You’d fought again. Of course you had.

It never started the same way, but it always ended like this—doors slammed so hard the walls shuddered, words sharp enough to cut, accusations throwing like knives neither of you meant to miss. His stare would go ice-cold, lips pressed into a fine line, jaw tight. Your expression was no different. You didn’t care about them enough—his words, they never bothered you.

And then came the deafening silence. The awful, crushing silence that never felt like peace. Not with him. Not when it meant two people still seething in the same room, breathing the same air like it was poison, and yet—still—unable to walk away.

The hotel suite he was put in reeked of sterilised elegance, but now the air was thick with something uglier. Your bag sat half-zipped near the edge of the bed. His phone, facedown. Neither of you moved. The city beyond the window glittered like it didn’t care that you were both breaking.

He leaned against the dresser, arms crossed, eyes like frost over glass—sharp, cold, beautiful. You hated how beautiful he was when he was like this. Distant. Detached. Like your words hadn’t left bruises on his ego or your hands trembling in your lap. The echo of your last argument still rang in the walls. Over what? Control? His pride? The way he weaponised silence when he didn’t want to admit he’d gone too far?

But the worst part? You were still here. Still sitting there, knees tucked against your chest like a storm hadn’t just passed through this room, like it didn’t still sting behind your ribs. Because you knew this was the part that always came next. The pull. The fucking gravitational force of him. You hated it. You needed it. He was the fire and you were the moth with wings already burned to black.

He ran a hand through his hair, sighing, but didn’t apologise. Michael Kaiser didn’t do apologies. Not in words. Not in the way most people expected. His pride stood taller than any tower he’d built in Blue Lock, in Bastard München, in your heart. But he took a step forward. Then another. His shadow cut across your skin, his voice low—too low.

“You done pretending you don’t need me?”

It wasn’t a question. It was a fucking challenge.

You blinked up at him, throat burning with things you couldn’t say. But your body knew what to do. It always did around him. You stood—barefoot, cold toes curling into the plush rug—and his hand was already curling around your wrist. Firm. Steady. Possessive. Like he could hold you together by force alone.

The kiss that came wasn’t soft. It never was. It was desperate. Reckless. Like you were both trying to swallow the storm whole and maybe drown each other in the process.

His hand cradled the back of your neck, pulling you in tighter, deeper, until the oxygen thinned between your ribs. You gasped against his lips, and he groaned, low and guttural. Like he needed this more than a breath. Like you were the only thing in the world that ever made him feel real.

“Tell me no one else gets to see you like this,” he growled against your mouth, forehead pressed to yours. “No one touches what’s mine.”

You should’ve hated how much that lit you up. Should’ve pushed him away. But instead, your fingers curled into his shirt, dragging him closer. “Yours,” you whispered.

A confession. A curse.

It was never healthy. Never simple. Never safe. But it was true. You needed him like oxygen—sharp, addictive, dangerous. And he needed you like a drug—sweet, lethal, irresistible. His touch wasn’t soft. It was branded heat. His breath came heavy against your skin as he whispered your name like it was something fragile. A warning.

A promise. A claim.

Later, tangled in each other with sweat cooling on your skin and the room spinning like the aftermath of a storm, you whispered into the space between you, “This isn’t normal, Michael.”

He didn’t open his eyes, just pulled you closer, lips brushing your temple. “Good,” he murmured. “Normal’s boring.”

And you? You were already far too gone to disagree.