Chapter Fifteen
Brynn
It was already late when we started eating dinner, so it’s really late when we finish.
I know the responsible thing to do is to go to bed. Morning will be here in the blink of an eye and then I’ll be buried under work, but going to bed with Killian is also a mildly intimidating prospect. Last night it happened so quickly and without warning, but tonight I’ve had a lot more time to anticipate it.
There are also things I still need to deal with.
Since I haven’t been near the frat house since last night, we decide to take a late-night ride past it to see if my car is still where I parked it. I have no way of moving it without my keys, but I’ll feel better knowing it’s still there and I can retrieve it if I get them back.
Unfortunately, it isn’t.
Maybe it’s because I’ve had so much to think about and I was busy working all day which provided a great distraction, but until this moment, it never occurred to me that I may not be able to get my car back.
“I guess I should have known. If they were planning to kill me when they found me last night, of course they were planning to dump it. And I left my keys.” I cover my face with my hands.
“We don’t know they dumped it,” he says.
I drop my hands and shoot him a look. “Well, we know it’s not where I left it.”
“I was hoping they hadn’t found it. Now that I know they have, I’m not sure I’d even let you get in it. They could have sabotaged the brakes or fucked with it somehow to make it unsafe. Try to get the car to do the dirty work since they didn’t finish the job themselves.”
I shake my head. “I should have called the police. I knew I should have called the police.”
Killian shakes his head. “We’re not getting the police involved.”
“None of this was your call,” I say, frustrated. “I listened to you and now I don’t have a car. I have to at least report it stolen. Maybe I can file an insurance claim or something. I can’t be without a car. I have to drive to work every week, and I need it to drive off campus.”
“You can report it stolen, but if you do, you’ll have to answer questions. They’ll want to know if anyone else had access to your keys, and you don’t even have your keys, so you’ll have to say you lost your purse at a party. Then they’ll ask questions about the party, and how good are you at lying?”
I grimace.
He nods. “That’s what I thought. Give me another day and I’ll find out where your car is.”
“And if it’s at the bottom of the river?”
“Well, then we’ll have to go car shopping, won’t we?”
“I can’t afford to go car shopping.”
“I didn’t say you’d be paying.”
My eyes widen. “You can’t buy me a car.”
“I can do whatever the fuck I want,” he says before cutting the wheel and turning on the road past the Rho Kappa frat house.
On the way back to his apartment, he pulls into a gas station that’s still open. Not to get gas, but to grab a couple of things inside. I go with him since I don’t want to wait in the car alone, plus I figure I should grab myself a few things to drink for the week since I’ll be staying with him.
Inside the gas station, I grab myself an iced coffee for school tomorrow and scan the shelves for something to munch on during study sessions while Killian wanders off to grab something in a different aisle.
I grab a bag of popcorn, but there’s a sale sign that says 2 for $5 or $2.99 each, so I decide to get Fritos, too, and maximize my savings. As I’m reaching for the bag of chips, I hear a familiar voice behind me.
“Brynn?”
I whirl around, eyes slightly wide. This close to the frat house, my mind goes straight to the Rho Kappas and the party last night, but when I turn, I see a guy from my physics class standing there. “Oh, hey, Liam.”
“I thought that was you.” He flashes me a dimpled smile. “You’re out late. Don’t you have class in the morning?”
I crack a smile. “Yep. Don’t you as well?”
“Guilty. But I’m meeting friends for dinner a half hour outside the city after my last class, and if I didn’t get gas tonight, I’d be walking there.”
“Hey, then you could skip the gym,” I joke.
He flashes me a winning smile, his gaze dropping to the bag of SmartPop in my hand. “You like popcorn, huh?”
“I… do,” I say with an uncertain laugh.
“There’s a gourmet popcorn place downtown. Their salted caramel is killer. We should go after the physics seminar on Tuesday. We can sit together and head into the city as soon as it’s over.”
“Oh, that sounds nice,” I say, searching for a polite excuse to decline.
Before I can come up with one, however, Killian rounds the corner. I glance his way, but he’s not looking at me. His jaw is locked, his gaze fixed on Liam before he even had a face to put to the voice. “Sorry, pal. Brynn already has a date to that seminar.”
Surprise flashes across Liam’s harmlessly handsome face. “Oh. Sorry, I didn’t realize. I also don’t recognize you from our physics class.”
Killian drapes an arm over my shoulders, letting his hand and whatever he’s holding in it drift into view as he pulls me closer. “I’m not in it,” he states.
