Hidden intentions

The notification on my university housing tablet had been sterile and final: Your institutional dynamic pairing has been assigned.

In a world rigidly structured by Doms, submissives, and switches where the law mandated every citizen find their designated ecosystem within the university system I had learned that the only safety lay in invisibility. I didn't need a protector. I didn't want someone managing a life I had spent a decade painstakingly rebuilding after the crash that stole my parents, my legs, and my entire world, who was a fucking teenager.

So, when forced to select from the directory of available Doms, I hadn't looked for kindness or high compatibility percentages. I had looked for a schedule.

Cole Thompson. Forward for the university's Division I hockey team. Early morning ice times, film sessions, athletic training, cross-country travel, and a reputation for bleeding the sport seven days a week.

He won't even know I'm here, I had reasoned, clicking his profile to lock in the pairing. He'll be too busy chasing pucks and glory.

I maneuvered my chair through the quiet common area of the accessible campus suite. The university had provided standard-issue, institutional furniture, but the entryway was dominated by Cole Thompson's life: a heavy hockey bag dropped unceremoniously, smelling faintly of frozen ice, old sweat, and expensive leather gear.

A shuffle of footsteps echoed from the hallway, followed by the heavy click of a door latch.

Cole Thompson stepped into the common area, having just emerged from his primary bedroom. He wore only a pair of gray athletic shorts that rode low on his hips, his powerful V-tapered torso entirely bare. His skin was still flushed from a hot shower, damp, dark hair falling haphazardly across his forehead.

He was, undeniably, magnificent. A sculpted monument to Division I athleticism. His shoulders were impossibly broad, tapering down to a washboard stomach marred by the faint, jagged white line of an old skate laceration just above his hip.

He stopped cold when he saw me, his dark gaze dropping instantly from my face to the carbon-fiber wheels of my chair, then snapping back up to my caramel-brown eyes. There was no pity in his expression just a sudden, sharp, predatory recalculation.

"You're Brooks," Cole stated, his voice a low, gravelly hum that resonated right through my chest. He crossed his arms over his chest, his muscles bunching with casual power as he leaned against the doorframe his hands above his head. He looked at me with the unthinking confidence of apex royalty.

My heart hammered a sharp, violent rhythm against my ribs, but I forced my chin up, meeting his intense, unbroken stare with a cool, unbothered facade that hid years of defensive walls.

"And you're Thompson," I countered, my voice smooth and steady despite the way the air suddenly felt too thin. "I did my research. You have an away series in Minnesota next weekend, three-a-day practices this week, and mandatory study hall. I calculated that our paths would barely cross."

Cole let out a short, amused breath, a dangerous glint sparking in his eyes. He pushed off the doorframe, closing the distance between us with a slow, deliberate grace. He stopped just a foot away, towering over my chair, radiating heat and an inescapable aura of command.

"Sweetheart," Cole murmured, leaning down slightly, looking at me with an intensity that made my skin tingle. "Never assume you know a Dom's schedule. Games change."

I didn't blink. I just looked up at him at the sheer, immovable wall of muscle towering over my chair and offered a bright, entirely fake smile.

"Right. Totally," I said, my tone dripping with the kind of sweet, cooperative agreement meant to shut down a conversation before it could really start. "We'll stick to our own lanes. You do your thing, I do mine. Perfect."

Cole didn't move. In fact, he narrowed his eyes, the amused glint in them sharpening into something a lot more calculating. He crossed his arms tighter, the motion flexing forearms corded with thick veins, and let out a low, disbelieving hum.

"You know that's not how this works, right?"

"Mm-hmm, yeah, sure," I agreed instantly, nodding along with zero intention of actually listening. My mind was already mapping out the exit strategy how quickly I could wheel myself into my bedroom, lock the door, and throw on my noise-canceling headphones.

He knew it, too. I could see the exact moment he realized that every single word coming out of my mouth was a polite, bulletproof lie designed to get him out of my space.

Cole didn't buy it for a second. Instead of backing off, he shifted his weight, closing the remaining inches between us until the heat radiating off his bare chest practically washed over me.

"You're nodding, Brooks," he murmured, his voice dropping into that low, gravelly register that made my traitorous pulse spike. "And your eyes are already planning how fast you can shut that door in my face."

I forced another bright, innocent smile, plastering on my best look of wide-eyed compliance as I gestured vaguely to the carbon-fiber wheels of my chair.

