Twenty-Six #2
Hurriedly crossing my arms over my chest, I pray that he’s too belligerent to notice the Cove College logo etched on the soft cotton. ‘Wild night?’
Heath babbles something unintelligible.
Kai grimaces. ‘Pretty sure he’s been drinking since Christmas.’
‘And that’s my problem because . . .’
He shoots me a look that I choose not to understand.
‘At the risk of sounding like a broken record,’ I start, pausing when Heath makes a little noise, a soft sigh that floats toward me and skates across my skin like a phantom. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘He lost his keys,’ Kai answers, without actually answering at all, tossing his barely conscious friend a thoroughly unimpressed glower. ‘And he tossed mine into a fucking drain.’
‘Why?’
‘Didn’t wanna go home.’
‘Where are the others?’
‘Brendan was . . . busy.’
I hear the innuendo loud and clear.
Was Heath busy too? I want to ask, want to spit, hate myself for even thinking it, hate my stomach for daring to roil. Before he consumed an entire liquor store? ‘And the girls?’
He doesn’t answer, but his face does a guilty little twist.
I crook a brow.
‘Bren has their keys. They’re downstairs. Didn’t wanna bombard you.’
Despite the glaring lack of humor to the situation, I bark a laugh. ‘How thoughtful,’ I call over my shoulder on the way outside, giving myself five, pathetic seconds to hover on the walkway before forcing myself into action.
The cold metal of the railing sears my palms as I lean over to peer down at the parking lot. ‘Y’all planning on sleeping down there?’
Two figures, shrouded in darkness, start at the sound of my voice. Only one tilts their face in my direction. ‘We thought it might be warmer.’
With another one of those empty laughs, I wave a summoning hand. ‘Come up.’
I half-think they won’t, just on principle. But by the time I’m back inside, they’re already on the walkway, and, a second later, they shuffle across the threshold.
And bring a brand new layer of awkward tension with them.
Matilda won’t look at me. Sniffing and huffing, she toys with the tip of her long, red ponytail and shifts from one heeled foot to the other, casting haughty glances at the ceiling, at the floor, never at me.
Imani won’t stop looking at me. Peering at me. Her eyes bore into me, the dark depths unreadable, her entire face a careful blank slate.
It irritates me. More than any of the rest of this does. Like a fresh cut over a healing scab, itching and aching and picking at me until I snap. ‘Can I help you?’
Her eyes flare before narrowing, head shaking as she croons an emphatic nope.
‘Ladies. Come on.’
‘Shut up, Kai,’ three feminine voices snap in perfect, pissed unison.
Wide-eyed, he holds his hands up innocently and mimes zipping his mouth shut. Knocking Heath’s legs away from where they’re awkwardly strewn over the arm of the sofa, he starts to sit down only to immediately hop to his feet again when I move toward the front door again. ‘Where are you going?’
I have no idea. I’ll decide once I’m out of here, once I can think clearly again. Reaching for my keys where they hang on the hook beside the door, my fingers just graze that silly fucking keyring when it’s abruptly yanked away.
‘Nuh-huh.’ Kai holds my keys aloft. ‘No way.’
‘Give them back.’
‘No way,’ he repeats, backpedaling a few steps. ‘Don’t be a dumbass.’
‘Don’t piss me off.’
‘Don’t exist, you mean?’
I scowl, groaning with irritation when he twists even more out of my reach. ‘Kai.’
‘Dani.’ He copies my tone, bearing a remarkable existence to an extremely annoying little brother. ‘No.’
A nasty noise escapes Matilda. ‘You’d rather walk around in the middle of the night than spend a few hours in the same room as us?’
‘Pretty much.’
Imani sighs. ‘Dani.’
‘What?’ I snap at her, but I’m still looking at Kai, the itchy frustration pooling behind my eyeballs is all for him.
‘Why are you doing this? Why can’t you just leave me alone?
This is mean, Kai. Coming here all the time, bringing them here, bringing him,’ my voice cracks.
‘It’s fucking mean. It’s cruel because there are a million other places you could’ve gone tonight and we both know it. ’
‘That’s not—’
‘Are you punishing me? Is that what it is? You’re mad that I duped you, that I used Heath, that you had to be my friend for no fucking reason, so now you’re throwing it all in my face? Your night got boring so you thought you’d come over and torment me a little?’
‘Dani. Jesus, no.’
With a ragged huff, I make one last failed attempt to grab my keys before deciding I don’t need them.
I’ll just walk . . . somewhere. Anywhere that’s not here.
Maybe I’ll go for a swim just to spite the asshole gawking at me.
I just need to grab my phone from where I left it on the coffee table and then—
‘Don’t go.’
I freeze. Slow as fucking molasses, my gaze drops. My stomach does too as I stare at the long, tan fingers looped around my wrist. Pretty eyes blink at me sleepily. Dreamily. Heath repeats his quiet demand, and I feel my legs fucking obey, I feel my knees fucking lock, primed to stay right here.