You and Garrett Graham were not together.

There had never been a conversation about it. No neat little explanation for why you slept in his bed more than your own, why he kept your coffee order in his phone, why you had a drawer in his room or slept together too much.

Garrett flirted with you like it was a game, touched you like it wasn’t, and looked at you sometimes like he had forgotten you were not supposed to mean that much to him.

So no, you were not together.

But you were not nothing either.

And maybe that was why he had told you about Phil.

Not everything, but enough for you to know why his jaw locked when someone slammed a door too hard. Enough to know why he hated raised voices when they turned sharp. Enough to know.

He had told you once at three in the morning, after you found him sitting on the floor beside his bed, phone abandoned near his knee, face pale with a kind of anger that looked more like fear.

Tonight, the hockey house had been packed.

Music shaking the walls. Bodies pressed too close. Beer on the floor. Someone laughing too loudly in the kitchen. Dean flirting with Allie. Logan yelling over the music.

It should have been normal.

It was normal.

Until it wasn’t.

You had been near the back hallway, trying to move past a guy you barely knew. A drunk friend-of-a-friend who had spent most of the night watching you with a smile that made your skin crawl.

At first, you were polite.

Then you were firm.

Then his hand grabbed your ass.

Hard enough that you froze and enough that Garrett saw.

Everything after that happened too fast.

Garrett’s voice, the guy turning, drunk and stupid and still smiling.

One ugly sentence from his mouth something about you, something disgusting and vulgar—and then Garrett’s expression changed.

Completely.

He hit him once.

Hard.

The sound cracked through the hallway, cutting under the music. The guy stumbled back into the wall, but Garrett was already on him again, and again, jaw clenched, eyes gone cold in a way you had never seen before.

Someone screamed.

Logan and Tucker rushed forward.

And for one terrible second, before they pulled him back, Garrett looked up.

His eyes found yours.

You did not mean to look scared.

You didn’t.

But you were shaken. By the guy. By the grabbing. By the sound of Garrett’s fist hitting bone. By the violence of it, the suddenness, the way his face had gone empty with rage.

Garrett saw it.

The exact second he did, something in him broke.

His body went still even as Logan dragged him back. His gaze stayed on you, not angry anymore. Not protective. Not even furious.

Just horrified.

Then he looked away.

After that, he disappeared upstairs.

You waited a few minutes before following him.

The party had gone strangely quiet behind you, then slowly loud again, like people were trying to convince themselves the whole thing had not happened.

His door was half-open.

You pushed it gently.

Garrett was sitting on the edge of his bed, elbows on his knees, head bowed, his dark hair was a mess. Blood marked the knuckles of his right hand, split and red.

He did not look up when you came in.

“You looked at me like him.”

The words landed before you could prepare for them.

Garrett let out a short, humourless breath and lifted his head.

His gray eyes were raw. “Don’t tell me you didn’t,” he said, voice rough. “I saw your face.” He looked down at his bloody hand like he hated it. “You saw me hit him, and you looked at me like I was Phil.”

Your chest tightened. “Garrett—”

“No.” He shook his head, jaw flexing. “I know what I looked like. I know what losing control looks like.

He stood suddenly, restless, too full of adrenaline and shame to sit still. He turned away from you.

“I saw his hand on you,” he said, lower now. “I saw you freeze, and I just—”

He stopped.

The room felt too small around him.

When he turned back, he looked almost afraid to come closer.

“I scared you.”

Garrett swallowed, his voice quieter now.

“I scared you, and I don’t know how to fix that.”