"Me? Run away from a conversation?" I murmured, injecting just enough dry sarcasm into my voice to test the waters. "Please. Obviously, you're going to be faster than me. I'm in a wheelchair—why would I even try to do that?"

Cole went dead still.

For a second, the heavy, playful tension in the air snapped into something razor-sharp. Most people especially strangers, and especially guys like him who were used to walking on eggshells around anything disability-related would have stammered, looked away, or tripped over an apology.

Cole didn't flinch. He didn't look away from my caramel-brown eyes, and he didn't offer a shred of pity. Instead, the corners of his mouth twitched into a slow, dangerous smirk.

"Is that a challenge, sweetheart?" he asked softly, his gaze dropping down to my chair and lingering there for a beat before snapping back up. "Because I don't race people who've already conceded defeat. Especially not when they're using sarcasm as a shield."

"It's not a challenge," I shot back, my patience wearing thin as I shifted my weight, reaching instinctively for my wheels to put some much-needed distance between us. "It's basic math. You have legs that can bench-press a small car. I have two wheels and a very tight schedule of my own."

I gave the wheels a sharp push, expecting him to step back.

He didn't. He just casually shifted his foot, blocking my left caster dead in its tracks.

My wheels hit the unyielding block of his sneaker, the sudden stop jolting my shoulders.

I stopped pushing, my fingers tightening over the rubber hand rims until my knuckles went white. Slowly, deliberately, I raised my gaze from his chest back up to his face. The playful edge in his eyes was gone, replaced by a steady, heavy focus that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

"Move your foot, Thompson," I said, keeping my voice level, though a hot spike of irritation flared right beneath my ribs.

"Not a chance," Cole replied, his tone as immovable as his stance. He didn't budge an inch. "We're not even five minutes into living under the same roof, and you're already trying to ghost me. That's a terrible roommate etiquette, Brooks."

"We're institutional pairings, not best friends," I snapped back, my temper finally cracking through my carefully rehearsed armor. "You get to check a box for the university mandate, and I get to check a box. The arrangement requires your presence on paper, not in my personal radius."

Cole tilted his head, studying me with an infuriating lack of urgency. The warmth radiating off his bare skin was inescapable, a constant, heavy reminder of how close he was and how entirely out of my depth I was if I let this turn into a power struggle.

"The mandate requires a lot more than a signature on a form, sweetheart," he murmured, his voice dropping an octave as he leaned in just a fraction closer, invading my space with absolute authority. "And as for my radius? You're standing right in the middle of it."

I glared up at him for one more defiant beat, letting him see every ounce of my frustration. Then, with a sharp yank, I spun my chair away from his sneaker, executing a tight, practiced pivot that left him standing there.

"Enjoy your hallway, Thompson," I muttered over my shoulder.

I didn't wait for a reply. I pushed hard against the wheels, speeding down the short corridor toward the room assigned to me. Slamming my palm against the heavy wooden door, I shoved it shut with a satisfying click of the latch, locking it tight behind me.

Leaning back in my seat, I let out a long, shaky breath, letting the adrenaline fade. I expected the room to look like every other sterile, half-thought-out dorm the university doled out.

Instead, I froze.

My eyes swept across the space, and my breath caught in my throat. The heavy, standard-issue student desk had been completely removed, replaced by a sleek, custom-height workspace with knee clearance that actually made sense. The closet sliding doors had been unhinged and tossed, replaced by a low-hanging tension rod with hangers I could easily reach from a seated position. Even the light switches by the entrance and beside the bed had been dropped down a foot on the drywall, flush with new faceplates.

Normal people people who had never spent a single day navigating a world built for long legs and vertical privilege wouldn't have noticed a single one of those things. The university certainly hadn't. They gave you a generic key and a prayer.

Cole had. Before I had even stepped foot in the apartment, he had gutted and reconfigured the room.

A strange, uncomfortable knot tightened in my chest. I didn't want his consideration. I didn't want anyone looking out for me, least of all a arrogant, bare-chested hockey player who thought he could rewrite the rules of our arrangement.

Shaking off the jolt of emotion, I rolled over to the bed, unlocking the heavy-duty canvas bag securely zipped to the underside of my chair. I pulled out my phone, opening up an encrypted messaging app to check in with the local moving service I'd hired independently.

Hey, just checking on the ETA for the boxes, I typed out quickly. Still on track for four?

Within seconds, a reply flashed back: On our way now. Should be at the side loading dock in twenty.

