Jordan ambushed me in our dorm room on Wednesday night.

I was deep into problem sets, my desk lamp creating a pool of artificial daylight in our otherwise dark room, when she materialized beside me with two cups of coffee and a determined expression.

"Nope," she said, setting one cup down on my textbook.

"I'm busy."

"You're always busy. That's not the same thing as being productive." She perched on the edge of my desk, blocking my view of differential equations. "When's the last time you ate something that wasn't granola bars and spite?"

"Spite is very nutritious."

"Mira."

I sighed and sat back, my spine protesting the movement. How long had I been hunched over this desk? The clock said 11:47 PM, which meant... six hours. Maybe seven.

Fuck.

"There's a student art exhibition tomorrow night," Jordan said. "Opening reception. Free wine, fancy cheese, the whole pretentious package."

"I have—"

"If you say you have studying to do, I'm going to physically drag you out of this room."

I looked at her. She looked back, completely serious.

"You wouldn't."

"Test me."

The thing about Jordan was that she absolutely would. Last semester, she'd literally carried me out of the library during finals week because I'd been there for thirty-six hours straight and started hallucinating that the circulation desk was judging me.

To be fair, it probably was.

"Fine," I said. "One hour. Then I'm coming back."

"We'll see about that." Jordan grinned and tossed something at me—a flyer for the exhibition. "Besides, I already told Kai we'd meet him there."

My hands stilled on the paper.

"You what?"

"Relax. I ran into him at the coffee shop this afternoon. He looked like shit, by the way. Like, 'hasn't slept in three days and is avoiding his problems' kind of shit. Very on-brand for him." She examined her nails with studied casualness. "Anyway, I may have mentioned this exhibition features some of his former classmates from Westbrook. And I may have strongly suggested he should go."

"Jordan—"

"And then I may have told him you were coming, so he'd actually show up instead of spending another night getting drunk in his apartment and feeling sorry for himself."

I stared at her. "How do you know that's what he's been doing?"

"Because that's what self-destructive rich boys always do when they're having feelings they don't want to examine." She slid off my desk. "Also, his roommate is dating my lab partner, and apparently Kai's been playing the same Radiohead album on repeat for three days. Which is basically a cry for help in pretentious white boy."

Despite everything, I felt my lips twitch. "You're meddling."

"I'm facilitating." Jordan headed for her closet. "Now, are you going to wear that?" She gestured at my study outfit—leggings and an oversized sweatshirt with mysterious stains that might have been coffee or might have been my will to live.

"What's wrong with this?"

"Nothing, if you're planning to seduce him with your complete disregard for personal hygiene."

"I'm not trying to seduce anyone."

"Uh-huh." She pulled out a black dress I'd forgotten I owned. "Wear this. It makes you look like you have your life together, which is a lie, but a convincing one."

---

The gallery was in the university's new arts building, all exposed brick and industrial lighting that probably cost more than my entire education. I felt out of place the moment we walked in, surrounded by people who looked like they understood art, who could say things like "the composition speaks to post-modern alienation" without sounding like pretentious assholes.

Jordan, of course, fit right in. She always did.

"Wine?" she asked, already heading for the drinks table.

"I shouldn't—"

"That wasn't a question."

She returned with two plastic cups of white wine that tasted like regret and poor life choices. I sipped it anyway, letting my gaze drift over the crowd.

I spotted him immediately.

Kai stood in front of a large abstract painting, hands shoved deep in his pockets, shoulders rigid. He wore all black—jeans, t-shirt, jacket—like he was attending a funeral. His hair was messier than usual, and even from across the room, I could see the tension in his jaw.

He looked beautiful and miserable in equal measure.

"Go," Jordan said quietly.

"I don't—"

"Mira. Go."

I went.

He didn't notice me approaching. He was too focused on the painting—a riot of blues and greens, abstract shapes that might have been water or might have been sky or might have been the space between breathing and drowning.

It was stunning.

"Hey," I said softly.

Kai startled, turning to look at me. Something flickered in his eyes—surprise, then pleasure, then that careful blankness he wore like armor.

"Hey yourself." His gaze traveled down, then up. "You look nice."

"Jordan's doing. I wanted to wear my organic chemistry hoodie, but apparently that's not gallery-appropriate."

"Shame. I bet you rock the periodic table."

"It's my best look."

A ghost of a smile touched his lips, but it didn't reach his eyes. He turned back to the painting.

We stood in silence for a moment. Around us, people laughed and chatted, their voices creating a white noise backdrop that somehow made our silence feel more intimate.

