His Enemy, Her Desire

Proof

They didn’t stop running until the outdoor bleachers swallowed them in shadow.

Aria’s lungs burned. The borrowed skates still hung from her fingers by the laces, thumping against her thigh with every step. Kane’s hand stayed locked around her wrist the entire way, grip hard enough to leave marks she would find later. Only when they were crouched beneath the lowest row of metal seats did he let go.

He pulled the hard drive and the ledger from his hoodie and set them on the cold concrete between them like evidence at a trial.

“Talk,” Aria said. Her voice came out thinner than she wanted. “What the hell just happened?”

Kane flipped the ledger open under the weak security light that reached them. Columns of numbers. Names. Dates. Transfer codes that meant nothing to her and everything to him.

“Your boyfriend’s been busy,” he said quietly. “These are betting ledgers. Underground. High stakes. Players, games, injuries—everything that can be bought.” He tapped one line with a blood-smeared finger. “That’s my name. Three different games last season where the line moved right before I ‘underperformed.’”

Aria stared. “Ethan wouldn’t—”

“Ethan did.” Kane’s voice stayed low, but the edge in it could have cut ice. “Or someone close to him. The hard drive will say which.” He looked at her then, really looked. “You still want to defend him?”

The question sat between them like a live wire.

Aria’s mind scrambled backward through every late night, every cancelled plan, every time Ethan had come home smelling like stress and secrets instead of her. She had told herself it was the pressure of the season. The scouts. The future.

She had never considered money.

“I need to see it,” she said.

Kane studied her for a long second, then nodded once. “Not here. Too open.” He shoved the ledger and drive back into his hoodie. “My place. It’s closer than your dorm and no roommate to ask questions.”

“I’m not going to your place.”

“You just watched me break a man’s ribs for a bag of proof that your boyfriend is dirty.” Kane stood, offering a hand she didn’t take. “You’re already in it, transfer. Walking away now only makes you look guilty when security finds that guy and starts asking who else was on the ice at two in the morning.”

The logic was ugly and airtight.

Aria followed him.

Kane’s off-campus apartment sat above a closed pro shop three blocks from the rink complex. The stairs were narrow. The door had three locks. Inside, the place was cleaner than she expected—minimal furniture, a massive TV, a kitchen that looked rarely used, and a single framed photo on the wall of a much younger Kane with a woman who shared his eyes.

He didn’t explain the photo.

He dropped the ledger on the kitchen island, plugged the hard drive into a laptop that looked military-grade, and started typing with blood still drying on his knuckles.

Aria hovered near the counter, arms wrapped around herself. “Your hand.”

“It’s fine.”

“It’s not.” She opened drawers until she found a clean dish towel and a bottle of vodka that was clearly not for drinking. “Sit.”

Kane glanced up, surprised enough that the hard set of his mouth loosened. He sat on a barstool. Aria took his hand, poured vodka over the split skin, and ignored the way his fingers flexed once in her grip.

“You’ve done this before,” he said.

“Sports psychology major. I’ve taped more ankles than I can count.” She kept her eyes on the cut. “Plus my dad used to box. Blood doesn’t scare me.”

“Good.” His voice dropped. “Because there’s about to be more of it before this is over.”

She wrapped the towel tight and tied it off. When she looked up, Kane was watching her face instead of his hand.

“Why help me?” she asked.

“Because the second you stepped onto that ice tonight you stopped being Ethan’s girlfriend and started being a witness.” He turned the laptop so she could see the screen. “And because I don’t like people who sell games. Especially when the games they’re selling have my name on them.”

Files bloomed open—spreadsheets, chat logs, encrypted folders that Kane’s software cracked with unsettling speed. Names she recognized from the team roster. Dollar amounts that made her stomach turn. And then a folder labeled simply COLE.

Inside were screenshots of messages.

Ethan.

Talking about “controlling the narrative.”

Talking about “keeping Rivera off his game.”

Talking about “the girl” as a possible distraction if needed.

Aria’s blood went cold.

Kane scrolled slowly, giving her time to read every word.

“He knew,” she whispered. “He knew you’d come after me.”

“He hoped I would.” Kane’s voice was almost gentle. “Nothing throws a rival off harder than thinking with his d**k instead of his stick. Classic Ethan. Always looking for the angle.”

Aria stepped back from the counter until her spine hit the refrigerator. The apartment suddenly felt too small. “I need to talk to him.”

“And say what? ‘Hey babe, found your illegal betting ledger while I was sneaking out to skate with your enemy at two a.m.’?” Kane closed the laptop. “He’ll deny it. Then he’ll start cleaning the trail. Then the people who actually run this operation will decide you’re a liability.”

“So what am I supposed to do?”

“Stay smart. Stay quiet. And stay where I can see you until I know how deep this goes.”

Aria laughed once, sharp and humorless. “You want me to move in?”

“I want you alive.” He stood, towering over her in the small kitchen. “There’s a difference.”

The air between them thickened.

For a moment neither spoke. Kane’s gaze dropped to her mouth the same way it had on the ice, and Aria felt the same dangerous pull low in her stomach. She hated that it was still there—after everything she’d just read, after the violence, after the proof that her entire relationship had been part of someone else’s strategy.

She looked away first.

“I need to go back,” she said. “If I’m not in bed when he wakes up—”

“He won’t notice.” Kane’s tone was flat. “But fine. I’ll walk you.”

He did.

They moved through the pre-dawn quiet like two people who had already crossed a line they couldn’t uncross. At the dorm entrance Kane stopped her with a light touch to the elbow.

“Phone.”

She handed it over without thinking. He typed his number in under the name East Door, then sent himself a message so he had hers.

“Anything feels off—anything—you text me. Not him. Me.”

Aria nodded, throat tight.

Kane’s thumb brushed once across the inside of her wrist, right over the pulse. “Get some sleep, transfer. Tomorrow the real games start.”

He waited until she was inside before disappearing into the gray morning.

Ethan was still asleep when she slipped back into the dorm, exactly where she had left him. Aria stood at the foot of the bed and watched him breathe for a long time. The boy she had followed across state lines. The boy who had used her as a chess piece.

She climbed into the empty bed on the other side of the room and stared at the ceiling until the alarm on his phone went off at six.

Ethan groaned, rolled over, and smiled at her like the world was still simple.

“Morning,” he said, voice rough with sleep. “You look tired. Bad dreams?”

Aria forced her mouth into something that could pass for a smile.

“Something like that.”

He got up, stretched, and started talking about the day’s training schedule. She listened with half an ear, already counting the hours until she could see Kane again.

Her phone vibrated once under the pillow.

East Door: Check the news in an hour. And lock your door tonight.

Aria locked the screen, heart hammering.

Sixty minutes later, while Ethan was in the shower, she opened the campus news app.

BREAKING: Security incident at Blackridge rink complex. One man found injured. Investigation ongoing. No suspects at this time.

She scrolled further.

A single line at the bottom of the article made her blood stop.

Sources say the injured party is known to have connections to illegal sports betting networks. More to follow.

Aria’s hands shook.

Across the room Ethan’s phone lit up with a message from an unknown number. She watched him dry his hair with a towel, glance at the screen, and go very still.

Then he looked straight at her.

For the first time since she had arrived, there was no warmth in his eyes.

Only calculation.

“Aria,” he said softly. “We need to talk.”