Calculated Alliance

Sienna

I turned the brass key in the lock, shoved the apartment door open, and deliberately walked inside without closing it behind me. It was not a gesture of welcome. It was simply an open threshold, leaving the choice entirely in his hands. Dropping my purse onto the entryway floor, I tossed my wool coat across the arm of the sofa and headed straight into the kitchen. My hands needed an assignment, anything to keep them from visibly shaking, so I pulled a clean glass from the cabinet and held it under the tap until cold water filled it to the brim.

Behind me, the front door clicked shut. The deadbolt slid home with a solid, metallic thud.

Declan Brooks had taken the open door as an invitation.

"Nice place," he remarked, his deep voice slicing through the quiet of my apartment.

I kept my back to him, staring down into the water I had no intention of drinking. "Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Do not make polite small talk." I turned around, resting the small of my back against the counter edge. This was the first time I had stood opposite him without cameras, flashing bulbs, or team officials crowding the perimeter. He stood in the center of my small living room, hands shoved deep into the pockets of his dark leather jacket, his dark eyes casually scanning my books, my worn rug, and the framed prints on the walls. He took stock of my life with the easy indifference of someone inspecting hotel furniture. "Say whatever you came here to say and get out."

Declan studied my face for a quiet second. Instead of moving toward the exit, he walked over to my sofa and sat down, leaning back against the cushions as if he owned the lease. He stretched one long arm along the back of the couch, crossed his ankles, and looked up at me with irritating composure. "You look tired."

"Thank you so much. The door is right behind you."

He lifted a hand, gesturing vaguely toward his own face. "You have mascara smudged down your cheek."

"I know what my face looks like." I set the full glass down onto the quartz surface with a firm tap. "You asked me in the hallway if we were doing this or not. So tell me. What exactly are we doing?"

A faint twitch stirred the right corner of his mouth, the ghost of an amused smirk that never quite formed. He tilted his head toward the armchair across from him. "Sit down."

"This happens to be my apartment."

"Then sit down in your own apartment," Declan countered, his tone flat and unbothered. "You have been standing in high heels for four hours. Sit."

My calf muscles burned, and my arches throbbed from pacing the press room corridors. Gritting my teeth, I crossed the room and dropped into the armchair, telling myself I was doing it for my feet, not his command.

Declan shifted his weight, dropping his elbows onto his knees and leaning closer. The lazy sprawl vanished, replaced by a dark, razor-sharp focus. "Three months. That is the timeline Beckett laid out. Three months of calculated public appearances, coordinated dinners, and media leaks. Just long enough to flip the narrative, bury Landon's little spectacle, and clean up the press before the playoffs."

"Beckett already gave me the sales pitch in the car," I said, folding my arms tightly across my ribs. "I understand the mechanics. What I do not understand is how anyone expects the public to buy it. You and I have never exchanged a single syllable before tonight."

"The public believes whatever the lenses feed them."

"The public believed Landon tonight without asking for receipts," I fired back, bitterness coating my tongue. "Forgive me if I lack faith in their collective judgment."

Declan held my gaze without wavering. There was no pity in his stare, but no malice either. "What Landon pulled on that stage was calculated to protect his image. This arrangement is also calculated. The only difference is that this one is designed to work in your favor."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Why did you volunteer for this, Declan?"

He did not reply right away. His dark eyes flicked across my features, weighing options, calculating how much truth to dispense.

"Beckett asked me to step in," he offered smoothly.

"That is a corporate answer, not the real reason." I leaned forward, matching his posture. "Beckett cannot order a franchise player to parade an equipment coordinator around town as his girlfriend. You chose this. Why?"

Silence stretched between us, thick with unspoken team politics. He tilted his chin up, his expression hardening into something predatory. "You already know who Landon Thorne is to me."

He was right. I knew the locker room dynamics better than anyone. Landon despised Declan. Declan was younger, faster, and possessed raw talent that the coaching staff built entire offensive strategies around. When management signed Declan, Landon realized his tenure as the franchise golden boy had expired. Landon had even mounted a dartboard in his private locker with Declan's media headshot taped over the bullseye, throwing brass tips at it between training sessions.

"You want to get under his skin," I murmured, piecing the cruelty together. "You want Landon to watch you walk into team galas with the woman he just humiliated. You want him seeing your face beside mine on every sports blog and highlight reel."

"I want to see what it does to his game," Declan admitted without an ounce of shame. "A furious, distracted center makes reckless passes. He takes stupid penalties. Landon making mistakes on the ice costs him his ice time, and losing ice time costs him his spot on the roster. I want him off this team."

I stared at him, stunned by the sheer, cold-blooded calculation behind his words. "You are using my personal disaster as psychological warfare to push a teammate off the roster."

"I never claimed this was charity, Sienna." He leaned back, resting his broad shoulders against the cushions once more. "Look at the board. You reclaim your professional dignity, Beckett saves his sponsorship money, and I break Landon from the inside out until he gets traded. Everybody gets what they want out of the deal."

"And what happens when the cameras are not around?"

"In public, we look convincing. No visible resentment, no flinching, no hesitation when I put my hand on your waist," Declan said, his gaze dropping briefly to my lips before rising back to my eyes. "In private, we negotiate strict boundaries. Whatever you need to feel comfortable behind closed doors, we put in writing."

I clenched my fingers in my lap. "You seem remarkably sure that I am going to agree."

"Landon expected you to curl into a ball and resign by morning," Declan said, his voice dropping an octave. "And you do not look like the kind of woman who runs away."

Before I could mount a defense, a harsh, rapid buzzing rattled across the quartz counter behind me. The screen lit up against the dark stone.