"This is Marcus Chen's work," Kai said finally. "We were in the same year at Westbrook."

I studied the painting again, trying to see what Kai saw. "It's beautiful."

"It's safe."

The word came out harsh, bitter. I glanced at him, but he was still staring at the canvas.

"Safe how?"

"It's technically perfect. Good use of color theory, solid composition, the kind of thing that looks impressive in a portfolio." He tilted his head. "But it's not saying anything. It's just... pretty."

"And that's bad?"

"It's boring." Kai moved to the next painting, and I followed. This one was darker, slashes of red and black across pale canvas. "This is Sarah Kim's. She always had perfect technique. Never took a single risk."

There was something in his voice—not quite jealousy, not quite anger. Something more complicated.

Longing, maybe. Or regret.

"You could have been here," I said quietly. "If you'd stayed at Westbrook."

His laugh was sharp enough to cut. "Yeah. Maybe."

"What happened?"

"Jordan didn't tell you?" He didn't look at me. "I figured she would have done a full background check by now."

"She tried. I didn't let her."

That got his attention. He turned to face me fully, and I was struck again by how unfair it was that someone could look that good while clearly falling apart. His eyes were shadowed, like he hadn't been sleeping. Paint stained his right hand—fresh paint, I noticed. So he'd been working.

"Why not?" he asked.

"Because if you wanted me to know, you'd tell me yourself."

Something shifted in his expression. Softened.

"Come here," he said.

He led me through the gallery, past clusters of people discussing technique and meaning, past wine tables and cheese plates that probably cost more than my weekly grocery budget. We ended up in a smaller room, less crowded, where larger pieces hung.

Kai stopped in front of a massive canvas—at least six feet tall, maybe eight feet wide. It was a portrait, but abstract, the figure suggested rather than defined. Blues and purples and deep greens, with gold leaf catching the light like stars. The face was turned away, dissolving into brushstrokes that might have been water or might have been wings.

It was breathtaking.

"This is what I wanted to do," Kai said quietly. "Not technically perfect. Not safe. Just... true."

I couldn't look away from the painting. There was something raw about it, something that made my chest ache.

"What stopped you?"

"My senior thesis critique." His voice was flat, carefully neutral. "At Westbrook, your final presentation is a big deal. Industry professionals, gallery owners, critics. Everyone who matters shows up to see the new talent."

I waited, not pushing.

"Professor Richard Chambers was the lead critic that year. He's kind of a legend—discovered three artists who are now in MoMA, written books on contemporary art theory, the whole deal." Kai's hands clenched in his pockets. "He took one look at my thesis work and eviscerated it. Said it was derivative. Soulless. That I was coasting on name recognition and family money instead of developing actual talent."

"Kai—"

"He said it in front of everyone. Gallery owners I'd been courting, critics who were supposed to review my work, other students." His jaw tightened. "He said the kindest thing I could do for the art world was find another career before I wasted anyone else's time."

The words hung in the air between us, sharp and cruel.

I thought about being twenty-two years old, standing in front of everyone who mattered, and having someone tear apart the thing you'd poured your soul into. Having them do it publicly, deliberately, with an audience.

"What did you do?"

"I thanked him for his feedback." Kai's smile was bitter. "Then I went back to my studio and destroyed everything I'd been working on. Every canvas, every sketch. Took me three hours to tear it all apart."

My chest hurt. "Kai."

"I left Westbrook the next day. Transferred to state, changed my major to art history, and decided that if I couldn't create, I could at least study what other people made." He finally looked at me. "Safer that way."

There it was again. That word. Safe.

I understood it now—the deliberate failure, the careless attitude, the way he treated his education like a joke. If you didn't try, you couldn't fail. If you didn't care, it couldn't hurt.

But he did care. I could see it in the way he looked at these paintings, in the fresh paint on his hands, in the careful way he said "wanted" instead of "want."

"He was wrong," I said.

Kai blinked. "What?"

"Professor Chambers. He was wrong."

"You don't know that. You've never seen my work."

"I've seen you teach color theory by drawing on napkins. I've watched you explain composition using coffee cups and textbooks. I've seen your face when you look at art." I stepped closer. "You're not soulless. You're not derivative. You're just scared."

His breath caught. We were close now, close enough that I could smell cedar and turpentine, close enough to see the paint stain on his collar that he'd missed.

"You can't know that," he said, but his voice was rough.

"Yes, I can."

The words came out fiercer than I intended. Around us, the gallery hummed with conversation and clinking glasses, but it felt like we were alone, suspended in our own moment.

