[Lottie’s POV]
Three days of strategic warfare, and I've become a ninja of avoidance.
I take the stairs when possible, treating them like my personal cardio program from hell. I eat lunch at my desk like a feral accountant protecting her spreadsheets from predators. I've memorized Oliver's schedule with the dedication of a stalker or a deeply unhinged ex-girlfriend.
Neither comparison flatters me particularly.
It's exhausting. Probably obvious to everyone with functioning eyeballs. But I cannot bring myself to care about appearances when the alternative is facing green eyes that make my nervous system malfunction entirely.
Today I stayed late specifically to avoid the evening rush. And him. Mostly him. The rush is just collateral justification I tell myself to feel less pathetic.
The office empties around me in waves. Colleagues gather bags and exchange weekend plans involving activities that sound suspiciously like having actual lives. I stare at my screen, pretending to reconcile numbers that reconciled hours ago.
By seven, the floor is a ghost town. Just me and the hum of fluorescent lights keeping each other company. The cleaning staff will arrive soon. Even they have more exciting Friday nights than I do.
I gather my things with the relief of a prisoner granted parole. Bag. Coat. Dignity I've been clutching like a security blanket. All present and accounted for.
The elevator arrives with a cheerful ding. I step inside and reach for the lobby button, already tasting freedom.
Oliver slips through just before the doors close.
Of course he does. Because the universe looked at my careful scheduling and laughed until it cried.
We stand on opposite sides of the small metal box. Approximately four feet of charged air separates us. The tension could power several city blocks through an entire winter.
Neither of us speaks. The elevator descends in silence so thick I could choke on it.
Fourth floor. Third floor. The numbers tick down with agonizing slowness.
Between three and two, the elevator shudders violently.
Then stops completely.
Emergency lighting kicks in, bathing everything in sickly yellow. A crackling voice emerges from the speaker panel with mechanical indifference.
"Attention passengers. Technical difficulties detected. Maintenance estimates thirty to forty minutes. Please remain calm."
Remain calm. Excellent advice. Completely useless to someone whose brain has just registered that she's trapped in a metal coffin suspended between floors with nowhere to escape.
The walls press inward. Or they seem to. My rational mind knows they haven't moved, but my irrational mind—the one currently seizing control—disagrees violently with that assessment.
My breathing quickens. Shallow gasps that don't quite reach my lungs. My hands shake against my bag strap. The ceiling lowers. The walls contract. The air thins.
The box shrinks around me like a coffin being custom-fitted for my specific dimensions.
I slide down the wall because my legs have abandoned their post entirely. My knees pull to my chest automatically. A defensive position. A terrified child's position. Pathetic and unstoppable.
Cupboards. Dark, cramped cupboards where a cruel boy locked me and laughed while I screamed. The memory surfaces without permission, flooding my system with ancient panic that never fully healed.
"Lottie." Oliver's voice cuts through the static in my head. "Look at me."
I can't. The walls won't stop moving. The air is running out. We're going to die in this metal box and nobody will find us until Monday morning when Sandra needs her quarterly reports.
He crouches before me, entering my shrinking field of vision. His hands find mine—cold, trembling, barely functional. His grip is warm. Steady. An anchor in the storm currently drowning my nervous system completely.
"Breathe with me. In through your nose. Out through your mouth. Match my rhythm."
I try. God, I try. But the air won't cooperate. It stutters in my throat, refusing passage. The panic has built walls inside my lungs that no amount of trying can breach.
"Tell me somewhere you'd rather be." His thumbs stroke across my knuckles. Grounding. Present. "Anywhere in the world. Describe it to me."
"My grandmother's garden." The words come in fragments. Broken pieces of sentences. "In Sussex. There was... sky. Open sky. And roses. Pink ones along the fence. She let me pick them."
"Keep going. What else?"
"I can't—" The walls press closer. The ceiling descends another inch. "It's not working. The box keeps shrinking around me."
Oliver's expression shifts. A decision forms behind those green eyes. Something reckless. Something necessary. Something I don't have time to analyse before it happens.
He kisses me.
Not passionate. Not the desperate hunger from the hotel room. This is different—grounding, deliberate, filling my senses until there's no room left for anything else except the reality of his mouth on mine.
His lips against mine become the only reality. The taste of him. The warmth. The steady pressure that demands attention my panic cannot compete with no matter how desperately it tries.
The walls stop moving.
My breathing unlocks. Air flows properly for the first time in minutes. The ceiling retreats to its original position, looking vaguely apologetic about its earlier threatening behaviour.
When he pulls back, his forehead rests against mine. Our breath mingles in the small space between us. His eyes search my face with something that looks dangerously like genuine concern.
"Did that help?"
A laugh escapes me. Slightly hysterical. Mostly relieved. Entirely inappropriate given the circumstances and our complicated history.
"You kissed me to cure my claustrophobia."
"Technically, I kissed you to redirect your sensory focus. The claustrophobia cure was a bonus."
"Is that medically sound?"
"Probably not. But it worked, didn't it?"
It did work. The panic has retreated to manageable levels. The elevator still feels small, but no longer actively murderous.
The machinery groans. The lights flicker. With a mechanical shudder, the elevator jerks back to life and resumes its descent.
We separate as the numbers tick down. Standing. Breathing. Pretending we didn't just share a moment that complicates everything further.
The doors open on the lobby. We step out without speaking. The kiss hovers between us—unaddressed, impossible to ignore, adding itself to the growing list of things we're apparently not discussing.
The evening air hits my face as we exit the building. Cool. Fresh. A relief after the recycled atmosphere of my metal prison.
I pause on the pavement, letting oxygen recalibrate my traumatized system.
A car sits parked across the street. Engine running. Headlights off. The tinted windows reveal nothing of whoever waits inside.
That prickle returns. The sensation I felt outside the café with Gemma. The awareness of being watched by someone specific. Someone intent. Someone patient.
For a moment, I stand frozen. Staring at the dark vehicle. Waiting for something to happen.
The car pulls away smoothly. Merges into traffic. Disappears around the corner like it was never there at all.
Oliver follows my gaze toward the empty street. "Something wrong?"
"No." I shake my head firmly. "Just being paranoid."
Paranoid. That's all this is. My traumatized brain inventing threats because the real ones—standing right beside me, smelling like expensive cologne and terrible decisions—aren't dramatic enough.
We part ways without further conversation. He walks toward the tube station. I walk toward sanity, assuming I can find it somewhere.
The kiss lingers on my lips like evidence at a crime scene. The car lingers in my memory like a warning I'm choosing to ignore.
Paranoia. Just paranoia.
I almost believe it.