Chapter 26
I’m talkingto James in the parking lot when Kai pulls up next to us. He’s here three minutes earlier than he said he’d be, meaning he probably only had about ten minutes to shower and change his clothes. Still, he looks as good as he always does. His damp, dark hair falls messily over his forehead as his eyes devour me from head to toe and back again.
The others are here in their cars too, because of course they are.
Leaving his engine running, Kai climbs out of the car, walking around toward me as if he knows I’m not about to get in there by myself.
I send another pleading look at James, who smiles at me before sipping the latte I made him to sweeten him up.
“I hope you’re enjoying that, because you’re not getting another one.”
He laughs under his breath.
Kai opens the car door for me and rests his arms on the frame, slowly shaking his head when I glance off toward the sidewalk.
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” he warns.
“Why not?”
“I’ll chase you.”
“You can chase me all you want. You won’t catch me.”
Looking both amused and turned on, he runs his eyes up and down my small form again. “I might let you prove it one day, but not today,” he says, tilting his head at the seat. “Get in.”
I look at James again, then at the other Kingstons, sighing in defeat when I accept the fact that I’m not going anywhere unless I go with Kai.
Knocking my cap down over my eyes, I get in the car, forcing myself not to let my face light up at the sight of the badass black and yellow leather interior. Kai wiggles his brows as if he knows it’s awesome before closing the door for me. When he’s seated next to me in the driver’s seat, he pulls his seatbelt on while I do the same, refusing to look at him when I feel his eyes burning into me. I was feeling brave when I sent him those pictures. It felt like I was winning this game of his at the time, but now that he’s right here next to me, the tables have turned and he’s back on top.
And now I’m remembering him on top of me, fucking my pussy and playing with my ass at the same time. I shift in my seat.
His voice is taunting and playful when he asks, “What are you thinking about?”
“Wren,” I joke. “He’s pretty hot.”
He laughs and reaches over the inner console, threading his fingers through mine. I look down at our joined hands, his thumb stroking my daisy tattoo. My stomach flips as he hits the gas, the engine purring as he follows his brothers out of the small parking lot. When I look in the side mirror, I see James pulling out behind us to follow.
“Did Derek come back?” Kai asks.
“No.”
“Have you talked to him?”
“No.”
“He’s avoiding you,” he guesses, our gazes colliding briefly before I break eye contact.
“Yeah.”
“What happened?”
“I, um…I asked him about Callie. He didn’t tell me the truth but he didn’t deny it either. I yelled at him. Hit him.” I swallow. “I haven’t seen him since.”
“You feel bad for him.”
My eyes hit his again. “No.”
“You do,” he says. “A little bit.”
Maybe. But not for the reasons he might think.
“I just…I just wish I knew he was okay.”
Kai’s quiet for a few minutes, our hands still linked as he uses them to shift gears.
“What?” I ask. “Say it.”
He sighs. “You’re too good for him, Hails. He doesn’t deserve you.”
“He’s my family,” I say quietly.
I don’t bother telling him he’s his family too, but I can tell he knows I’m thinking it. His nostrils flare as he stares straight ahead, his free hand flexing on the steering wheel.
I pull my brows down. “You really don’t give a fuck about him anymore, do you?”
“He hurt my sister,” he says, his eyes darkening along with his tone. “He hurt my brother when he fucked his girlfriend and broke his heart. He hurt all of us when he walked out on us without so much as a goodbye. He stopped giving a fuck about us way before we stopped giving one about him.”
I don’t think that last part is entirely true, but I keep that to myself.
I fall silent and lie my head back on the seat, still holding his hand while he drives us toward the coffee shop. When we get there, Damon climbs out of his car and does a double take at Kai.
“What’s his deal?” I ask, tipping my chin at Damon.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, an hour ago he was threatening to kill you, and now he looks like he wants to kill me for taking the smile off your face.”
“That’s just Damon.” He shrugs. “Anger and overprotectiveness are his love language.”
