Chapter 2
KENNA
K enna and Sarah were on opposite sides of a table at the most popular coffee shop outside campus, working on organic chemistry.
Well, Kenna knew she was working—but she was fairly sure Sarah was just scrolling through her phone, trying to pick out a date for tonight.
Sarah, of course, wasn’t sweating.
“I love you, but also I hate you a little,” she muttered, knowing full well Sarah would hear, and she did, leaning over to flash her a mega-watt smile.
“You could’ve worn shorts.”
Kenna rolled her eyes, and Sarah stuck her tongue out.
Sarah was dressed for the weather: short jean shorts and a tank top that showed off her long, tan limbs, her blonde hair swept into a high bun that emphasized the curve of her neck and jawline.
Kenna, on the other hand, wasn’t. She usually wore her wavy brown hair down, framing her face, a makeshift veil against the world, and her dark brown eyes were shadowed with exhaustion from actually caring about her grades.
Her skin, perpetually sun-kissed thanks to her mother’s distant Latino heritage, was mostly hidden beneath a long-sleeved turtleneck and jeans, because she wanted today to be on easy mode.
No curious kids. No sidelong glances. No questions she didn’t have the energy to answer.
Four years ago, a freak electrical fire took her home—and her family. Only Kenna had survived. She’d woken up in a burn ward to the worst news of her life—and then she’d been expected to keep on living.
It’d been hell on earth for two years. But after that she’d found a new normal—and a reason to keep going.
She was going to become a plastic surgeon.
She didn’t hate her scars—in fact there were dresses in her closet back at their apartment, proof that she could own her story when she wanted to—but the idea of helping others reclaim their confidence after injuries or trauma had become her driving force.
And she knew, thanks to the world’s most traumatic “personal essay,” she’d have a killer application for med school.
She just had to pass O-chem, first.
“Sarah? Hello?” she said, reaching forward to tap the eraser end of her pencil on Sarah’s textbook. “You can’t just guess where the hydroxyl group goes.”
“It’s the weekend.” Sarah groaned.
Kenna leaned into her chair, hearing her back pop. “It’s not like it’s going to get any more fun to study on Sunday.” Which just happened to be her twenty-third birthday. One more reason to get all her homework done early.
Sarah suddenly blinked and sat up straighter, finally distracted.
“ Oh my God, K ,” she whispered. “The world’s hottest homeless man just walked in the door.”
One of Kenna’s eyebrows rose. “So?”
Santa Cruz was full of ripped beach bum types. Kids whose parents didn’t know they’d dropped out of classes to become surfers, or Silicon Valley dudes who’d cashed out to pretend to become hippies—all sorts of people came to town and never left.
Unlike her.
Kenna was getting out, in a big way, the first chance she got. Christ, she did love Sarah, but sometimes being two years older than everyone else in her class felt like a lifetime.
Then the back of the man himself came into view, as he passed their table.
It was ginormous. Muscled. And the white tank he wore showed off every inch of it, including all of his chiseled arms and—fine, Sarah was right, he was hot, but he was also probably on steroids, and he was not at all related to organic chemistry.
She huffed and went back to figuring out the homework problem in front of her—then thirty seconds later, she felt a looming presence to her left.
She looked slowly over, and then up.
Mr. Steroids himself stood half a foot from their table, peering down with a burning intensity that made her panic.
His brown eyes flicked between her and Sarah, lingering just a second longer on her, and she watched every muscle clench in his jaw, like he was deep in thought.
He needed a shave, and now that she could see the front of him, there was a black mark streaked against his tank like he’d carelessly leaned against an open car door.
His straight brown hair was unruly, and her overall impression of him was that he was unhinged.
“I am here for one of you,” he announced.
Kenna blinked as Sarah burst into laughter.
“Excuse me, what?” she sputtered.
Kenna’s mind scrambled for an explanation and landed on one quickly—he was a drug dealer. Hot guy, too much free time, money for ’roids, but no care for his appearance otherwise, because people would buy from him no matter what.
She quickly scooted her chair to the side. “Whatever you’re selling, we don’t want any.”