Good. I locked my phone, tossed it onto the mattress, and reached deeper into the bag, my fingers brushing against the familiar, cold brushed-aluminum casing of my laptop. I pulled it out, setting it onto the custom desk, and cracked the lid open. The screen glowed to life, bypassing the university's firewall through a private proxy.

To the campus administration, I was just Sloane Brooks: a quiet, compliant student forced into a dynamic pairing.

To the dark underbelly of the university's digital network, I was The Spectator. An anonymous, undercover blogger running the most feared rumor and exposé site on campus.

And my next target wasn't just any campus gossip. It was the untouchable, hyper-masculine ecosystem of the Division I hockey team. Cole Thompson and his golden-boy teammates thought they owned this school, but I was about to dig up every single secret they were trying to hide.

I pulled up the dashboard for The Spectator, watching the encrypted traffic spikes roll in. My site wasn't just a blog; it was the digital pulse of the university. While the administration pushed their "harmonious pairing" propaganda, I was the one documenting the reality: the broken contracts, the Doms who abused their authority, and the submissives who were being quietly pushed out of the academic system because they didn't fit the "perfect" mold.

My fingers flew across the keyboard, opening a hidden folder labeled Roster: D1 Men's Hockey.

I had been scraping data on them for weeks. They were the untouchable gods of campus, protected by the university's athletic department and a fan base that looked the other way regardless of what they did behind closed locker room doors.

But I saw everything else.

I scrolled through the anonymous tips flooding my inbox a goldmine of digital dirt.

Tip 142: "Saw the backup goalie, Jaxson Ross, at the downtown clinic again. He's definitely failing his drug screenings, but the coach is scrubbing the files."

Tip 156: "The captain's girlfriend is a sophomore transfer. She looks terrified every time he's in the room. Keep an eye on her."

Tip 168: "Thompson isn't as 'clean' as his PR suggests. Watch his financial disclosures. He's been moving massive amounts of crypto through an offshore account."

I leaned back, the blue light of the screen reflecting in my eyes. They all thought they were invisible. They all thought that because they held the power in this society, they were immune to consequences.

That was their first mistake.

The university was full of people like me people who had been overlooked, discarded, or forced into pairings they never asked for. From the scholarship students working three jobs just to keep their heads above water, to the quiet wallflowers in the library who saw everything but said nothing, I had eyes everywhere.

I wasn't just a student in a wheelchair. I was the person holding the receipts.

A notification pinged at the top of my screen a message from a user I'd been cultivating for months: The university is fast-tracking the new "Athletic Expansion" bill. They're planning to cut funding to the Disability Resource Center to pay for a new private training facility for the hockey team.

My jaw tightened. Of course they were.

I glanced toward my bedroom door. Beyond that wood paneling, Cole Thompson was probably cracking open a protein shake, entirely oblivious to the fact that his new roommate wasn't just a quiet, compliant girl who needed help with a light switch.

I was the biggest threat to his entire world. And I was already inside his house.

My phone buzzed against the wooden desk, snapping me out of my digital investigation. It was a text from the moving service: We're at the side loading dock. Coming up with the boxes now.

"Coming," I muttered under my breath, slipping the phone into my pocket.

I wheeled myself out of my room, intending to head straight for the entryway to let them in. But as I rolled into the common area, I found Cole already standing by the front door. He had thrown on a black hoodie, his tall frame blocking the narrow hallway. He was holding a clipboard the campus housing department must have left behind, looking over a manifest.

He turned his head the second my casters clicked against the floor, his dark eyes locking onto mine.

"Moving truck's downstairs," Cole said before I could even open my mouth. He didn't sound annoyed; if anything, he looked mildly amused, like a cat watching a very determined mouse try to rearrange the furniture in its cage. "I told the guys I'd take the heavy boxes. You can direct traffic."

I stopped my chair a few feet away, crossing my arms over my chest. The last thing I wanted was his help. It felt too domestic, too much like the kind of caretaking I had spent years running away from.

"I hired movers, Thompson. They're fully capable of carrying cardboard boxes," I said, my voice sharp. "You don't need to play the helpful roommate."

Cole didn't flinch. He just dropped the clipboard onto the kitchen counter, took two long strides toward me, and looked down with that infuriating, calm authority.

"It's not about capability, Brooks," he murmured, his voice dropping into a low, steady register that made my pulse hitch. "It's about efficiency. And right now, my schedule is wide open."