I scrunch my nose. My feelings toward the Kingstons—Damon especially—are rocky at best, but I can’t help feeling a little envious of their relationship. This family… They worry about each other constantly. They’d kill and die to keep each other safe. They protect each other and love each other unconditionally, flaws and all.
Valerie loved me like that.
Derek loves me like that in his own way, but it’s not the same. Not anymore.
“Why don’t you drive?” Kai asks randomly.
“Isn’t it obvious?” I turn my head on the seat to look at him. “I’m a passenger princess.”
Kai blinks at me once, twice, and then lets out a surprised laugh, leaning over to tuck his finger under my chin. “My passenger princess.”
He kisses me, and I let him even though his siblings are watching. When I see one of them moving in my peripheral, I turn my head to find Wyatt saying something to Wren on the sidewalk, though his eyes are on me and Kai through the car window. Wren takes a step to the right, blocking his view of us.
I turn back to Kai. “Be nice.”
He smirks, leaning in for another kiss, and I push his face away.
Climbing out of the car, I try to smile at Wyatt, but I’m sure it looks more like a grimace. “Hey.”
“Hey…” he says warily, trying to get a better look at me through the small gap between Wren and Kai’s heads. “You okay, Hailey?”
I nod, finding myself surrounded by Kingstons while I get the door unlocked. I frown at them, but they don’t back up.
When we get inside, Kai sticks to me like a shadow, staring at Wyatt over my head as if he’s daring him to say something about it. Wyatt wisely keeps his opinions to himself while he gets to work.
The others sit at their usual table in the corner, all half asleep, lounging across the couches like they own the place. I smile a little at the way they’re all laying on each other, and Kai notices, wrapping his arms around me from behind with his chin perched on my shoulder.
“It’s okay if you like them a little bit,” he says in my ear. “I won’t tell anyone.”
I don’t respond to that.
After making us all a coffee, I carry the loaded tray with one hand and grab Kai with the other, dragging him over to his siblings by the scruff of his hoodie. I sit him down next to Callie, who yawns, sticking her grabby hands out as I pass her a mocha latte. Wren and Levi smile up at me when I reach into the pocket of my apron and dump a handful of sugar packets on the table between their coffees. Damon grunts, then laughs under his breath when I drop a bottle of water on his lap, just missing his dick.
“Ballsy little thing,” he murmurs, his fingers moving through Callie’s hair.
Kai looks at me with hearts in his eyes.
An hour later,I’m talking to one of my early morning regulars, Eric, a cute, black haired guy who’s wearing more eyeliner than Callie is, when Kai walks up to the counter, getting way too close to my customer as he props his elbows on the surface in front of me. “Baby.”
I grit my teeth at him in warning.
“Baby?” Eric mouths to me, raising a brow before he cranes his neck to get a good look at Kai’s form. “Well, shit. Hi.”
“Hi,” Kai says back. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Kai,” I growl.
“Kingston.” Eric nods his approval. “Good for you, Hailey. Is he your boyfriend?”
“No.”
“Yes,” Kai says at the same time.
I drop my jaw in outrage.
“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Kai.” Eric holds out his hand. “I’m Eric.”
Kai shakes it. “You’re standing too close to my girl, Eric.”
“Kai.”
“I’m gonna need you to back your ass up a few steps before I beat it.”
Kill me now.
Eric grins at Kai, then me. “I like him.”
“By all means.” I wave a hand. “Shoot your shot.”
“Nah.” Eric takes the coffee I pass him. “Deny it all you want, Hailey. Your boy’s taken. I don’t go for guys who are obsessed with my favorite barista.”
“He’s not obsessed with me.”
“I am,” Kai says.
“He is,” the rest of the Kingstons call out.
I pinch the bridge of my nose.
When Eric leaves, I lean over the counter, getting in Kai’s face to whisper, “I hate you.”
He smiles at me like I’m adorable, brushing his nose against mine. “You ready to go?”
