THE CAPTAIN'S DARK OBSESSION

THE KNEE THAT COULD END HIM

Told myself I wasn't gonna be nervous about this, whatever. Lasted about as long as it took me to pull into the parking garage under Ironline and see the black SUV sitting right there in the spot closest to the elevator, engine running, windows so dark I couldn't even tell if anyone was in it or not. Just sat there a sec. Hands on the wheel. Telling myself it's fine, it's just another client, another knee, another body that needs fixing, I've done this a hundred times. I've worked on guys twice his size, bigger guys, worse injuries, guys who screamed the whole session and guys who didn't say one word for six weeks straight. This is nothing. This is a Tuesday. Said that part out loud actually, alone, in my car, like saying it enough times would just make it true.

Except it wasn't nothing, obviously, or I wouldn't be sitting here writing this down at midnight with my hands still kind of shaking, coffee gone cold on the counter, and no actual plan for sleeping tonight.

Anyway. Had a contract with my clinic's name on the front page and rent due Friday and neither one of those things cared even a little bit how I felt about my new client, so up I went. Parked crooked, didn't even care, didn't have it in me to fix it.

Elevator took forever, or felt like it anyway, one of those too-fancy ones that's way slower than it has any right being, all brushed steel and some weird faint eucalyptus smell, who even thought of that, an elevator that smells like a spa. Kept staring at the floor numbers instead of my own reflection cause I already knew what my face looked like, didn't need the reminder. Tight. Careful. Kind of the same face I had three years ago walking out of that press conference except back then at least I had adrenaline going for me, some actual fire under it. Today just nerves and a laminated badge some woman in a team polo handed me at the desk, barely even looked up from her tablet doing it, then walked me back through like four hallways to this gym.

And I mean private. Private like the whole thing was bigger than my entire clinic, maybe twice over, maybe more, with equipment I recognized from catalogs I'd never actually clicked buy on because who has that kind of money, and a wall of glass looking out over the whole city like it was nothing, like views like that just come standard.

He was already there when I walked in.

Don't know what I expected honestly. Some version of the guy from three years back maybe, the cocky rookie who talked to reporters like he was doing them a favor by existing, all teeth and swagger, the kind of confidence that made me wanna throw something at a TV screen back then. Instead there's this man sitting on the edge of a treatment table, no shirt, just staring at the wall like it owed him money. Knee wrapped so tight I could see the muscle straining against the brace from across the whole room, hadn't even made it all the way in yet. Not a good sign, any of it. Didn't say that part out loud though. Just filed it away, the way you do.

Didn't look up right away so I got a second, just one, to actually look at him properly. Probably shouldn't have. Did it anyway. Bigger than I remembered, broader through the shoulders, like three years put actual mass on him instead of just age. Scar through one eyebrow now that definitely wasn't there before, I would've remembered that, I remember every single detail about that press conference whether I want to or not.

Then he looked up and whatever I thought I saw a second ago, gone. Just, gone. Cold again, like a door shutting.

"You're late."

"I'm four minutes early," I said, and dropped my bag on the floor way harder than I needed to, which, fine, whatever, petty, I know, sue me.

"Four minutes late to me showing up early." Totally flat voice. No heat in it anywhere, which somehow made it worse than if he'd just yelled, because yelling I know how to handle. "I don't like waiting."

"Then maybe don't hire a physio you clearly can't stand."

Something moved across his face for like half a second, quick, there and gone. Not anger exactly. Something else, something I couldn't name fast enough before it disappeared again.

"I didn't hire you because I like you, Ms. Brooks."

"Elena's fine."

"I didn't hire you because I like you, Elena." Said it slow, like he was testing it out, seeing how it sat in his own mouth, or something. "I hired you because you're the best in the country and I don't have time right now to be second best at anything."

Almost laughed. Didn't, but almost. "That's the closest thing to a compliment I've ever gotten out of you."

"Don't get used to it."

Went and grabbed his chart instead of answering that one, mostly because if I kept looking at him one more second I was gonna say something I'd regret, and I need this contract too badly to blow the whole thing up on day one over pride, my pride specifically, which has cost me plenty before. His knee was worse than what the file said, way worse, and whoever'd been managing his recovery before me clearly cared more about getting him back on the ice fast than getting him back right, cutting corners in ways that made my stomach turn a little reading it. Felt this flash of anger on his behalf, actual anger, which, again, not my job, not my place, definitely not something I should be feeling about a guy I've known for exactly six minutes, but there it was anyway, sitting right in my chest.

