He watched coldly as she stepped barefoot onto the ice, his voice like frost frozen for a thousand years: "Luckily, you're not wearing socks today."
She smiled, eyes lifting at the corners, red lips parting lightly: "That's not the only thing I'm not wearing."
Seven days earlier, they'd signed a contract in an underground parking lot—**partnership on ice, no feelings.**
Each clause read aloud, sounding like judgment, like self-deception.
The third rule was scribbled the most carelessly: **No kissing.**
His fingertips brushed her cheek, cold as if untouched by emotion.
She tilted her head away, yet her lips curled upward: "Rule three."
He leaned close to her ear, breath burning: "Deal."
But when money flowed into the account, their embrace grew tighter than ever before.
She broke away sharply: "Let me go."
His voice suddenly broke, his gaze cracking open: "What I want has never been money."
"I want your heart."
She froze.
Then, step by step, she moved closer, rose onto her toes, and pressed a kiss sharp as a blade to his lips—
The ice shattered, blood threading from the corner of her mouth.
"Olivia!" He suddenly roared, pinning her against the wall. "Stop pretending! You only want to skate with *her*, don't you?!"
Her eyes widened, uncomprehending—then his voice collapsed again, nearly pleading:
"...Say my name. Say Emma’s name… and I’ll go crazy for you."
Cut to the locker room.
Teammates sat in a circle, smirking suggestively: "Hey, did you notice? The way he looks at her—it hasn’t been right for a long time."
And she, head bowed, slowly zipped up her jacket.
Deliberately, as if locking away a heart inch by inch into winter.
The phone lit up abruptly.
The screen showed a playing series—*Thin Ice*.
On it, the exact moment they had just kissed.
Barrage comments rolled wildly:
【Holy shit! Is this real life?!】
【This isn't partnership—this is love carved with ice blades!】
She stared at the screen, fingers trembling.
Turns out the whole world had seen the fire they pretended didn’t exist.
Beneath the ice, lava had long been surging.
And they were standing at the very center of the crack about to break.
After betrayal ruins her career, injured skater Emma strikes a risky deal with suspended hockey bad boy James. Enemies on ice, allies by force—until his secret bet threatens to destroy them both.
