Page 35 of Freestyle (Boys of Frampton U #2)
Rowyn
T he school buildings fall away behind me, but the shadows stay.
I don’t ask where we’re going when Gray leads me through the back entrance of the house, Phoenix silent at my heels. I don’t need to ask. I already know.
Gray’s room is dim, just a single lamp burning low in the corner, casting long shadows across the gray walls and the old swimming trophies lining his shelves. But it’s not the room that stops me.
It’s them.
The silence between us is weighted, alive, breathing. I should be afraid. A small, fractured part of me is. But there’s something stronger, something sharp and coiled, that’s kept me standing all night.
The door clicks shut behind us.
Gray’s eyes haven’t left mine since we walked into his room. Phoenix has taken up position near the door, silent, alert, watching me like he’s waiting for me to break.
I don’t know where to stand. Where to look. The walls feel too close, and the air’s too thick with things unsaid.
“We need to know what’s going on,” Gray says, voice low but steady. “Why the hell did you freak out so bad in the quad?”
I swallow hard.
Phoenix steps closer. “Row, if he’s back… if you think he’s back, we need to know.”
He. Alberto.
The name sticks in my throat.
“I just—” I start, then stop. My pulse won’t slow. “It was a feeling. A memory. Not a fact.”
Gray narrows his eyes. “You don’t look like someone remembering. You look like someone afraid.”
My breath catches.
I open my mouth to deny it, to explain it, to anything, but nothing comes out.
Because if I say it, if I admit it, then it becomes real.
Not the memory. Not the trauma I’ve already named.
This is something else.
Something new.
Something following me.
The silence stretches between us like piano wire, taut and trembling. Gray’s gaze is locked on mine, searching for something I’m not ready to give. Phoenix shifts his weight beside me, tension radiating off him like heat.
They’d explode if they knew.
Not just with rage, with purpose. They’d tear the woods apart, ransack every dorm, pull apart the very world I’m trying to keep from collapsing.
So I stay quiet.
Not because I don’t trust them, but because I don’t trust what they’ll do with the truth.
I feel the question in Gray’s eyes, I feel Phoenix’s concern pressing in like a vice.
But I just swallow it down, blink once, and say, “I’m fine.”
And that lie might be the most dangerous thing I’ve told all night.
The silence crackles.
I think, for half a second, that I might’ve gotten away with it. That my “I’m fine” was delivered with just enough calm to pass.
But Phoenix steps forward, jaw locked.
“You’re staying with us tonight.”
I blink. “What?”
“You heard him,” Gray says, folding his arms, tone too measured. “I’m not letting you out of our sight.”
“It’s not a big deal—” I start.
“It is to us,” Nix cuts in. His voice is softer than Gray’s, but there’s steel underneath. “You’re jumpy. You won’t say why. That’s fine. You don’t owe us everything, but we’re not letting you be scared and alone.”
Their protectiveness should feel suffocating. A few months ago, it probably would’ve been.
Now?
It feels like armor.
“We’re not letting you disappear behind some locked door while pretending you’re not unraveling.”
I press my lips together, then nod once.
It’s not surrender.
Not exactly.
It’s survival.
My mouth opens. Closes. “I didn’t bring anything.”
“We’ll get it,” Phoenix says, already pulling out his phone like he’s got a list forming in his head. “Bag, toothbrush, charger, whatever. Just tell us where.”
I blink. “You don’t have to—”
“We do,” Gray cuts in, sharper this time. “You don’t have to tell us what’s going on, but we’re not giving whoever’s putting that fear in your eyes another inch.”
Phoenix grabs a hoodie off the chair and tosses it to me—his. Worn and soft. “Put that on. You’re freezing.”
“What am I really doing here?” I ask, though my voice barely carries past the lump rising in my throat.
Gray stiffens beside me. “What do you mean?”
I look at them, both of them. Gray’s hand brushing against mine, Nix leaning against the wall with that unreadable expression he gets when he’s feeling too much and doesn’t want to show any of it.
My pulse is loud in my ears. My chest is a war zone.
“I can’t do this,” I breathe. “I can’t be with you guys like this.”
Nix stands straighter. Gray stiffens. The air shifts like thunder is waiting to drop.
“You can’t leave,” Gray says gently, but there’s something fierce and aching under the words. “We won’t let you. We need you.”
Need me.
God.
If they only knew how that word cuts.
“You don’t understand,” I whisper, curling in tighter, trying to hold myself together. “I’m not who you think I am. I’m... I’m not strong. I’m damaged. Beyond repair.”
My throat constricts, and before I can stop it, the tears rise, hot and blinding.
Gray’s hand finds mine, warm and solid. “Row, we’re not asking you to be perfect.”
Nix’s voice is barely above a breath. “We’re asking you to let us be here.”
I try to speak, but the words crumple in my mouth.
“I’m scared,” I manage. “Of falling, of needing you, of you seeing the worst of me and running.”
Gray leans closer, close enough for his breath to coat my skin. “Then we won’t run.”
“I—” I start, but Nix cuts in gently.
“Let us help you,” he says. “Let us have you.”
The air trembles. So do I.
They’re not pressing. They’re offering.
Suddenly I realize that I’ve been holding my heart hostage out of fear, but they’ve been standing here the whole time, waiting for me to open the door.
Can I do this?
Can I shed the armor, let them see the pieces, and trust they won’t just pick through the damage?
“I don’t know how. I don’t know how.” My throat tightens. Words tangle into knots I can’t undo.
But then, warmth. Hands. One on my wrist, another brushing hair back from my eyes. Not pushing. Not pulling.
Just there .
“You don’t have to know how,” Gray says gently. “You just have to stay.”
“And if you fall,” Nix whispers, brushing his thumb against my cheek, “we’ll catch you. Even if it takes everything.”
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Because they don’t see a shattered little girl.
They see me and they want me, not in spite of the cracks, but through them.
Maybe even because of them.
I look at them. These two flawed, fierce, beautiful boys.
And I let the words escape before I can stop them, “Catch me.”
And they do.
With their hands.
With their hearts.
With everything they are.
Nix kisses me on the forehead, keeping his lips in place a beat longer.
“Text Lynds,” he murmurs. “Tell her we’re coming. ”
Gray nods. “We’ll be quick. There are security cameras surrounding the house, and they are always being monitored. You’ll be safe here, I promise.”
Phoenix gives me a look, not demanding, not dramatic, just present. Like if I flinch now, he’ll burn the whole campus down and call it mercy.
Gray pauses at the door, one hand braced against the frame, the other curling into a quiet fist at his side. The hallway light cuts across his face, and for a second he doesn’t look like the cold-blooded strategist everyone thinks he is.
He just looks like him, the version I used to catch glimpses of when no one was watching.
His eyes find mine.
“You’re safe here,” he repeats softly. “Even if you don’t feel like it.”
It’s not dramatic. Not a promise wrapped in steel and fury. It’s quiet. Honest.
And somehow, that’s the part that undoes me.
Then he’s gone, the door clicking shut behind them, and I’m left in the hush he left behind, heartbeat loud, silence louder, holding his words like they mean more than either of us is ready to admit.