“No.”
“No?”
“I’m not riding to school with you.”
The slow smirk he hits me with might as well belong to the devil himself.
“I hate you,”I tell him again.
Driving through the school gates, Kai slows the car down and parks in his usual spot next to Damon. “Whatever you say, beautiful.”
Working my jaw, I subtly look around while I undo my seatbelt. Everyone is looking at us, at me, sitting in the passenger seat of their king’s car, and it’s not hard to figure out what they’re all thinking. I mean, they wouldn’t be wrong but shit. I should have fought him harder.
“You touch this when you’re nervous.” Kai takes my hand, running his thumb over my daisy tattoo before lifting it to his mouth to kiss it.
I pull my hand away. “I’m not nervous.”
“Your hands are shaking, Hailey.”
“That’s because I’m fighting the urge to slap you.” I twist around to grab my bag out of the back seat before I climb out of the car.
Laughing, he jogs around to my side before I can ditch him, wrapping his arm tightly around my middle, ensuring I can’t get away.
“If you make a scene, I will slap you.”
“Baby, you’re the one making a scene.” He dips his head, nudging my hat up to look into my eyes.
My nostrils flare. “Just let me go.”
“No,” he says, the infuriating asshole.
We stare at each other for what feels like ages. He waits me out, chuckling to himself when I slap my hand into his and dig my nails into his knuckles, pulling him over to where his family waits for us. As I fall in line on Damon and Callie’s left, I look sideways at Wren, who’s smiling to himself as he looks between me and his twin brother.
“What do you look so smug about?” I mutter. “I’m not walking with you by choice.”
He doesn’t stop smiling as we walk in through the main entrance. “Does she lie to you a lot?”
“All the time,” Kai answers.
When we get to our lockers, one of the senior girls stands on the other side of the hallway, lifting her phone as if she’s about to take a picture of me. She falters when she realizes I’ve caught her, dropping the phone to her side before she scurries away from us.
“Ignore them,” Kai says quietly, closing his locker before crowding my space from behind. “They’re just jealous.”
“Jealous of what?”
“You.”
I scoff. “Are you always this full of yourself?”
“Yes.” Turning me around, he pushes me back against my closed locker, trapping me in the same position he did on my first day here. He towers over me, running his hands around to my back to slide them into my back pockets. “Fuck, I love your ass in these jeans,” he whispers, pulling my lower half into his. “I want to fuck it.”
Scorching heat blazes through me.
Students start to filter away as the first bell rings, but Kai doesn’t move. Instead, he kisses me like no one’s watching, but they are watching, and I’m the dumbass letting him do it, melting against his skilled mouth.
God, what is he doing to me?
After longer than I’d like, I come to my senses and break the kiss, pulling my phone out when it rings in my pocket. I see my brother’s name on the screen and hesitate. I don’t want to talk to him in front of them, but he hasn’t called me in almost a week. Something could be wrong. I answer it and press the phone to my ear. “Der?—”
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” He sounds furious.
Kai’s still pressed against me, his eyes searching mine, his brows drawn in as he studies the expression on my face.
“Hailey!” Derek shouts, making me cringe.
Kai must hear him because he takes the phone from me, putting it on speaker and holding it between us. I panic and try to grab it back, but he shakes his head at me, side-eyeing the others as they move closer to us.
“Jesus Christ,” Derek hisses. “Are you with him right now?”
I open my mouth, then close it again. Kai nods at me. I swallow. “Yeah, but how do y?—”
“Can he hear me?”
Kai nods again, so I say, “Yeah.”
I don’t know why I’m looking to him for guidance. This is my brother. I can handle him without?—
“Show her the fucking pictures.”
I frown. Seeming to know exactly what he’s talking about, Kai’s jaw ticks as he reaches into his pocket for his own phone. My entire body tenses as I wait. I swear to God, if those pictures I sent him this morning have somehow ended up in my brother’s hands…
“Relax,” Kai murmurs. “He’s not talking about those.”
