By the time Lily and I stepped out of the café, the afternoon had turned on us.
The sky, which had looked bright and harmless only an hour earlier, was now a heavy sheet of dark clouds stretching low over the city. The air had cooled with the kind of sudden bite that made you pull your coat tighter around yourself without thinking. A few drops had already begun to fall, soft at first, then steadier, tapping against the sidewalks and the tops of parked cars.
Lily groaned the moment the first cold gust swept past us.
"Oh, come on," she muttered, lifting one hand to shield her hair. "It was sunny ten minutes ago."
I laughed, hunching my shoulders as another breeze rushed down the street.
"New York likes drama."
"It really does," she said, tightening her grip on her shopping bag. "Apparently so does the weather."
We hurried forward, shoes clicking over the wet pavement as more people spilled out of nearby stores and restaurants, all of them moving faster now, heads ducked, bags pulled close, umbrellas appearing like magic from purses and jacket pockets. The sidewalk had become a messy swirl of motion: tourists stopping too suddenly, delivery cyclists weaving past, a couple arguing under one shared umbrella, someone nearly colliding with a man carrying a box of pastries.
Lily and I laughed as we dodged around them, each of us trying not to knock our shopping bags into strangers.
"Watch it," Lily said, twisting sideways just enough to avoid a woman coming toward us with two oversized coffee cups.
"I am watching it," I said, though I was laughing so hard I could barely say the words properly.
"You are absolutely not."
"I am!"
A man brushed past us too closely, and I instinctively pulled my bag toward my chest.
Lily rolled her eyes. "You're terrible at city survival."
"I'm excellent at it."
"Mm-hm."
Another gust of wind pushed damp air against my face, cool enough to make me blink. I glanced upward, half expecting the rain to stop, but the clouds above us only looked darker now, swollen and heavy like they were settling in for the evening.
"Do we have an umbrella?" I asked.
Lily gave me a flat look.
"Do I look prepared?"
I snorted.
"Fair."
She grinned, then shifted her bag to her other hand. "Let's just get to the corner before we drown."
We were still laughing when the black SUV eased up to the curb not far from us.
It wasn't the kind of vehicle anyone would give much attention to in Manhattan, except that it had that unmistakable look of quiet wealth, clean lines, tinted windows, polished enough to catch the gray light even through the rain. It slowed, pulled in neatly, and came to a stop with a soft hiss of tires against the wet street.
I only noticed it properly when the back door opened.
And then everything in me stilled.
Adrian stepped out.
For a second, the rain, the noise, the crowd, the whole restless city seemed to blur around the edges.
He was dressed differently from how I had ever seen him before.
No suit.
No tie.
No sharp executive lines.
Just dark jeans, a simple sweater that fit his shoulders in a way that made him look broad and solid and much too human for my heart to handle, and casual shoes darkened slightly by the rain. The look should have made him less intimidating.
It did not.
If anything, it made him worse.
More real.
More approachable.
More dangerous.
Because now he looked like a man who could belong anywhere, and that somehow made him feel even more impossible.
He shut the door behind him, one hand briefly touching the edge of the car as he straightened. A few drops of rain clung to the shoulders of his sweater. His hair was slightly damp at the temples, and without the usual polished armor of a suit, the faint tiredness in his face was easier to see.
He looked up.
And found me immediately.
The surprise on his face was quick, but unmistakable.
His eyes widened by a fraction.
His steps slowed.
For one suspended moment, he stared.
My own body reacted before my thoughts could catch up.
My fingers tightened around the shopping bag handles until the paper creased under my grip. My pulse jumped hard in my throat. My shoulders, which had been loose a second earlier, went rigid all at once. It was such a small thing, seeing him there in the rain dressed like this, but it felt like the air had changed shape around me.
Lily noticed it immediately.
She followed my stare, then looked back at me with a slow, knowing expression.
"Oh," she said softly, the word dragged out in a way that was far too perceptive.
I barely heard her.
Adrian's gaze stayed on me as he took another step forward, careful now, like he was walking into a moment he hadn't expected to have. His face had settled into that familiar calm by the time he reached us, but the surprise hadn't fully left his eyes.
"Ava," he said, his voice low and steady over the rain.
