Chapter 13 · The Residency Rider

"Don't move." Torin's hand lands flat on the cinderblock beside my head, close enough that the heat off his forearm bleeds through his sleeve onto my skin. "You wanted the exit. There it is." He doesn't point. He doesn't have to. The tunnel mouth sits twenty feet behind him and he hasn't shifted an inch to let me reach it.

"You're blocking it on purpose."

"I'm standing where I'm standing." His voice drops rough, like he ran the last two periods dry. "Get past me. Try."

I don't try. That's the problem. My spine's against the wall, his chest a breath from mine, and every part of me that isn't furious is doing something stupid — something that has nothing to do with default triggers or pension math. There's still someone else's blood smeared along his jaw from the third period. Under the sweat he smells like ice, cold and metal, and I hate how far into my lungs it goes.

"You held a door in Boston too," I say. "Different door. Same trick.