If there was one thing you hated more than anything—more than early labs, more than impossible exams—it was arrogant men. The type who strutted around like they were the shit when really they were shallow, careless, and impossibly rude.

So naturally, your Stanford med rotation dumped you into the worst possible environment: a full month studying sports injuries, assigned to the ice hockey unit—the loudest, cockiest, most injury-prone group on campus.

And hockey guys? They were the kings of arrogance. The worst offenders. Walking testosterone with egos bigger than the rink.

Liam Miller was the perfect example.

Captain of the team. All muscle, swagger, and dimples. Girls practically melted at his feet, blinded by brown curls, a perfect smile, and those infuriating chocolate-colored eyes.

But beneath all that?

A disaster. An overconfident, injury-prone mess.

By the end of week one, you’d seen him more than any other player. His recklessness on the ice turned into your problem off it. Every visit was a reminder of how much you disliked him—the stupid jokes he cracked while you worked, the way he barely listened, the way he buried himself in his phone texting whichever girl he had lined up next.

You hated men like Liam.

Shallow. Thoughtless. A hollow skull wrapped in muscle and charm.

Somewhere under all that bravado, he probably had real feelings—fleeting shadows you caught when he thought no one was looking. But getting to them would require chiseling through mountains of ego.

So he filled whatever emptiness he carried with hockey and girls. Recently, even that wasn’t helping. Last night’s hookup had gone sideways, and a brawl this afternoon had left him injured—badly enough to force him into your hands one more time.

He shouldn’t have been in the clinic after hours. You shouldn’t have still been there either. But the universe liked to screw with you, and there he was—leaning against the exam table, arms crossed, jaw set like stone.

You didn’t acknowledge him at first. You didn’t even look at him. You dropped your bag on the counter and flipped on the light, pretending the sudden pounding of your pulse was just exhaustion.

“You’re here late." he muttered.

You froze. His voice was different—low, sharp, not dripping in fake charm like usual. You turned slowly, already feeling your irritation flare.

Then you saw it. Not a limp, not one of his usual careless injuries—his eye was swollen black and blue, his lip split, and his knuckles raw and angry red.

His jaw tightened when he caught you taking it in, a stark contrast to the cocky grin he normally used to get under your skin. His chocolate-coloured eyes were narrowed, his mouth a hard, unbending line.

“Need you to patch me up,” he muttered, the words bitter on his tongue. Stubborn.