Page 3 of Try Line Hearts
Byrne turned.
Kaine stood a few paces away, grin easy, posture loose, eyes bright with something that felt dangerously like interest. His accent curledaround the vowels—New Zealand by way of somewhere sunnier than Dublin had ever been.
“I hear you’re the one to beat,” Kaine said. “Thought I’d start at the top.”
Byrne swallowed.
“You don’t hold back,” Byrne said, keeping his voice level.
Kaine’s gaze flicked over him—not a stare, not anything anyone else would’ve clocked. Just a brief, assessing sweep: the armband snug against Byrne’s bicep, the set of his shoulders, the way he carried himself like space made room for him whether it wanted to or not. It lasted barely a second.
It was enough.
Kaine’s brows lifted, expression easy, curious. “Do you?”
Byrne felt it then—that familiar tightening, the one that came when someone saw more than they were meant to. He kept his face still. Captains didn’t react.
“Never,” he said.
The corner of Kaine’s mouth tilted, like he’d been expecting that answer. Like he’d hoped for it.
“Good,” Kaine said. The grin spread—not cocky, not sharp. Open. Unbothered. Infuriatingly warm. “Hate wasting time figuring people out.”
Byrne’s jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. “You’ll find we’re efficient.”
“I like efficiency,” Kaine replied, tone mild. “Means everyone shows their cards early.”
There it was.
Not flirtation—not something you could point at and name—but a shared understanding slipping between the words. Kaine wasn’t asking who Byrne was on paper. He was asking how hard he’d push back. How much he’d give when pressed.
Kaine took a step closer, rolling his shoulders loose, readying himself. His voice dropped just slightly—not quieter, just closer.
“Then tackle me like youmeanit.”
It wasn’t sexual. Not technically. Kaine had no idea who he was talking to, not really.
But Byrne’s body didn’t care about technicalities.
Heat slid through him like recognition, sudden and disorienting, as if something ancient had woken up and stretched. His pulse jumped. His palms tingled inside his gloves. He hated himself for it immediately.
He nodded once, sharp. “Set.”
Kaine’s eyes held his for a beat longer than necessary—bright, intent, unreadable.
Then the whistle blew.
Kaine hit him like a dropped stone—low, explosive, technically perfect. The impact rattled Byrne’s teeth; his back smacked the turf hard enough to knock the breath from his lungs.
Not the hardest hit of his career.
But the most startling.
Kaine popped up effortlessly. “You alive down there?”
Byrne dragged in air and growled, “Again.”
They reset.
