The bass from the party still echoed in her skull as she stepped into the cold. The air bit at her bare skin, sobering her faster than she wanted. She wasn’t drunk—just dizzy. The kind of dizzy that made the world sway, that made bad choices look almost reasonable.

She knew she shouldn’t drive.

So she called an Uber.

The car reeked faintly of smoke and cheap cologne. The driver’s eyes kept finding her in the rearview mirror—too often, too long.

“So… a pretty girl like you shouldn’t be alone this late,” he said, voice low and wrong.

She forced a small laugh. “Yeah, I’ll be fine.”

But she wasn’t fine. The city outside grew emptier, the streetlights thinning until the world looked like a tunnel. Her fingers clenched around her phone. Her friends were all drunk, laughing through messages she couldn’t join. She needed someone else—someone steady.

She called her brother.

Static. Then silence.

Her pulse climbed into her throat. She stared at the screen, waiting. And then, finally, a message lit up her phone.

Ethan: Hey, I saw you’ve been texting Ryan.

Ethan. Her brother’s best friend. The one who always looked at her too long, too quietly.

She typed quickly: Oh, yeah. Where is he?

He passed out, he replied. Why are you texting him at this hour?

Her breath trembled. I don’t feel safe right now. The Uber driver’s saying weird things. Can I share my location with you? Share it with me, he said.

She didn’t think. She just sent it.

Seconds later, her phone rang.

“Hey, baby,” a voice drawled through the line—low, rough, familiar in a way that made her knees go weak.

“Ethan?”

“Look to your left.”

She turned—and her heart stuttered.

There he was, riding beside the car, black helmet glinting under the streetlight, one hand gripping the handlebar, the other raised in a lazy wave. His motorcycle roared like a heartbeat.

“Let’s go home together,” he shouted over the wind. “I’ll take care of you.” Relief broke through her chest—but it wasn’t clean. It was something darker, heavier. Because for a second, she wasn’t sure if she was safe with him… or because of him.

When the Uber pulled up to her house, the driver didn’t meet her eyes. Ethan stood there, tall and silent, watching until the car disappeared.

Inside, her hands still shook. “Thank you,” she whispered.

He smiled—soft, dangerous. “That’s the least I could do.”

She looked up, hesitant. “Should I tell Ryan?”

He stepped closer, his shadow swallowing the space between them. “No,” he murmured. “Because then he’d know how I feel about you.”

Her breath caught. His fingers brushed her jaw, light as smoke.

“You shouldn’t have called me tonight,” he said, voice like a secret. “Because now that I’ve had to come for you…”

He leaned in, lips hovering near her ear. “…I don’t think I can stop.”

The kiss he left on her cheek burned long after he was gone.