Page 50 of Iced Out
I needed space. Movement.
The shared studio was still open, dimly lit but quiet—no one else inside. Thank God.
I crossed to the lockers in the back corner, the ones artists claimed but never really owned. Mine sat third from the end, a streak of dried paint on the edge that could’ve been anyone’s—except I knew it was mine. I’d bled indigo there once. From shaking hands. From not knowing how to stop.
I hesitated, fingers hovering over the lock. The combo came to me before I asked for it. Muscle memory. One right. Two left. One right again. Click. The door creaked open, and air whooshed out of me so fast I had to grip the metal to keep from sinking.
Everything was still here.
Sketchbooks stacked in uneven piles. Half-used tubes of oil paint. A sweatshirt I'd left behind with his last name and hockey number printed on the back. A tin of graphite pencils I hadn’t touched since the last time I drew Luke asleep on my couch. Messy. Barefoot. Home.
They hadn’t cleared it out. No one had cut the lock or claimed the supplies. I hadn’t been erased. I’d been… preserved.
Did he do this? Did Luke make sure they left it untouched?
The idea twisted through me—half agony, half comfort. He was the only one who ever made me feel seen and cared for this way. As though I was more than the hurricane in my blood. Like I could be known and still wanted.
And that was the most dangerous thing of all.
Because this ended. It always ended. When my mom lost control, when her schemes unraveled, when whatever tower she built herself into crumbled—she dragged us with her. And we ran.
She made a game of it when I was little. Pretended we were spies escaping danger, choosing new names, new houses, new lives. But that illusion shattered years ago. Now I just braced for the end of whatever place I managed to carve out.
And this place with Luke? It was never built to survive the blast.
I rested my forehead against the cool metal of the locker, fingers still gripping the edge. I’d promised myself I would never come back here. And yet here I was. Still chasing dreams. Still painting storms. Still wishing for a different ending.
My eyes fell to the pile of tubes stacked in the locker—dried caps, labels smeared with fingerprints I recognized as my own. Graphite tins, familiar brushes, half-crushed rags stiff with old color. Supplies I’d abandoned, still waiting. Still mine.
Before I could think better of it, I scooped up a handful—burnt umber, French ultramarine, titanium white—and carried them to the nearest easel. The sweatshirt with Luke’s name still hung over my shoulder, paint-stained and familiar. The smell of turpentine rushed up the second I twisted a cap, thick and sharp, like no time had passed.
The first stroke dragged shaky across the canvas. Then steadier. A sweep of blue, darker at the edges, pulling me under. My hands remembered even if my head didn’t want to. Motion took over thought. Shadows. Light. The bones of another storm clawed to life in front of me.
I painted until my breath evened out, until the ache in my chest dulled to something manageable. For a flicker of a second,the canvas didn’t look like survival—it looked like possibility. Like I could keep doing this. Make it mine.
The thought scared me more than the truth about my mom. More than Elise. Because wanting a future meant admitting I believed in one.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
LUKE
The kiss still breathed through me—mind, body, everything. I could taste her. Even after she tore out of the restaurant’s parking lot, engine screaming, as if it carried the same ache I did.
I followed behind her. Not close. Just enough to see her veer toward the coast.
The studio.
I took the next turn, forcing my hands to stay on the wheel instead of spinning it back around, pretending I hadn’t wanted to chase her down and finish what we started.
It didn’t matter.
But it did, because that kiss was burned into my skin—fast and rough and unforgiving. A hit I didn’t see coming but had taken straight to the chest. And now? I wanted to go after her.
But Elise’s voice echoed in my head:“Power shifts fast, Luke. You know that.”And there was the message from my mom that the family dinner had been moved to tonight. A weekend night. That didn’t happen unless something big was brewing.
And I didn’t believe in coincidence.
My phone buzzed. I didn’t check it. If it was Mila, I didn’t trust myself not to go to her. If it was Elise, I didn’t trust myself not to throw the damn phone into traffic.