Derek curses under his breath.
When Kai passes me his phone, I look down to find a group chat filled with messages about me and him. A few pictures of us in his car a few minutes ago. More of the six of us walking into school together, my hand in Kai’s. The two of us kissing in the very spot we’re standing in now. You can’t see my face in most of them because it’s hidden behind the brim of my ball cap, but to anyone who knows me, there’s no denying it’s me in these pictures.
What the fuck is going on?
I try to look at the remaining students in the hallway, but I can’t because five Kingstons are surrounding me, shoulder to shoulder, shielding me so that I can’t see out and they can’t see in.
“Der, I didn’t…” I stammer. “I didn’t know.”
“No, but he did,” he says. “I told you he’s fucking poison, Hailey. How do you not realize he’s playing you to get to me, you stupid little g?—”
“Watch your fucking mouth,” Kai and Wren say together, and Derek stops.
I bounce my eyes between them. Levi’s holding Wren’s hand, their fingers locked together as they stare at my phone. Damon’s got his arm around Callie’s waist protectively, his eyes filled with rage at the sound of Derek’s voice. Kai doesn’t take his eyes off me, his free hand coming up to my face to run his thumb over my cheek.
“You don’t like to be seen,” he says, somehow knowing this is about more than my older brother being an asshole for the fun of it.
I slowly shake my head.
“Why?”
“I—”
“Don’t you dare, Hailey,” Derek bites out.
I snap my lips shut.
Kai glares at the phone in his hand as if he wants to reach through it and strangle his cousin.
“Kai,” Derek says. “You can’t do this. She…” He pauses. “Do you know who she is to me?”
Kai doesn’t answer that.
“Fuck. Please, Kai. I’m begging you. Make those pictures disappear and leave my sister alone.”
Kai shakes his head, his gaze catching mine again as he speaks to him for the first time in months. “If you ever talk to her like that again, I’ll make you swallow your own teeth.”
Derek pauses before he lets out another muttered curse.
Kai grins evilly. “In case you haven’t figured it out already, I’m not leaving her alone.”
“Goddamnit, Kai?—”
Kai hangs up on him. Without asking me the questions I know he’s dying to ask, he gives me my phone back, he and his siblings still crowding me as Kai takes my hand and walks me to homeroom.
He doesn’t leave me alone, just like he said he wouldn’t, but he does manage to make all of the pictures disappear. Within the hour, they’ve all vanished from the group chat as if they were never there to begin with. Some people probably still have the pictures on their phones, but Kai already not so nicely warned everyone not to let any more pictures of me end up on the group chat or online.
At lunch, I’m sitting between Kai and Callie at the Kingston’s table, Kai’s arm around my shoulder while I scroll through the endless chat on his phone.
“Does this happen all the time?” I ask.
I’ve only skimmed through the last three days so far. It never stops. It’s an endless string of brutal high school kids giving each other shit and gossiping about every little thing the Kingstons do. There’s even a picture of Kai and Wren eating at Lucky’s Diner the other day, sitting side by side in a booth, their plates piled high with food.
Derek’s not in this chat anymore, meaning someone must have sent him the pictures of us before he called me, but there’s not much I can do to figure out who it was.
“Pretty much, yeah,” Callie says around a mouthful of pizza. “You should have seen the shit they were saying when Wren and Levi outed themselves in the hallway out there.” She tips her head at the doors behind me. “It was insane.”
Curious, I search back, scrunching my nose at all of the wild, intrusive messages. There’s a video of Levi kissing Wren in public for the first time in front of everyone, but I don’t watch it. I keep scrolling, stalling when I get to one of the messages beneath the video. I look up at Wren and Levi with a brow raised. “Did you two really hook up in the bathroom after that?”
They smirk at each other.
“They’ve got an exhibitionism kink,” Kai tells me.
I nod, digging into my own pizza. “Yeah, I’ve noticed.”