FIVE #3
“I’ve already told you. I was making sure you were heading somewhere safe, that’s all,” he answers, and I despise how genuine he sounds.
“I don’t believe you,” I admit, not sure if I even believe myself at this point. “It’s a noble reason, but much too suspicious.”
Kaito’s head tilts, his dark hair rustling against the barrel of my gun. “Why? Is it suspicious because I’m an Alpha or because I’m a guy?”
“Yes,” I answer quickly.
One of those funny little choked sounds comes from him again before he strains, “Okay, that’s fair.”
My fingers tighten around the gun. It’s such a simple answer. Fair. No argument, no offense, no wounded male pride charging through the room like an overgrown toddler in combat boots having the temper tantrum of the decade.
Fair.
I actually hate that more than if he tried to argue his case.
“Turn around,” I order bluntly.
Surprising me a little, Kaito slowly turns, his hands still in the air.
I step back as he does, keeping my gun aimed at his face.
In the dimmed living room, he looks rougher than he did at the school.
Blood has soaked through the bandage at his side, dark against his shirt.
His black jeans are torn, his dark hair mussed from the fight earlier, and the bruised stain of shadows marks the skin under his almond eyes.
It makes his face look sharper somehow. Edgier.
He’s tall, toned, and much too steady for someone currently one bad decision away from getting shot in the forehead.
Kaito’s own gaze flicks over me once. Not down my body, and definitely not in the way that scarred Alpha from the pharmacy did.
This is different. He looks at my face, then to the gun, quickly followed by my injured arm, and then the exits.
He notices the room before he notices the person holding him at gunpoint, and there’s something interesting about it.
Not safe, by any means. But definitely interesting.
“You’re bleeding again,” I point out before I can think better of it.
His lips twitch. “Is that the sound of worry I hear?”
“Just an observation,” I refute.
His lips twitch again, like he’s holding back a smile that’s trying to fight its way through, right as he says, “Huh. Sounds like a fancier word for worry.”
Oh, this asshole.
Narrowing my eyes in an unimpressed glare, I grumble, “Very original. Don’t steal my lines.”
Those damned lips of his quirk a little more, the battle he’s fighting a lost cause at this rate. I raise my gun a little higher, and that smile vanishes entirely. That’s better.
“You can leave now,” I tell him.
He nods. “I could, yeah.”
“You should,” I force out.
“You’re probably right,” he agrees.
I pause before jerking the gun toward the door very quickly, before training it back on him. “Great. We agree. Now the door’s there. Don’t let it hit you where the good Lord split you.”
The fucker doesn’t budge. Hell, he doesn’t move a single inch, and it pisses me all the way off. My patience is already stretched thin enough to see through. His refusal to catch a hint and move shreds it a little more.
“Kaito,” I growl, fingers tightening around the gun to stop myself from strangling the stupid bastard.
The Alpha looks at me when I say his name. Like, really looks, and something inside him seems to settle around the sound in a way I don’t think I like. Or, maybe I do like it? Which actually makes it worse, and therefore it’s going straight into the mental trash where it belongs.
Before I can utter a word, Kaito says, “I don’t think you should stay here alone tonight.”
The laugh that breaks out of me sounds flat. “That’s adorable.”
“I’m serious,” he argues gently.
“Oh. Adorable and delusional,” I volley, rolling my eyes again.
He pauses before his eyes drop to my arm again. “You’re hurt.”
“We’ve already been through this. I’m hurt. You’re hurt. We’re all hurt. What’s your point?” I ask, raising an eyebrow I’m not sure he can even see.
“I’m bigger,” he tries.
I scoff, jerking the gun at him. “That’s not an argument when I’m the one holding a gun.”
His eyes drop to the barrel, then those dark brown eyes meet mine again. “That you are.”
The quiet acceptance chips at something inside me. Something I don’t understand, or want to understand, and I make sure not to let it show as I say, “You don’t know me. You don’t know anything about me.”
A quiet pause follows before he quietly counters, “What I do know is that you saved my life when you didn’t need to. You jumped in and risked your own life to save mine.”
“You were making noise. I couldn’t very well not step in,” I retort a little sharply, not exactly enjoying this back and forth.