The energy between them is weird, so I try to make it nicer. “Um, Killian, this is a classmate of mine. Liam, this is Killian.”
I don’t know how to introduce him, so I don’t offer an explanation of who he is.
Liam smiles tightly, clearly uncomfortable. “Ah. It’s nice meeting you, Killian.”
“Yeah, same here,” Killian says, but he’s openly dismissive. Glancing down at me, he asks, “You ready to go?”
“Um… yeah, I guess so.” I feel a bit guilty as I look back at Liam, my face warm. “I’ll see you Tuesday?”
Liam forces a smile. “Sure. See you then.”
“I’ll see you, too,” Killian tells him. “Make sure you bring us some of that popcorn.”
I look up at him, feeling like I should say something about him being such an ass, but Killian just uses his arm around my neck to lead me back in the direction he just came from.
I wait until we’re out of the aisle, and I keep my voice low, but I can’t help pointing out, “That was a bit rude.”
Unbothered, he glances over at me. “I’m a bit rude.”
“That’s not something you should be proud of,” I inform him primly.
“I’m not too worried about it. Rude or not, you still prefer my company to his.”
My jaw drops at his unabashed arrogance. “How do you know?”
Killian smirks. “Because it’s my bed you’re sleeping in tonight.”
Horrified, I look around to make sure Liam isn’t close enough to hear us since he isn’t considerate enough to lower his voice like I did.
In a stage whisper, when Killian notices what I’m doing, he tells me, “I think he knows.”
I look back at him to ask how, but before I have to, we get to register. The guy behind the counter doesn’t say anything as I put my stuff down, and Killian doesn’t either. He just adds the two bottles of water he grabbed from the cooler to our pile of stuff, and then he puts down the other thing.
The thing he was holding when he slung his arm around my neck in front of Liam. The thing Liam clearly saw.
A box of condoms.
My eyes widen and my jaw unhinges. I look over at Killian, speechless and horrified, and he smirks, shrugging like he doesn’t see the problem. “I was out.”
“Oh my god,” I finally say.
“You’re welcome,” Killian replies.
Eyes bulging, I say, “What could I possibly have to thank you for right now?”
Killian’s dark eyebrows rise as he looks at me pointedly. “The last guy you let pick you up was Kyle, and look how that turned out.”
“Liam wasn’t trying to pick me up! We’re in the same class and we’re both attending the same seminar. He wanted to be seminar buddies.”
“Uh-huh,” Killian says knowingly, drawing out his wallet. “And the gourmet popcorn date he suggested afterward?”
“That wasn’t a date.”
“Okay,” Killian says, but he says it like I’m utterly delusional and he’s just humoring me.
I’m still staring at him, dumfounded, horrified, and retroactively humiliated, but my attention shifts when I notice the cashier grab my bag of SmartPop to ring it up.
And he made me forget my damn Fritos.
I debate for a split second if I’m willing to endure possible mortification if Liam is still in that aisle just to save $.49 on a bag of chips, but I am who I am.
Wordlessly, I stomp back to the chip aisle.
Thankfully, Liam has fled, so I don’t have to face him.
I return to the register quickly and throw the second bag of chips on the counter. “I forgot something,” I murmur to the cashier, but he doesn’t care. Then, to Killian, I complain, “You almost made me overpay for chips.”
Killian smiles, shaking his head as he draws his credit card out of his wallet. “Actually, I almost made me overpay for chips.”
“Have you ever had vegetarian chili?”
If he’s thrown by my sudden segue, he doesn’t show it. “Can’t say that I have.”
“Do you want to try it? I could make us a small batch tomorrow and we could have Frito pies for dinner.”
“What’s a Frito pie?”
“What… is a Frito pie?” I reiterate dramatically. “Only the best use of Fritos of all time. It’s a bed of corn chips with chili on top, then you sprinkle on some cheddar cheese and add a dollop of sour cream. Then you eat it with the chips like a dip.” I nod confidently. “Yep, I’ll stop at the grocery store after class tomorrow. That’s definitely what we’re having for dinner.”
“Sounds good to me.”
He sounds too smug, so I look over at him with unconcealed suspicion as he takes the bags from the cashier. “What?”
“Nothing. Just don’t see you cooking dinner for your physics buddy, that’s all.”
Sighing, I give Killian a warning glare, but he just smirks, takes my hand with his empty one, and leads me out of the gas station.