"Who cleared you to keep training on this."

"Team doctor."

"Your team doctor should lose his license."

"He's not usually wrong."

"He's wrong now." Looked straight at him. "You keep pushing it like this and you're not looking at missing a season anymore. You're looking at missing a career. The whole thing. Gone."

Didn't say anything back to that one. Jaw did this thing, tightened up then let go, and for like one second, one single second, I actually saw how scared he was underneath all of it, real fear, before the wall slammed right back down so fast I half convinced myself I'd made the whole thing up in my head.

"Fix it," he said.

"Not that simple."

"Make it that simple."

"You don't get to bark orders at me like I'm one of your teammates." Came out sharper than I meant it to, oops, whatever. "I'm not here to make you feel like you're still in control of something. I'm here to rebuild a knee that's one bad landing away from ending everything you've spent your whole life building. You want it done right, you're gonna have to trust the process. Maybe even trust me, God forbid."

He just looked at me a really long second. Actually looked, not the polite kind people do when they're being nice about it, more like trying to read something he used to know how to read and mostly forgot. My skin went warm under my scrubs, ugh, extremely inconvenient timing, last thing I need is my own body forming opinions about Asher Knight's eyes, of all the things it could pick.

"Trust isn't really my thing," he said, quiet, almost missed it entirely.

"Yeah. Got that impression three years ago."

Didn't mean to say that part out loud, just slipped out, the way old stuff does when you're standing too close to the person who caused it in the first place. Watched it land on him too, actually watched it hit, his whole body changing in real time, shoulders squaring up, that cold mask coming right back down like a visor.

"We're not talking about that."

"Fine by me."

"I mean it, Elena."

"I said fine." Grabbed the resistance band off the cart harder than I needed to, snapped it a little just from how I yanked it. "Lie back. We're starting with passive range of motion and you are going to hate every single second of it and you're going to do it anyway because that's just how this works now, okay, that's the deal."

Laid back without saying anything else. Next forty minutes neither of us talked about anything that actually mattered, just the work, the counting, the little grunts he refused to let turn into actual sounds no matter how bad it clearly hurt. Walked him through it, watched him grit his teeth through pain he wouldn't make a single noise about, not one, and I tried, genuinely tried, not to notice the way his eyes kept tracking me around the room the whole time. Like he was cataloguing something. Like this wasn't even the first time he'd studied me this close, this careful, this specific, which, far as I knew, it was. Had to be. First time. Only explanation that made any sense.

By the time we wrapped my hands ached and my whole professional composure was basically hanging on by one thread, one fraying little thread. Packed up my stuff, gave him a quick rundown on icing and elevation that he's probably not gonna follow even a little, and headed for the door already planning out my entire drive home around convincing myself this was a totally normal, totally manageable work arrangement. Sure. Fine. Totally normal. Great start.

"Elena."

Stopped in the doorway. Hadn't moved off the table at all, still sitting there, bare chested, bruised up all down one side, watching me with some expression I honestly could not read no matter how hard I tried.

"Same time tomorrow." Not really a question.

"Fine."

Made it all the way to my car before I let myself breathe right, actual breath, the kind you don't realize you've been holding. Made it all the way home, all the way through traffic and two red lights I definitely rolled through, before I let myself think about the way he'd said my name, like it meant something to him, like some word he'd practiced saying alone in a room by himself a hundred times before he ever got the chance to say it to my actual face. Which is a weird, weird thought to have about a client. But there it is anyway. Can't unthink it now.

Didn't even find the envelope till midnight, going through my mail on the kitchen counter, still smelling like cold arena air and rubbing alcohol, hair still up in the same clip from six this morning. Plain white envelope, no return address, my name in these careful block letters like whoever wrote it took their time doing it. Inside there's a stack of cash thick enough to make my hands actually shake holding it, plus one line typed out on an index card, no signature, nothing.

For your mother's bill. It's handled. Don't look for who sent it.

Just stood there in my kitchen holding money that matched, almost down to the exact dollar, the amount I'd spent four years quietly paying off, four years of skipping stuff I wanted so that number would shrink. No idea how anybody could've known that figure. No idea how anybody gets that precise unless they'd been watching close enough the whole time, knowing exactly what I owed and exactly when to send it.

Phone buzzed on the counter right then. Unknown number.

Almost didn't look. Wish now, more than almost anything, that I hadn't.

A photo. Me. Standing right there in my own kitchen, curtains wide open behind me, taken from somewhere across the street judging by the angle. Timestamped four minutes ago.