Tenten wasn't looking for anyone.She never had.
She trained.She fought.She sharpened steel until the reflection staring back at her was cold enough to keep the world at arm's length.
Affection? Distracting.Attachment? Dangerous.Love? A fairytale for fools.
And yet—
She kept watching him.
Naruto.
He was everywhere now.A name spoken with reverence in mission halls.A presence felt before seen.The one even seasoned jōnin went quiet around.
He didn't strut.He didn't boast.He simply was.
And when he walked into a room, women shifted.Men glared.The air tensed.
Tenten didn't shift.She didn't glare.But her fingers gripped her weapon hilts just a little tighter.
Because she wasn't afraid of him.
She was afraid of what she might become if she stopped resisting.
They crossed paths during a strategy briefing.
A B-rank mission. Tight squad. Minimal casualties. Three-man team. Tsunade put them both on it.
She didn't argue.
But when she stepped into the room and saw him already there, standing near the window—arms folded, gold hair catching the sun—her stomach knotted.
He didn't speak.
He didn't smile.
He just looked at her.
And that look—calm, evaluating, just long enough to unfold her entire armor without touching it—made her chest tighten.
They didn't speak much during the mission.
Tenten was surgical.Naruto was silent.The third squad member didn't even try to break the tension.
When they returned, bloodied but victorious, Tsunade dismissed them with a nod.
Tenten washed the dirt off her arms in the mission hall's basin.
Naruto walked past her. Said nothing.
But as he passed…
His fingers brushed her wrist. Light. Deliberate. Casual.
And then he was gone.
But the spot he touched?
Burned.
Three nights passed.
She found herself at her training field—alone, as always—throwing blades into the center of a wooden post until her arms ached.
"Still the cleanest strikes in Konoha," came his voice.
She turned.
He stood at the edge of the clearing. Watching.
Again.
Always watching.
"Still silent," she replied.
"Still steel," he countered.
They stared.
Then:
"Why are you here?" she asked.
"Because you're pretending you haven't wanted me for months."
Her jaw tightened.
"I'm not like the others."
"I know."
"I don't bend."
"I don't want you to."
Tenten stepped forward.
"You think you can melt me with a look?"
"No," Naruto said. "But you've already been melting on your own. Haven't you?"
The breath she took felt like admitting defeat.
"I've seen what you do to them," she said. "Hinata, Ino, Anko. You ruin them."
"No," he said. "They chose me. All I did was give them what no one else could."
"And what's that?"
He stepped closer.
His voice dropped.
"Someone who sees them… all the way down."
Tenten shivered.
Not from cold.
From how hot that truth was in her chest.
He didn't touch her.
He didn't need to.
But she stepped forward anyway.
Close.
Not submissive.
Not dominant.
Just… present.
Her voice lowered.
"If I give you this—if I let you in—you won't get to break me."
Naruto's lips brushed her temple.
"I don't want to break you," he whispered. "I want to feel you shatter by choice."
Her eyes closed.
And her voice, breathless, said:
"Then take me."
He didn't rip her open.
He peeled her apart.
Their first night wasn't wild.It was controlled. Intimate. Intense.
She didn't beg.She didn't whimper.She let him handle her.
She let him see the cracks she never showed.
And when she came—arching under him, sweat-soaked, silent but shaking—he kissed her collarbone and said:
"You're not frost."
She looked up, dazed.
"You're the blade beneath it."
When she left in the morning, she didn't say goodbye.
He didn't stop her.
Because with Tenten?
There would never be words.
Only steel.
And the knowledge that when she returned—
It would be her choice.