was doing her a favour. The blood rose to a throbbing rhythm in my ears, but the alarm bells were louder.

I teetered on a precipice, half of me scrambling back, the other peering over the cliffside, wondering what the fall would taste like.

My jaw locked up like granite, teeth aching as I forced myself to walk away. I didn’t wait for her response. Couldn’t. I kept on dragging leaden legs through tar, terrified of what I might do otherwise.

All because of a little scholarship student who couldn’t keep her mouth shut around me. She shouldn’t even have registered—but the low hum in my bones disagreed.

Pull. Static. Hunger.

Light reflected off the dark oak panels and leather seats of The Rook as the incredibly talented bartender tossed bottles in the air like they were unbreakable. People came in just to watch him work, but the impeccably dressed waitresses and their dazzling smiles were nothing to scoff at either.

Everyone was done up in that kind of effortless elegance, from the perfectly cut suits to the high polish of crystal glasses. This was my domain. This was where I belonged. Mia was a speck of dirt I needed to wipe from my life—and fast.

“—but that little tuft of hair,” Matthew chortled, cutting through the static of my thoughts, his pale face ruddy with drink and laughter.

“Yeah, I’d just shave it.” Liam smothered a wince behind an easy chuckle.

While Professor Thorne’s hair was rather unfortunate, something sharper than the aged whiskey sliced through me.

“I wanna see you guys achieve as much. And tell me if you give a fuck about your hair then,” I said smoothly over the rim of my glass.

A heavy silence hung around us, but I didn’t dispel it.

Their expressions shifted to thoughtful, and a few slow nods followed.

“You know he might take a few of us on a real case?” Tiffany offered, a conspiratorial smile tugging at her red-painted mouth.

My body inched forward of its own accord.

“Is that right?” Liam drawled, trying for casual, but the sharp glimmer in his eyes said otherwise.

“How many?” I feigned boredom as well, when deep down, I would’ve done close to anything for a chance to work with him.

“No deets yet. I’ll let you know.”

Her smile held a bit too much innuendo for my taste. The whiskey soured in my mouth as her unspoken words crept down my spine, “You’ll need to pay for this. One way or another.”

It hit me like a freight train, why Mia had crawled under my skin—she didn’t want shit from me. If anything, she wanted nothing to do with me. Her reactions were brutally honest, a drug engineered specifically for people like me.

I blinked, shut the thought out, and took a long drag of whiskey, the need for a smoke roiling under my ribs like a living thing.

“That would be sick,” Matthew beamed, mercifully pulling me out of my spiral.

Something bright and fizzy chased away earlier’s urge to vomit. Working on a case with a real team… I could almost taste it.

“I don’t see you mocking his hair now,” I teased, mouth curling with amusement.

“Yeah, well…” he chuckled, his expression turning sheepish, warm eyes crinkling at the corners.

We all burst into laughter.

As one, our gazes turned to check on Oliver, our buddy who’d recently been dumped. His mission for the night was simple: strike up a casual conversation. But so far, it had been a disaster. I couldn’t tell what sealed his fate: his ears, flushed scarlet with nerves, or the obvious desperation in his eyes.

He shuffled away from the bar with his tail as good as tucked between his legs, and I smothered a weary sigh.

“So, before you put that bike in hibernation… can I have a ride?” Tiffany asked, the proprietary purr in her voice nearly giving me whiplash.