DANGEROUS CONTACT
1188 Words
The air between them was razor-thin.
Kaia’s hand was still on his sleeve. He hadn’t noticed until the cold stabbed through him again, fierce and punishing. The frost bit into his veins like shards of glass.
His smirk faltered.
"Let go," he said, the words quiet but edged like steel.
She didn’t.
Instead, she tilted her chin, those golden eyes narrowing as if she’d just uncovered something rare and dangerous.
"Dangerous, Mr. Eremon? You mean to scare me?"
His jaw locked. "No… I mean to save you." But the words stayed trapped behind his teeth.
Her eyes narrowed, curiosity sparking. “I’m not afraid of danger,” she murmured.
Being bold, he leaned forward, letting his gaze lock on hers. “Maybe you should be.”
The temperature in the room dipped. The glass of water beside him fogged, condensation sliding down in freezing drops. She didn’t notice, or maybe she did and simply refused to acknowledge it.
Her fingers slipped as she tried to pull away, but the fabric of his tailored sleeve caught on the thin gold bracelet at her wrist.
Eagan grabs her,
Pushing her with the curse under his breath, Eagan wrenched free, shoving her hand away so hard she stumbled back. He turned from her, doubling over slightly, one hand braced on his knee, the other clutching his chest.
His back was to her, his breath came sharp and ragged, each inhale frosting the air in front of him.
The contact didn't burn hot.
It had burned cold.
As he distanced himself free, the sound of fabric tearing broke the spell.
Tacking himself up.
"Watch yourself," he said in a calm manner. "You have no idea what you’re playing with."
Kaia startled yet intrigued. "Then enlighten me, or do you fear the touch of a woman?"
With a surprising smile.
Her challenge slid under his skin like a hook. Damn her. Damn that voice, that look.
"Leave it alone, Miss Keen."
She stepped closer, close enough for him to smell the faint trace of jasmine on her skin.
“And if I don’t?”
The cold swelled again, this time harder to control. A thin sheen of frost crept across the edge of his glass desk, all happening behind Miss Keen and Eagan could see it growing and stretching forth.
Eagan took a slow breath, forcing himself to look away before he did something reckless, before she saw too much.
He turned to the skyline view, the glass towering over the city’s glimmering lights.
Anything to keep her from seeing the frost.
Anything to keep himself from reaching for her again.
Behind him, her heels clicked softly against the polished floor. He heard the whisper of her breathing, steady and deliberate, as if she was calculating her next move.
“Mr. Eremon” Her voice was low, threaded with something he couldn’t quite name. “You avoid my questions, you shove me across the room… yet you look at me like you’re starving.”
A deep breath.
"What with all this seduction, Miss Keen? All this, for a mere art piece, it must be priceless. Since you came all the way here by yourself, I'll make it less painful. How about a trade? "
Eagan kept his distance, every movement precise. Kaia noticed. She suspects she has charmed the tech mogul.
"Tell me, Mr. Eremon," she countered, "What does a tech genius want with an ancient artifact?
“I am a collector of fine art,” Eagan said, his voice smooth, unhurried. Drawn to anything with history in its bones. The older it is, the more it speaks to me. "My style is unapologetically vintage, timeless, elegant, and touched with the charm of another era.”
Kaia took one last step toward him, close enough for the heat of her breath to ghost over his jaw.
“Careful, Mr. Eremon,” she murmured. “You’re starting to make me curious.”
For the briefest flicker, his eyes darkened no, deepened as if something ancient and cold stirred behind them.
Kaia smiled like she’d just won something.
Eagan turned away before she could see it, the faint frost already creeping along his left arm.
“If this wasn’t our first encounter,” she teased, “I’d think you had a crush on me.”
He laughed, sharp and sudden. “Don’t kid yourself.”
She drifted closer. “You keep your distance like I’m the danger in this room… but I think it’s the other way around.”
He didn’t answer.
Kaia’s smile didn’t waver, but inside, she was cataloging every shift in his expression, every guarded glance.
He didn’t remember her. Good.
That night, years ago, had been cloaked in shadows and chaos. A different city. A different name. She’d been close enough to watch him freeze the air in his lungs and close enough to feel the way his power made the world hold its breath.
She had walked away before he could notice her.
And now here he was, inches away, oblivious.
She decided she’d keep it that way. For now.
Instead, she slid the slim black envelope back onto the desk between them and tapped it twice. “What I want is simple.”
His gaze flicked to the envelope, then back to her.
“A private viewing of the artifact in your vault,” she said, her voice low and steady. Forty-eight hours of access. In return, I complete it.”
He went very still. “Complete it? What?”
Kaia’s smile curved slowly. “Open it.”
When he didn’t move, she stepped in too close, slipping two fingers with a card into his breast pocket. The brush of her knuckles against his chest sent a surge of ice lancing through his veins. Behind him, frost feathered across the glass without her noticing or maybe she did.
The envelope felt light in his hand, almost insignificant… until he slid a thumb under the flap.
Inside: a single photograph. His obsidian stone. A crescent-shaped void circled in red.
Beneath it: a small velvet sleeve.
He tipped it over. A thin, rune-carved shard slid into his palm warm. Impossibly warm. Like it didn’t belong in this world.
The mark on his chest where his heart is seared.
The warmth bled out in a heartbeat.
Ice ripped up his arm, jagged and merciless, crawling beneath his skin like frozen lightning. The air between them snapped, a sudden, unnatural chill swallowing the room.
Kaia’s gaze darted to the desk just as frost bloomed across its glass surface, swallowing it whole in seconds.
“Eagan…” she breathed.
The glass of water beside him shattered, exploding into frozen shards. Frost spiraled out of his shoes, racing over the polished floor toward her.
Her breath caught. She stepped back too late.
The cold wrapped around her ankles, a creeping, glittering snare.
His gaze locked on hers. For one charged moment, the world narrowed to the sound of the ice spreading, cracking, claiming.
Then... everything stopped.
The air detonated.
The door slammed open so hard the frame rattled, a thunderclap in the frozen stillness.
Boom.
- Writer
