Page 118 of Under the Lights

Control was safe.

Control kept you from getting hurt. But lately, it had been slipping through my fingers. No matter what I did, I couldn’t hang on to it.

My phone buzzed.

I glanced down, ready to ignore it, but the preview stopped me in my tracks. No contact. No name.Again.

Unknown: Smile pretty, sweetheart. You’re being watched.

My spine snapped straight. I tilted the phone slightly away from Dom, hoping he hadn’t seen the flicker across the screen.

“Everything okay?” His voice was low but sharp. Not casual or curious, and with an underlying level of awareness that was slightly off-putting.

I forced air into my lungs, then tried to laugh, but it didn’t quite come out right. “Yeah. Spam text. One of those weird phishing things about my car’s extended warranty or whatever.”

His brow twitched up. I could feel his eyes on me, even though I kept mine locked on the book.

“You don’t have a car,” he said.

“Exactly,” I said too brightly. “Totally fake.”

Dom didn’t push. He didn’t say anything at all — just sat there beside me like a wall of quiet heat. He was patient, but his presence was heavy. It was as if he were waiting for something I wasn’t ready to give.

I didn’t mean to reach for his hand under the table. I just… did.

His fingers curled around mine without hesitation. No words were needed. There was just warmth and connection. Like we were already in sync and didn’t need to speak it aloud.

He kept showing up for me.

And what was worse — he kept onmeaningit.

Thirty Six

Sierra

Blinking slowly, I tried to get my eyes to open, my mind still hazy, muddled from sleep. The overhead fluorescents were too bright, humming with a quiet vengeance like they knew how much I hated mornings.

God, Iloathedearly mornings.

Who the hell had the idea that team meetings should be this early in the morning?

The campus halls were eerily quiet at this hour, like the world hadn’t fully woken up yet. Even the vending machine down the corridor made its usual buzz feel too loud, too alive for this hour.

It should beillegalto be awake right now, unless you were participating in extracurricular bedroom activities or stumbling home from a night out. I guess driving to the airport for a vacation was acceptable, too.

But nothing serious should be happening at this hour of the day.

A familiar, bulky figure rounded the corner down the hallway, and I involuntarily perked up.

His footsteps echoed down the linoleum like they belonged here — solid, certain — while I was still halfway dreaming. His hoodie sleeves pushed up, duffel slung across his back like some jocky morning mirage.

Fuck. When did that become a thing? With both our seasons in full swing, I barely saw him during the day anymore.

We were two trains on parallel tracks — same direction, same speed, but never crossing. Just close enough to catch the blur of each other in the periphery. Our lives were running parallel, a similar kind of madness and chaos, but never quite lining up.

I should have been happy that he wasn’t popping up everywhere like some fucking real-life whack-a-mole. But the truth was that I had gotten so used to it that it now felt like something was missing.

I pursed my lips in annoyance at the sting in my chest.

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