Chapter 23
TWENTY-THREE
CHANEL
“I’m sorry, but…” Kaso cleared his throat next to me “...the fuck am I lookin’ at?”
I tried not to laugh and failed. Miserably.
I had to turn and bury my face in his shoulder to conceal the giggles coming out of my mouth.
It’d been a week since we’d seen them, but a week felt more like a year these days.
I didn’t know when it’d happened, but for those seven long days I missed him.
I wasn’t sure if he could say the same even with my face pressed to his arm he didn’t react.
When all I seemed to be doing with him this close was reacting.
Then again, his golden eyes were locked on the New Years’ Eve ball dangling from the bottom edge of a balcony.
Except, it wasn’t just any ball.
Actually, it wasn’t a ball at all.
By the looks of shock and horror and overall confusion on the guys’ faces, they definitely hadn’t experienced a New Years’ Eve outside of Manhattan.
New Years’ Eve celebrations had changed many times during the course of the last two millennia, and we were significantly older than that, but I supposed somewhere along the way things stopped shocking me.
Apparently Kaso and Andreas hadn’t yet reached that point. Their youth was refreshing.
Granted, in all the celebrations I’d seen… this Florida town using a hammerhead shark as their ball really took the cake. Of course, it wasn’t a real shark. That was definitely a sculpture made of plastic but that was honestly a relief.
This coastal town was a downright vibe that popped up out of nowhere in the last decade and I was lowkey offended Christopher was the reason we’d found it.
Their quaint little downtown reminded me of St. Augustine on the other side of the state with its old Spanish-style architecture, red tiled roofs, and balconies overlooking everything.
The sprawling oak trees were a nice touch with the moss dangling from every branch.
Every corner held an open-aired pub with patrons spilling out onto the sidewalks.
I assumed it wasn’t like this every night, with the streets blocked off for people to roam freely and every pub’s radio being synced to the same station, but I was starting to think I needed to return next New Years’ Eve.
Jimmy Buffet’s Cheeseburger in Paradise had been playing when we first arrived and now the entire street of people — which had to be several hundred — were all singing along to Tom Petty’s Free Fallin’ and I was loving it.
Andreas cleared his throat behind me. “Well, my brother, that does appear to be what looks like a… fuckin’ shark.”
“I can’t tell if I’m relieved by that or not.” He scratched the back of his neck and kept staring at it. “Like I don’t wanna be hallucinatin’ or nuttin’ but I also don’t wanna be lookin’ at the undercarriage of a fucking shark over my head.”
“Also — and I’m just spitballin’ here—” Andreas rubbed his jaw with his thumb. “But why not an alligator? Isn’t an alligator more a Florida thing?”
Regan frowned. “Well, New Smyrna Beach in Florida is widely recognized as the shark attack capital of the world.”
“But it’s not the gator attack capital?” Andreas’ eyebrows rose. “Where else they got more gators than here?”
“Louisiana,” Regan answered without hesitation. “But the population density of Florida—”
Andreas groaned. “Stop talking dirty to me.”
“Look,” Kaso continued as if his brother hadn’t changed subject. “My vision is above average but that shit looks real.”
“Kaso,” Regan chuckled. “It’s plastic.”
“I don’t like sharks.”
I pursed my lips. “You kind of are one.”
“No, I—” he closed his mouth and frowned like he was thinking about it. “Okay, maybe that’s fair. But I ain’t no shark in the water.”
“Noted.” I bit my bottom lip trying not to stare at him.
His golden gaze snapped down to me, wide and sparkling. Then he pressed his fingertips to his chest, right over his black sweater that hugged his muscles in all the ways that were driving me crazy. “I have ‘em in my pocket, don’t play with fire.”
He’d held up his end of the bargain. The suit and suspenders combination was nowhere to be seen.
This Kaso could’ve been on the current front cover of Vogue magazine and I hated it.
Well, I loved it but that was why I hated it.
Never would I have imagined he looked that good in modern clothes.
Those black jeans even had rips in the knees.
If we didn’t hurry up and kill Christopher I was going to have to provoke him to put the suspenders on with this outfit.
My whole body heated at the thought of it.
“Hey, knock it off.” He snapped his fingers in my face. “Get ya mind outta the gutter before I take us both down there.”
I grinned. “I’m sorry.”
“Dammit,” he grumbled. “You’re supposed to be the angel here.”
I pretended to draw a halo above my head.
Being with Kaso was too easy, too comfortable.
Up until this point we’d both been so focused on the physical chemistry between us that I hadn’t noticed just how nice it was just to be around him.
Conversation flowed effortlessly and even when there was silence it was…
peaceful. It was odd to me. The only people I ever felt comfortable silence around were my other Virtues.
That was it. To have Kaso walk into my life and fit right in like he was built to be there was – oh no.
OH NO.
NO, NO, NO, NO, NO.
I had it bad for him. This wasn’t just a physical attraction, a need to drag him to bed.
No, this was so much worse. This was a …
a…a crush. Oh no. Chanel what have you done now?
We don’t crush on BOYS. But as I stared up at the sharp cut of his jawline and cheekbone I felt my chest get all tight and warm.
When the cool, salty ocean breeze swept the long strands of his black hair onto his forehead my fingers itched to reach up and slide through them.
He was talking, I heard his voice in the back of my mind yet I was too far down this rabbit hole of panic to register the words. The warm, soft cadence of his voice sent all the tinglies down my spine.
“TEN!”
I flinched, grabbing his arm.
“NINE!”
“Do we really need to lower the shark?” Kaso grumbled.
I snickered.
“EIGHT!” The crowd chanted as one, their excitement palpable. “SEVEN!”
I forced my gaze away from my kryptonite and found the plastic shark hovering a few feet above our heads.
“SIX!”
