Page 11 of Cross Ice

“Yeah,” I agreed, because I didn’t have words either.

He pressed a kiss to the top of my head, and my gut twisted. This was dangerous. This was exactly the kind of thing that led to getting hurt.

But his heartbeat was steady under my ear, his hands were warm on my skin, and I let myself drift off anyway.

I woke up to weak light leaking through the floor-to-ceiling windows and Nico already awake beside me, propped up on one elbow, watching me with a soft expression that made my stomach flip.

“Morning,” he said, voice rough with sleep.

“Morning.” I sat up, suddenly very aware that I was naked in a hotel suite with a man whose last name I didn’t know. A man I’d left a club with on impulse, breaking every careful rule I’d built for myself. “What time is it?”

“A little after seven.” He ran a hand through his hair, making it stick up in different directions. “I have to be at work at nine.”

Right. Work. The real world, where I had clients to manage and a reputation to protect, and a carefully constructed life that didn’t include reckless decisions in expensive hotel rooms.

What had I been thinking?

I hadn’t been thinking. That was the problem. I’d just… wanted. And look where that had gotten me.

“I should probably get going, then,” I said, looking around for my clothes. Needing distance, needing to get out of there before the full weight of what I’d done settled over me.

“Wait.” He caught my wrist gently. “Let me order coffee first? I don’t want you to think I’m kicking you out.”

The genuine concern in his expression made my chest loosen despite my better judgment. “Okay. Coffee would be good.”

He called room service and ordered coffee and pastries, and we sat together in the plush hotel robes the suite provided, eating croissants and drinking coffee that was better than anything I made at home.

It felt intimate. Dangerous.

“Last night was great,” Nico said, meeting my eyes with that confidence I’d noticed from the start. “I want to see you again.”

Not a question. A statement.

My heart did a complicated turn in my chest. “You do?”

“Yeah.” He pulled out his phone. “Give me your number.”

Every self-preservation instinct I had screamed at me to say no. This was supposed to be one night. Nothing more.

But the chemistry between us had been undeniable. And the way he looked at me, steady, sure, like he’d already decided we weren’t done, made butterflies swirl in my gut.

I reached for my phone. “Yeah,” I said quietly. “Okay.”

We exchanged numbers, and he smiled with a genuine, bright smile that transformed his entire face.

“I’ll text you,” he promised.

“Sure,” I said, trying not to sound too hopeful. Trying not to let myself imagine that he actually would.

After quick, separate showers, we dressed in a comfortable silence that shouldn’t exist between strangers but somehow did. Nico walked me to the elevator. Before the doors opened, he kissed me—gentle this time, sweet, different from the desperate kisses of last night.

The elevator arrived, and I stepped inside. The doors started to close, and I watched him watching me until metal and distance separated us.

As the elevator descended, I leaned against the wall and tried to process what had just happened.

I’d broken every rule I’d made for myself after Ryan.

But part of me—the part that remembered how Nico had asked before kissing me, how he’d made me laugh when I’d wanted to run—hoped he’d text.