Page 17 of Ruthless Edge

Knox is looking at me with an expression I don't entirely know how to categorize. It's not the grin. It's something more direct than that.

"Remember, I mentioned that they're playing Friday," he says. "At the Anchor."

"Right."

We both follow their socials. We both like them. But I haven’t gone to one of their concerts since I stopped talking to Knox. I told myself I was just busy, but some part of me knows I just didn’t want to run into him.

"If we go, we could talk to them after the show. Pitch the gig in person. It's a better ask than a cold email from an SAB address."

He's not wrong. Cold email gets ignored. In-person ask from a familiar face, after a show they've just killed, gets a yes or at minimum a conversation.

"Fine," I say.

"Yeah?"

"Friday. But this is a working meeting, not⁠—"

"A concert."

"Not whatever you were going to say it is."

"A concert," he repeats, pleasantly. "Which it will be. And also work."

I write it in my planner. Friday, Anchor, Hacksack Blues, pitch conversation post-show. Completely professional. Completely structured. Absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the last time I went to see Hacksack Blues I was nineteen, sitting in the third row, and Knox had his shoulder against mine and laughed at every transition between songs like the band was doing it specifically for him.

That information is not relevant.

We keep working.

At some point the section goes fully quiet around us, like how library sections go quiet late in the evening when the foot traffic thins out and it's just whoever's committed enough to still be here. The overhead lights are steady and the windows behind me have gone dark and Knox has pushed his three-bullet sheet aside in favor of my binder, which he asked to look at and I handed over, and he's reading my notes with that same focused frown.

I'm watching him read my notes.

I stop doing that.

But the thing is, and I'm only admitting this internally, working with Knox is easier than I wanted it to be. He picks things up quickly. He doesn't need everything explained twice. He has opinions and he states them clearly instead of hedging, which I respect even when the opinions are wrong. When I push back on something he either argues for it or drops it, no sulking, no passive resistance. We've put together more of a framework tonight than I thought we'd get through, and it almost feels⁠—

I stop.

It almost feels like freshman year, is what it almost feels like. The two of us at a library table, building something together, the conversation coming easier than it has any right to.

I know what that led to last time.

I look back at my laptop.

Knox's phone buzzes on the table between us. We both look at it at the same time.

Laura Prescott.

Knox picks it up. He doesn't hesitate, doesn't glance at me first, just answers. "Hey."

Laura's voice comes through the speaker, cheerful and bright, the version she uses in public when she wants to sound effortless. I can hear her clearly enough from where I'm sitting.

"Finished practice?" she asks.

"Done hours ago. I'm at the library."

"Doing what?"