The heat of his gaze blazed a trail down the side of my face causing my pulse to flutter.
“FIVE!”
I peeked up at him through my dark eyelashes and our eyes met.
“FOUR!”
My heart pounded in my chest. I was locked in and unable to get out of his snare.
“THREE!”
His fingers burned a trail up the side of my arm until he gripped my elbow.
“TWO!”
He pulled me flush against his body, my chest pressed against his. Our eyes were locked on each other, neither one of us budging.
“ONE!” The crowd shouted. “HAPPY NEW YEAR!”
The plastic shark exploded into teeny pieces above our heads.
Confetti paper in shades of blue, green, and yellow rained down on us, catching in our hair.
I licked my lips and pushed up on my tip toes.
He took my face in his hands. The world slipped into slow motion as he dipped his head toward mine.
Our lips crashed together and the world faded away.
My ears were ringing. My whole body was on fire. I was lost to him.
A high-pitched wailing siren ripped through the heavy thudding of my heart. We jumped apart, our breaths hitched and cheeks flushed. I glance over and Regan was locked onto Andreas. Their arms were wrapped around each other as their mouths remind pressed together.
Shit. Shit. Shit. “Regan!”
They jumped apart and Regan sighed. “I couldn’t help it.”
“Yeah me either.” Resisting them was nearly impossible.
That siren wailed again but this time Kaso flinched then dove into his jeans pocket and pulled out his cellphone. The color drained from his face. “It’s a text from Christopher.”
Andreas gasped. Regan pulled her daggers off her thighs and scanned the crowd around us, most of whom were still cheering and kissing in the confetti hurricane.
My stomach tightened into knots yet all I could do was stare up at Kaso.
He slid his thumb across the screen. His eyes went wide then he let out a string of violent curses.
“What? What did he say?” I asked with a rough voice.
Kaso shook his head. “He said ‘a little birdy told me you’d betrayed me for the Virtues so I needed to see if it was true’ and then he sent a picture of…of…shit…of us kissin’.”
“What? Where?” I grabbed his phone and my stomach sank. “Here? That’s HERE. Where is he?”
Regan leaned over my shoulder to look at the screen then growled. “The pic was taken from over there.”
“He’s gone.” Andreas scrubbed his face with his hands. “He would’ve waited to hit send until he was already gone.”
The wailing siren text tone on Kaso’s phone rang out again with another text from Christopher. All three of them looked to me with expectant eyes since I was still holding his phone. I sighed. “He says, ‘Catch me if you can, Mr. Ocean’ though I don’t understand how that reference works here.”
“It’s Vegas.” Andreas pulled his phone out and started typing. “He refers to Kaso and I as Mr. Ocean and Rusty from the Ocean’s movies. He’s always begging to get us out to Vegas.”
Regan put her hands on her hips and sighed. I knew she was strategizing. “I don’t know, that could be a bit of a stretch but we don’t know him like you do. Vegas would be prime hunting ground for him.”
“Or maybe that’s what he wants us to think?” Kaso ran his thumb over his lip. “Maybe he’s misleading us so we run off to Vegas to catch him and instead he’s here.”
“Here?” I scanned the crowd that was full fledged partying around us now.
“Believe it or not, yeah?” He took his phone back and tapped on the screen for a moment before turning it around to show me the tiny blue dot indicating Christopher’s location. “He brags nonstop about his little private beach spot in the Keys.”
“That’s where his dot is.” I frowned. “How could he be all the way down in the Keys right now and here to take this picture? The math ain’t mathin’.”
“Exactly my point.”
Andreas shouted a curse. “Just because that text came from Christopher’s phone doesn’t mean he took the picture himself. For that matter, just because his phone is currently in the Keys doesn’t mean he is.”
“It’s intentional.” Regan tapped her fingernails on her hip. “He’s playing a game with us.”
“He is, so let’s outsmart him.” I gestured for them to follow me off to the side where there were less human ears. “I think perhaps we divide and conquer—”
“You’re not going to Vegas, Chanel—”
“Regan!” I gasped.
Kaso scowled. “Why not?”
Regan rolled her eyes. “Because Chanel is banned from going to Vegas by herself, even if she’s with a bunch of people, she gets too distracted by all the sparkly things. We won’t see her again until the casino kicks her out because she smells.”
Kaso laughed.
Andreas cleared his throat. “Right, well, Kaso knows where this beach of his is so why don’t the two of yous stake out the beach and we’ll go to Vegas.”
I nodded. “Two birds, one stone. I like it.”
Andreas arched one eyebrow. “Look at that, brother, someone who uses that metaphor correctly.”
“Bite me.”
Heat rushed to my cheeks at the thought of him biting me.
Kaso slid me a sideways glance. “No, no, I was talkin’ to him.”
I bit my bottom lip and nodded, trying not to giggle. This whole pretending I didn’t want to rip his clothes off and violate his personal space was not a game I was going to succeed in. Not when he was him.
Regan rolled her shoulders and her wings popped out. She pointed her finger at me. “Be strong. Stay focused—”
I rolled my eyes.
“—catch the son of a bitch.”
“Right back at ya.”
It wasn’t until I watched Regan fly out of view carrying Andreas that I realized the weight of the decision we’d all just made. It had bad news written all over it. Our first night working together as a team and we separate into couples who wanna smash.
“Right. Let’s go then?” Kaso turned to me, wrapped his arms around my neck and jumped - lifting his legs in the air for me to catch him in the cradle of my arms. Which I did on impulse alone. He grinned. “I love a girl boss.”
“Yeah, well, let’s try not to get too close to the sun, yeah?” I pushed my wings out and shot into the sky.
“We’ll be fine. We’re professionals,” he said reassuringly. “We can control ourselves. I have faith in us.”
That makes one of us.