Just my name.
It should not have felt like that much.
It did.
I swallowed, suddenly aware of how damp the air had become, how cold the wind felt against the back of my neck, how unsteady my breathing had become.
"Adrian," I managed.
Lily looked from one of us to the other, then back again, as if deciding whether this was entertaining or suspicious. Probably both.
"You two know each other," she said, though the tone made it clear she knew she was stating the obvious.
Adrian's eyes flicked briefly to her, polite and composed.
"Lily," he said, as if he recognized her too.
That made Lily raise her brows.
"Well," she said, tugging the strap of her bag higher on her shoulder, "look at that. He remembers me."
Adrian's mouth shifted, almost into a smile.
"I remember everyone who keeps Ava out of trouble."
I made a face immediately. "I do not need keeping out of trouble."
Lily barked out a laugh beside me.
Adrian's eyes moved to mine then, and that almost-smile deepened just enough to make my stomach turn over in a way I would have preferred not to notice.
"You say that with a lot of confidence," he said.
I folded my arms more tightly, mostly because I needed something to do with my hands and mostly because it gave me a reason not to look at him too directly.
"I'm offended."
"I'm sure you are."
The amusement in his voice was gentle, but it tugged at me anyway.
The rain came down harder then, thin silver lines against the streetlights and the darkening sky. A woman rushed past us with her coat over her head. Somewhere nearby, a taxi horn sounded impatiently.
Adrian glanced up at the weather, then back at the two of us.
"You didn't bring an umbrella."
It wasn't a question.
Lily looked down at her empty hands, then back up with mock innocence. "Was that required?"
His gaze shifted to the shopping bags in our hands, then to the rain falling steadily around us.
"My driver is right here," he said. "If you're heading home, I can give you a lift."
I opened my mouth to answer and found, very unhelpfully, that I had no immediate words.
The offer was simple.
Practical.
Completely reasonable.
And yet my whole body reacted to it as if he had asked something far more personal.
A ride.
That was all.
Still, my fingers curled tighter around the bag handles.
Lily, who had apparently no intention of letting me short-circuit in peace, said before I could speak, "That would be very kind."
I shot her a look.
She ignored it.
Adrian's gaze moved to her, then back to me. He seemed to understand exactly what was happening and not understand it at all, which somehow made him look even more composed.
"I was heading your direction anyway," he said.
That wasn't true, and I knew it. But the way he said it quietly, matter-of-fact, almost casual, made it sound impossible to challenge.
Rain slid down the curb in thin streams. The city pressed in around us, all noise and wet movement and evening light reflecting off glass.
I could feel my heart in my throat.
Lily tilted her head slightly, her expression turning mischievous in a way that made my stomach drop.
"Well," she said, looking between us, "that settles that."
I turned to her in alarm. "Lily
But she was already smiling in that bright, maddening way of hers, the kind that meant she had decided on something, and there was no point trying to stop it.
Adrian looked mildly amused, though there was something more careful under it too, something I could not name and did not trust myself to name.
He opened the back door of the SUV.
The gesture was polite.
Simple.
And somehow it made my pulse stumble all over again.
I stared at the open door for one too-long second, then at the rain, then at Lily, who gave me the tiniest, most infuriating nod.
So I stepped forward.
My shoes hit the wet pavement with a soft splash. I slid one bag onto the seat, then the other, and climbed in carefully, aware of Adrian standing close enough outside that I could smell the faint clean scent of his sweater mixed with rain and cold air.
For one brief second, as I settled inside the car, I looked back at him.
He was standing by the open door, one hand resting lightly on the roof, rain darkening the edges of his hair.
He met my eyes.
And there it was again.
Not romance.
Not yet.
Just surprise.
Attention.
A quiet awareness that felt far too intimate for a ride home.
Then he closed the door behind us, and the world outside became a blur of rain and moving lights.
Lily leaned back against the seat beside me, biting her lip like she was suppressing a laugh.
I stared straight ahead, my fingers still tight around the edge of my shopping bag, trying very hard to pretend my heart had not just forgotten how to behave.
Because Adrian Blackwood had appeared in the rain wearing jeans and a sweater, looking far more human than I was prepared for.
And somehow that made it even harder for him to survive.