Chapter 10: Riley’s Morning Training Sentence
Bang!
The innocent wooden door of the nurse’s office was kicked open cleanly by a sneaker-clad foot, letting out a loud groan of protest.
The overwhelmingly forceful entrance made Tessa, who was still being carried, jolt again. She shrank slightly in Riley Summers’s arms.
Yet in complete contrast to the rough way she had opened the door, Riley held Tessa with unbelievable gentleness. She strode into the empty nurse’s office, where the faint smell of antiseptic hung in the air. Her gaze quickly locked onto an exam bed covered with clean white sheets, and she carefully set Tessa down on it.
The moment Tessa’s feet touched the floor, her floating body finally regained a tiny bit of reality. Her heart, however, was still throwing a wild rave inside her chest, pounding as if it might leap out through her throat.
Before she could even catch her breath, Riley’s commanding voice sounded above her.
“Sit still. Legs straight. Don’t move.”
Tessa straightened her back on reflex, like an elementary school kid waiting to be scolded by a teacher.
Riley shot her a look, as if warning her not to try anything, then turned and strode to the medical cabinet. She began rummaging through it with a series of sharp clatters.
Tessa sat on the edge of the bed, her legs pressed together helplessly. Her gaze stuck to Riley’s back despite herself. Her cheeks still felt terrifyingly hot, and her mind was a complete mess.
Being princess-carried by a girl.
Being brought to the nurse’s office in such a forceful way.
What was this? What was this supposed to mean?
Her soul, the straight-guy soul named Evan Hale, was roaring at an ear-splitting volume.
Run! This woman is terrifying! She’s going to eat you alive!
But this cursed, useless succubus body of hers still trembled with the strange aftereffect of that bright, sweat-warmed embrace. It left her legs weak in a way she absolutely did not want to think about.
“Found it.”
Riley’s voice cut through the battle between heaven and earth inside Tessa’s head. She walked back with a white first-aid kit in hand, moving like a storm. Then she did something that made Tessa’s eyes nearly pop out of her head.
She knelt on one knee in front of her.
Riley’s sharp, handsome face was just below Tessa’s knees. She looked up, her gaze intense, and spoke in a tone that was almost an order.
“Roll up your pant leg. Above the thigh.”
“Huh?!”
Tessa’s brain buzzed and crashed on the spot.
Roll it… above the thigh?
Wouldn’t that mean her whole leg would be…
“Hurry up. What are you stalling for?” Riley frowned, impatience entering her voice. “How am I supposed to tell if you twisted anything or scraped yourself if I can’t see clearly?”
Under that overwhelmingly forceful stare, Tessa felt every bit of resistance inside her get crushed flat. Biting her lower lip, her cheeks red enough to bleed, she reached out with trembling hands and pinched the cuff of her loose athletic pants.
Then, bit by bit, she rolled it upward in pure humiliation.
As the fabric moved up, first came her delicate ankle. Then her smooth calf. Finally, the skin of her thigh appeared under the nurse’s office lights, so pale it almost dazzled.
For a split second, Riley’s breathing stopped.
Her eyes landed on that smooth whiteness before she could stop herself. The skin looked soft and luminous beneath the light. The line of Tessa’s leg was tense from nerves, giving it a sweet, fragile beauty that felt painfully hard to look away from.
Riley’s throat moved almost imperceptibly.
Damn it.
She cursed herself inwardly.
Was she seriously staring at another girl’s leg? Had she lost her mind?
She shook her head hard, forcing the stray thought down, then cleared her throat to hide her moment of weakness. When she looked up again, her eyes had regained their focus.
She opened the first-aid kit and took out cotton swabs and a bottle of povidone-iodine.
“This might sting a little. Hold still.”
Before Tessa could react, something cold touched her swollen ankle.
“Hiss!”
The medicine met the broken skin, and a sharp sting shot through her at once. Tessa sucked in a breath from the pain. Her body trembled beyond her control, and a mist of tears instantly gathered in her eyes.
Seeing her pitiful expression, Riley felt as if something had squeezed her heart.
Almost without thinking, she lowered her head and moved closer to that pale, fragile skin. Then she gently blew on the red, medicine-wet scrape.
“Hoo…”
Her warm breath brushed over the most sensitive skin near Tessa’s ankle like the softest feather.
Boom!
The sharp pain seemed to be washed away by that warmth in an instant. In its place came an indescribable, electric tingling. It rose from her ankle, ran up her spine, and shot straight to the top of her head.
“Ngh…”
Tessa shuddered all over. A tiny, uncontrollable gasp escaped from deep in her throat. Her body went soft in an instant, and that strange, leg-weakening feeling swept through her again.
[Ding! Detected deep “Pity” from Riley Summers. Affection Points +8!]
[Ding! Detected “Strong Nurturing Concern” from Riley Summers. Affection Points +7!]
The system alerts rang in her head, but Tessa had no attention to spare for them.
From Riley’s point of view, however, all she saw was the “porcelain doll” trembling even harder after Riley blew on the wound, even letting out a pained little sound.
She must be hurting even more.
Riley’s heart ached beyond words, and her movements became even gentler.
After disinfecting the scrape, she squeezed a bead of clear ointment onto her fingertip, warmed it slightly between her fingers, and covered the swollen area again.
“Relax. It’ll heal faster if I rub it in.”
Her warm fingertip moved over that delicate skin with firm, unavoidable pressure, gently massaging in small circles.
The pressure shifted between light and heavy as she tried to work the ointment deeper into the skin.
Tessa felt less like a person and more like butter being warmed over a flame, slowly melting apart.
Riley, of course, misunderstood this perfectly.
“Does it hurt that much?” She stopped and looked up at Tessa, her brows twisted together. “If it hurts, say so. Don’t hold it in. What if you make it worse?”
Tessa stared at her.
If I say anything, that’s when things will really get worse!
She shook her head frantically, but could not force out a single word.
Once Riley finished with the ankle, her gaze moved upward. Soon, she noticed a scrape on Tessa’s fair elbow.
“This is hurt too.”
Without asking, Riley took Tessa’s slender arm and placed it on her own thigh. Then she repeated the same suffocating treatment process from earlier.
Disinfect.
Blow gently.
Apply medicine.
Her warm breath brushed across the skin of Tessa’s arm again. Her warm fingertips pressed and rubbed around the scrape again.
By the time Riley finished treating the last wound and straightened up, Tessa felt as if she had just been pulled out of water. A thin layer of sweat covered her body, and all her strength had been drained away.
Riley looked at the soft, dazed junior sitting on the bed, flushed from her cheeks all the way down to her neck like she had been cooked through. She sighed helplessly.
“How are you this weak? You’re practically made of paper.”
She stood up and looked down at Tessa, who still sat there with a blank expression.
Riley stared at her for a long while. The expression in her clear eyes shifted, then gradually became firm and serious, as if she had made some enormous decision.
“No,” she said in a low voice. “Protecting you like this only treats the symptoms, not the cause. You’re too weak. I can’t be by your side every second. You have to get stronger yourself.”
Tessa looked up blankly and met Riley’s eyes, which now burned with frightening determination.
Riley planted her hands on her hips and declared the final verdict one word at a time, her presence heavy enough to make refusal impossible.
“Where is your dorm room? In a couple of days, once your injuries are better, I’ll come to your dorm at six every morning. I’ll train with you.”
“I’m going to rebuild that soft little body of yours myself.”