Chapter 175
Summer's POV
Brooke appeared at Evan's side again, her smile bright and practiced. But even from where I stood — Mia's grip firm on my elbow, her whisper urgent: Come on, we need to get out of here before this gets worse — I could see the rigidity in Brooke's posture. She held herself too carefully, like someone trying to glue together pieces that no longer fit.
She was trying so hard to pretend the last few minutes hadn't happened. Trying to erase the memory of him shaking off her hand. The cold dismissal in his eyes. And as Logan steered Kieran toward the starting line with a hand on his shoulder, I let Mia guide me up the metal steps. My legs moved automatically, but my mind stayed trapped in that moment of confrontation, replaying Evan's threat over and over: If you lose, you stay the fuck away from her. Permanently.
We found seats in the middle section — close enough to see, far enough to avoid the knot of Evan's supporters clustering near the front. I sank onto the cold aluminum bench still feeling the ghost of Kieran's hand on my waist. The way he'd positioned himself between me and danger without hesitation. My heart was pounding so hard I could feel it in my throat. Copper and fear on my tongue. This was my fault. I'd made that spectacle with the cheerleading performance, painted his number on my face, forced this confrontation into existence through my own desperate need to show everyone how I felt.
And now he was about to race for me. For the right to stay near me. For the chance to keep existing in my orbit without Evan using his family's influence to destroy him.
If Kieran lost—if Evan crossed that finish line first—I would lose him. Not just for today, not just until the gossip died down, but permanently. The word echoed in my head like a death sentence, making my stomach clench with nausea. Evan would make sure of it. He'd use his mother's connections, his family's money, his position on the board. He'd find a way to revoke Kieran's scholarship, to make St. Jude's impossible for him, to erase him from my life as thoroughly as if he'd never existed.
The thought made me feel sick and terrified and furious all at once.
"He's going to win," Mia said beside me, her voice fierce and certain, her hand finding mine and squeezing hard enough to hurt. "He has to win."
I wanted to believe her. I wanted to believe in Kieran the way he seemed to believe in himself, with that quiet, unshakeable confidence. But I'd seen Evan run before, had watched him break the school record last year, had heard the way people talked about him like he was untouchable, like his victories were inevitable simply because he was Evan Whitmore and the universe bent itself around his expectations.
And then Kieran started to warm up, and everything else fell away.
He pulled off his St. Jude's warm-up jacket, the movement casual and unselfconscious, and I heard the collective intake of breath from the crowd around me, felt the shift in attention as every eye in our section suddenly focused on the track. Underneath, he wore only a fitted running tank that clung to his torso, and even from this distance, I could see the definition of his muscles, the way his shoulders and arms had filled out since I'd first met him, like all those hours working at The Happy Patty and helping his mom with heavy lifting had carved him into something harder, stronger, more dangerous than the quiet physics genius everyone assumed he was.
"Holy shit," Ashley breathed from two rows behind me. "When did he get so fucking ripped?"
"Oh my God," another girl whispered, her voice carrying in the sudden hush that had fallen over our section. "He looks even better than Evan. Like, way better."
"Those abs," someone else said, almost reverently, the words drifting up from the row below. "I didn't know scholarship kids were allowed to look like that."
I felt my face flush hot, a mixture of pride and possessiveness flooding through me as I remembered what it felt like to touch those muscles, to feel them flex under my hands when I'd clung to him on his bike, to know that underneath his oversized hoodies and careful distance, Kieran Cross was hiding a body that could make half the school stop and stare. But I didn't want them staring. I didn't want anyone else looking at him like that, seeing him like that, imagining what it would be like to run their hands over that skin, to feel the heat and strength of him the way I had.
"Summer, you're blushing so hard right now," Mia said, barely suppressing a laugh, her elbow nudging my ribs. "Oh my God, have you seen him without a shirt before?"
I couldn't answer. My throat had gone completely dry, my mind flooded with the memory of his abdomen pressed against my back when I'd fallen asleep on his bike, the heat of his skin through thin fabric, the way his breathing had changed when I'd touched him, when I'd let my fingers trace the edge of his ribs without thinking. I wanted to run down there and throw his jacket back over him, wanted to hide him from all these curious, hungry eyes that had no right to look at what was mine.
Mine. When had I started thinking of him as mine? When had the possibility of losing him become more terrifying than anything else?