He frowned, his jaw tightening further. “I am not...selling...anything. I need to talk to one of you, is all.” He licked his full lips, glancing between them again. “I just don’t know which.”
“One-two-three-not-me,” Sarah said, faster than Kenna could shake her head. “I mean, you’re cute and all, but I have a boyfriend.” She smirked at Kenna.
That was a lie. Sarah absolutely did not have a boyfriend. Kenna, however, kind of did.
She’d been in an online relationship with a guy named Cliff for three months.
They’d met on a The 1975 fan board and clicked instantly.
She’d been upfront about her scars, and it hadn’t scared him off.
In fact, he was flying up from San Diego to see her tonight—for the first time—and was staying till late tomorrow.
Which was another reason Kenna needed to finish all her organic chemistry homework ASAP.
“Please, just,” Kenna started, trying to be nice while shooing the muscled man off. He smelled like he’d recently come from a gym—half disgusting and half sheer man.
He leaned forward and deeply inhaled her in return. His nostrils flared, and for a second, she thought she saw something wild and golden flicker behind his brown eyes.
“Could I be allowed to I touch you?” he asked, his voice low and strangely formal.
Her patience had firm boundaries. “Oh, fuck no,” she said, jerking back in her chair. “Get out of here.” She pointed toward the door. “Stop being a creeper.”
He blinked, like the word didn’t compute. “What is a creeper?”
“What you are doing. By definition.”
Kenna stood, angling herself out of his path, while Sarah bolted toward the counter to get help. She jabbed a finger into his chest—it was like poking a furnace wrapped in stone—and stared up into his face. “You’ve had your fun. Move along.”
That didn’t stop him. He extended a hand, like he wanted to shake hers, and Kenna felt an inexplicable compulsion to take it, then nearly twenty-three years of ingrained stranger-danger training rose up and saved her from herself.
“I don’t know what you’re selling,” she said, clenching her hands into fists at her sides, “but we’re not buying.”
His hand dropped, and for a moment, he just stared at her. She was small, scarred, and a good foot shorter than him—she should’ve been scared of him, but she didn’t back down.
She hadn’t let herself feel fear since the fire—with all of her life goals, she didn’t have time.
“Move along,” she snapped, like he was a bad dog.
His expression crumpled. “Where?” he asked, and he wasn’t being snarky or rude, he seemed to be genuinely confused.
“Where what?”
“Where...do I go?” he asked her, with what sounded like utter honesty.
Kenna was torn between two drives: one, to be compassionate to someone who was clearly Going Through Some Things, but the other to keep living her life uninterrupted by Random Weirdos.
“The fuck if I know,” Kenna said, while still trying to sound kind.
“Hey, dude, cut it out,” said a man with a smoker’s voice from beside them. Sarah had returned with the cafe’s biggest barista, a giant with broad shoulders and a firm, no-nonsense tone. “The door’s over there. You’re scaring people, and that’s uncool.”
The muscled man stepped back, his gaze flicking between Kenna and Sarah, but it was Kenna he focused on. She swallowed, her stomach twisting.
“I will see you again,” he said. It sounded like a promise.
Sarah got up in his face like a blonde, pissed-off chihuahua. “Go fuck yourself, you fucking fucker!” she shouted and dramatically gestured for the door.
The muscled man surveyed the situation, looking dismayed. Their ranks were bolstered by yet another barista, and everyone else in the coffee shop was clearly paying all the attention Kenna had been trying to avoid when she’d gotten dressed this morning.
The man gave her one last look. “I will,” he swore, and then stalked away, his head held high.
“Ugh!” Sarah said, dropping back into her chair, and going right back to her phone.
The baristas gave Kenna a Santa-Cruz-am-I-right? shrug as she sat down much more slowly. “Americano on the house?” the taller one offered.
“Yeah, thanks.” Kenna gave both of them a tight grin as they returned to their station on the far side of the counter.
She twisted to look out the windows behind her and froze. For all the space the strange man had taken up just moments ago, he was gone. Not walking away down the street. Not getting into a car. Just...gone. Like he’d never been there at all.
“Your eloquence knows no bounds, Sarah,” Kenna said, shaking her head.
Sarah grinned. “You’re welcome.”