“You came to save me even after you managed to get away,” he pushes, and my finger twitches on my gun.
“You were making a lot of noise,” I contradict.
Kaito’s lips twitch, and I brace myself for whatever counterargument is about to spill out of his mouth, pre-annoyed before he’s uttered a word. “You sacrificed two knives to save me. Two.”
“That’s why I returned. I wanted them back,” I blurt, latching on to that excuse like it’s a raft on a stormy sea.
Apparently, it’s the wrong thing to say, because Kaito bites his smile away before he points out, “You grabbed them before you ran to the school. Your timeline is getting muddled.”
Fuck.
He’s got me there.
I don’t bother responding. I simply stare at him, and he only stares back. I don’t particularly appreciate his memory right now, more so because it bested mine, and there’s nothing more infuriating.
When the silence stretches too long between us, I finally relent and grumble, “You’re very annoying.”
“So I’ve been told,” he quips with a small snort.
“By who? People who survived telling you?” I ask.
He jerks his head back and forth before he says, “Eh. Only some of them.”
I’ll be damned to the deepest parts of hell if a laugh doesn’t try to climb up my throat. I kill it promptly with a damned shovel, an axe, and a whole plethora of other mental tools I can conjure. I will not laugh at this Alpha. Not in this world or the next.
Outside, a low groan floats through the broken window in the kitchen.
Another follows quickly after, and my head turns slightly.
Kaito’s does the same, mirroring my movement.
The stress isn’t clear anymore. Or maybe it never was and I’ve let my irritation with the bleeding Alpha distract me, which is exactly why people are so fucking dangerous.
They don’t even need to attack, coming in with guns blazing.
Sometimes, all it takes is someone just standing there being an inconvenient pain in the ass until you stop paying enough attention to the things that bite.
A shadow passes the kitchen curtains, and then another, and very quietly, Kaito asks, “Biters?”
“Zeds,” I correct automatically, the word slipping out before my brain can stop it.
His gaze flicks to me, and I instantly regret even opening my mouth, more so when his mouth almost curves as he tests the word on his own tongue, “Zeds.”
I give him a dirty look. “Don’t make it weird.”
“Wouldn’t dare,” he deflects.
“You were thinking about making it weird. You have that look about you,” I argue, not sure why I do.
His mouth twitches. “I was just thinking it’s shorter and easier to use.”
“Because mine is better,” I agree.
“More efficient,” he tries to correct.
“That’s what I said.”
A thump lands against the back door, and my grip tightens on the gun. Kaito turns his head toward the sound before focusing his gaze back on me as he asks, “How many ways out?”
I tilt my head like a smartass and drawl, “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
He pauses for a split second before nodding as though he’s questioning my intelligence. “Well, yeah, since I’m currently in the house with you.”
“A problem of your own creation, might I remind you,” I smugly retort, and the look I receive isn’t one of annoyance or anger, but one of irritated defeat. It brings me no short amount of satisfaction.
“You’re right,” he agrees as though it pains him slightly, and it almost makes me laugh again.
As it was, another thump hits the door harder this time, drawing me back to the problem at hand.
The door rattles in the frame, and I move first, because this is my house for the night and I know exactly which floorboards scream.
Kaito follows without being told, quiet enough that the only reason I even know he’s there is the strange pull of his scent under the rot coming through the walls.
Burning wood. Warm flannel. Warm, worn-in, and infuriatingly comforting in a way that makes my Omega sit up at attention as if someone has just whispered her name from another room.
Once more, my Omega can fuck all the way off.
In the kitchen, two Zeds are pressed against the back door, their faces squished across the grimy glass panes. A third is dragging itself through the weeds beyond them. More could be nearby, but it’s hard to tell with the setting sun and descending darkness.
Cursing under my breath draws Kaito’s attention, and he asks, “How many bullets?”
“Enough,” I answer shortly, spitting out the lie easily.
“That means not enough,” he counters, and I glare.
“I actually hate that you’re not stupid,” I snap.
“Thank you.”
“It wasn’t a compliment,” I argue, mind running a mile a minute.
“It kinda felt like one, so I’ll take it for what it was,” he retorts, and if there wasn’t an immediate threat, I’d clock him in the temple with the butt of my gun.