"What would you have done differently?" I asked. "This painting—if it was yours, what would you change?"

Kai stared at me like I'd asked him to solve quantum physics. "Why does it matter?"

"Because I want to know. What would Kai Ashford do with this canvas?"

For a long moment, he didn't answer. Then, slowly, he turned back to the painting.

"The figure's too centered," he said quietly. "Too balanced. I'd shift it off-axis, create tension. And the gold leaf—it's decorative, but it could be integral. Use it to trace the dissolution, make it part of the transformation instead of just accent." His hand moved unconsciously, sketching in the air. "The blues are too uniform. I'd add warmth in the shadows, make it unsettling. Beautiful but wrong, like looking at something through water."

I watched his face as he spoke, watched the way his eyes lit up, the way his whole body changed when he talked about creating instead of just observing.

This was the Kai that Victoria saw. The one he kept buried under sarcasm and deliberate failure.

"You should paint again," I said.

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because what if Chambers was right?" The words burst out of him, raw and desperate. "What if I try again and it's still soulless? Still derivative? What if I'm just a rich kid who thought he had talent because everyone was too polite to tell him the truth?"

"And what if you're brilliant and you're wasting it because one asshole had a bad day and took it out on you?"

"Mira—"

"What if you're so terrified of failing that you're failing on purpose just to control the narrative?"

His eyes widened. "That's not—"

"Isn't it?"

We stared at each other. The air between us felt electric, charged with something I couldn't name. His chest rose and fell rapidly, and I realized mine was doing the same.

"You're infuriating," he said.

"You're a coward."

"You don't understand—"

"I understand perfectly. You're so scared of being hurt again that you'd rather hurt yourself first. You'd rather destroy your own potential than risk someone else doing it for you."

"Stop—"

"Make me."

The words hung in the air for half a heartbeat.

Then Kai moved.

One moment we were standing apart, the next his hand was on my waist and my back was against the gallery wall and his mouth was on mine.

The kiss was nothing like I'd imagined. Not soft or tentative or questioning. It was desperate and fierce and tasted like wine and something darker, something that felt like falling.

His other hand came up to cup my face, thumb brushing my cheekbone with a gentleness that contradicted the intensity of his kiss. I made a sound I'd probably be embarrassed about later and grabbed his jacket, pulling him closer, closer, until there was no space between us.

Cedar and turpentine and heat. His body was solid against mine, all lean muscle and barely controlled tension. When I opened my mouth, he groaned, and the sound went straight through me.

This was dangerous. This was stupid. This was everything I'd been trying not to want.

I didn't care.

His hand slid from my waist to my hip, fingers pressing through the thin fabric of my dress, and I forgot how to breathe. Forgot where we were. Forgot everything except the taste of him and the way he was kissing me like I was air and he was drowning.

Then, suddenly, he pulled back.

"Fuck." The word came out ragged. "Fuck, I'm sorry."

He stepped away, and the loss of contact felt like a physical blow. His chest was heaving, his hair even more disheveled than before, his lips swollen from kissing.

He looked wrecked.

"Kai—"

"I can't." He ran a hand through his hair, backing up another step. "I can't do this. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—"

"Don't." My voice came out sharper than I intended. "Don't you dare apologize for that."

"Mira, you don't understand—"

"Then explain it to me."

But he was already moving, already retreating into the crowd. I pushed off the wall, my legs unsteady, my lips still tingling.

"Kai, wait—"

He disappeared into the cluster of people near the main gallery entrance.

I stood there, alone in front of the painting he'd analyzed, my heart hammering against my ribs. My fingers touched my lips, still feeling the ghost of his kiss.

Around me, the gallery continued its elegant hum. People discussed art and drank wine and had normal conversations, completely unaware that my entire world had just tilted on its axis.

Jordan appeared at my elbow, two fresh cups of wine in hand. She took one look at my face and whistled low.

"So," she said. "That looked intense."

I took the wine and downed half of it in one gulp.

"Understatement," I managed.

"Want to talk about it?"

"Not even a little bit."

"Want to get drunk and make questionable decisions?"

I looked at the spot where Kai had vanished, my lips still burning, my whole body still humming with want and confusion and something that felt dangerously like hope.

"Yeah," I said. "That sounds perfect."

But even as I followed Jordan back to the wine table, even as I tried to focus on her chatter and the art and anything except the feeling of Kai's mouth on mine, I couldn't shake the image of his face right before he'd kissed me.

Desperate and terrified and wanting.

Like he was about to make a mistake he couldn't take back.

Like maybe, just maybe, he didn't want to take it back at all.