I turned around. Declan did too.

My phone vibrated violently, skittering across the counter as a fresh call came through. I rose to grab it, but Declan moved with the startling speed of a professional athlete. He cleared the space between the sofa and the counter in two fluid strides, snagging the phone before my fingers could brush the casing.

He glanced down at the display, raising an eyebrow. He turned the screen toward me so I could read the caller ID.

Tessa.

My best friend lived two hours away, and based on the fifty notifications already stacked on the lock screen, she had watched the entire press conference broadcast live.

Before I could snatch the device back, Declan pressed the green icon and brought the phone straight to his ear.

My breath hitched in disbelief. "What are you doing? Give me that!"

Declan held up a single, warning finger, cutting me off with total authority. "She will call you back shortly," he spoke into the receiver. His tone transformed into something low, calm, and effortlessly reassuring.

A frantic squawk of high-pitched questions leaked from the speaker, Tessa demanding to know who was holding the phone.

Declan never blinked. "She is fine. Safe in her apartment."

Another wave of muffled shouting came through the line. Declan's eyes shifted toward me, his brow arching in silent amusement at whatever fierce warning my best friend was barking into his ear.

"I will relay the message," Declan said smoothly.

He pressed the red button, ending the call with a clean tap against the glass. He set my phone back down on the counter with a quiet click.

I glared at him, furious. "You just answered my personal phone. At midnight. In my home."

"You were standing there staring at it like it might detonate."

"That gives you no right to touch my things!"

"She told you to drink your water and reminded you that she loves you," Declan said, his face a mask of absolute seriousness. He gestured toward the glass sitting untouched beside the sink. "Drink your water, Sienna."

I crossed my arms, refusing to budge. "What did she say right before you hung up?"

Declan studied me for a long, quiet interval. He reached into his leather jacket, pulled out a plain white business card with a phone number scrawled across the back in black ink, and set it down neatly on the coffee table.

"She said you are the strongest person she knows," Declan replied evenly. "And she warned whoever answered this phone that if they make your night worse, she will drive down here and handle them herself."

The room fell into absolute silence. His dark eyes locked onto mine, stripping away the banter.

"I have no intention of making things worse for you," he said.

The air between us grew uncomfortably warm, humming with an energy that had nothing to do with contracts or press releases. He held my gaze until my chest grew tight, then let out a slow exhale and stepped toward the front entryway.

"Call me when you make up your mind," Declan said, resting his hand against the brass handle of the door. He paused, glancing back over his shoulder with a sharp grin. "And Sienna?"

I hated myself for answering. "What?"

"Landon is terrified of me. He has been terrified since the day I signed my rookie contract," Declan remarked, his lips curling with obvious amusement. "What I plan to do to spite him is going to be incredibly petty. You probably will not approve, considering you are such an incorruptible little goody two-shoes."

My hands curled into tight fists. "I am not a goody two-shoes."

"Is that right?" Declan turned fully, leaning his muscular shoulder against the door frame. His unbuttoned dress shirt shifted, revealing the hard lines of his collarbone and chest. "Then tell me why you kept your mouth shut when you caught your boyfriend cheating in the facility. Why didn't you march straight into the coach's office and demand Landon's suspension?"

Words lodged in my throat. I stared at him, caught entirely off guard by the accuracy of the hit.

"That is what I thought," Declan murmured softly, his gaze dropping over me with heavy approval. "Stay the good girl, Sisi. Let me handle the dirty work of destroying Landon Thorne my own way."

My heart hammered against my ribs. Curiosity pulled the question from my mouth before I could stop it. "And how exactly do you plan to do that?"

Declan held my eyes with terrifying, unblinking intensity. "Honestly? I want you. Literally."

The declaration struck like a physical blow. The breath left my lungs in an audible rush, my mouth falling open in shock. I pointed an index finger toward my own chest, dumbfounded.

Declan offered a single, decisive nod.

He pulled the front door open, stepping out into the carpeted corridor without waiting for my reply. "Get some sleep, Sisi bean."

The latch engaged with a sharp snap.

I stood frozen in the quiet kitchen, the phantom weight of his presence lingering in the narrow space. My palm pressed flat against my breastbone, trying to slow the erratic rhythm pounding beneath my ribs.

I grabbed the glass of tap water and swallowed every drop in rapid, greedy gulps until the ache in my throat subsided.

Setting the empty glass down, I walked back into the living room and sank into the couch. The fabric beneath me was still warm from where Declan had spent the last twenty minutes sprawling across my cushions. My eyes fell onto the plain card resting on the glass table.

*Honestly? I want you. Literally.*

A wave of heat surged upward from my chest, burning into my cheeks with furious indignation. The sheer arrogance of the man was breathtaking. Did he think Landon's betrayal made me an easy target? Did he think a superstar contract and a pretty face entitled him to my surrender?

Over my dead body. I would tear up my press credentials and scrub the arena concourse before I ever let Declan Brooks into my bed.

A sharp buzz shattered the silence.

I jumped, my eyes snapping toward the counter. My phone screen glowed bright white against the dim quartz surface.

I picked it up with a shaking hand. A text message from an unsaved number sat in the preview banner.

*31 days till you get in my bed, Sisi.*

I stared at the numbers glowing on the screen, my grip tightening until the edges of the phone bit into my skin. Over my dead body, I told myself again.

Yet as I sat alone in the quiet apartment, the cold reality sank beneath my skin. For the first time since the press conference had begun, white-hot fury was no longer the only thing coursing through my veins. A dark, reckless heat had taken root deep inside my chest—and the thought of where it might lead terrified me far more than Landon ever had.