Chapter Five Damien
Dinner seemed to drag on forever. The whole time, I sat across the table from Kelsie and felt a sense of unease that reached my soul.
Why didn’t she save me a seat? She always did that.
That wasn’t the only thing off about her tonight. When she smiled at me, it didn’t touch her eyes. But it seemed that she was only like that with me. That asshole Gordon got her real smile and her bright laughter.
I didn’t like that. She didn’t even know the man. The fact that he was related to Ryan didn’t automatically make him a stand-up guy. And he was a little too flirty, as if he did it all the time.
Kelsie wasn’t just one in a long line of girls. She was special, and I wasn’t going to let her become a notch in Gordon’s bedpost. No way in hell.
As the dinner ended, we all filtered out of the restaurant.
It was a part of the resort, so we were in the lobby as the group started to branch off in various directions.
Jake headed to the bar, probably to meet the busty brunette he’d arranged a date with during our boat outing.
Some people headed to the elevators to go to their rooms and another group walked off together while talking about checking out one of the resort’s pools, where there was a glow party taking place.
But most of the wedding party seemed to be heading upstairs to the rooms. Kelsie was one of them, but I quickened my pace to reach her, grabbing her by the elbow to get her attention.
“Hey, can I talk to you for a minute?”
I couldn’t explain why I felt such urgency to do this right now. Something told me that if I didn’t seize the opportunity to have this conversation, Kelsie would find a way to avoid it. I couldn’t let that happen. Things were already so fucked up between us, and I hated it.
This was why I never should have slept with her. I knew it could break us, and that made me feel like someone had punched a hole in my chest and was squeezing my heart in an iron fist.
Kelsie hesitated, her unique grey eyes full of uncertainty. “Uh, sure.”
That unenthusiastic response was a punch to the gut, but I just guided her to a corner of the room where there weren’t many people loitering around. I released her arm and turned to face her.
In that moment, it didn’t matter how ramped up my anxiety was or how much regret I was carrying.
She was standing close to me for the first time since I started to recall what happened between us last night, and my body was suddenly buzzing with desire so strong that I nearly reached for her before I caught myself.
I shook my head to clear it, rattled by the urge I felt to yank her body flush against my own and feel all of her feminine curves while my mind was clear. I wanted to kiss her while sober and see if she tasted as sweet as my hazy memories told me she did.
No. I couldn’t think that way. The sex was out of this world—I knew that even though I couldn’t completely recall everything that happened—but I couldn’t let myself think that way about my best friend. The temptation was too great, and the cost would be even worse.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
Kelsie blinked before giving me that fake smile again. “Of course. I’m fine.”
I frowned and reached for her hand. It was just meant to be a casual touch, the kind that we’d shared a thousand times before without even thinking about it, but she pulled her hand away, using the excuse of tucking a strand of hair behind her ear to avoid contact.
The hits just kept on coming.
“Are you upset about what happened last night?” I asked.
I expected her to say yes, but she immediately shook her head.
“No, I’m not upset about that at all.”
I ignored the feeling of satisfaction that washed over me at that. “Then, what’s wrong? Why does everything feel so… off?”
“Nothing is wrong.” Kelsie’s eyes shifted to the side for just a second, and I knew that wasn’t the truth. “Let’s just forget about what happened.”
So, she wasn’t upset about sleeping together, but she wanted to forget it happened? None of that sat right with me, but I leapt at the chance to erase the awkwardness between us.
“Okay,” I said, letting out a long breath and scrubbing my hand down my face. “Okay, yeah. Things can just go back to normal. We can stay friends, right?”
The small grin on her face was almost sad. “Sure, Damien.”
My gut twisted. “How about we hang out tonight? I bet the hotel’s streaming service has that scary movie you’ve wanted to see.”
Kelsie loved horror, even though she covered her eyes for all the scariest parts.
I hated the way she hesitated, but after a couple of seconds, she nodded. “Yeah, sure. That sounds fun.”
“Like old times.”
Again, she flashed that sad smile that I couldn’t quite interpret. “Meet in my room? Twenty minutes?”
“It’s a…” I trailed off before I could finish that sentence. Calling our movie night a date didn’t feel appropriate, even though I wouldn’t have thought twice about it in the past. I swallowed around a lump in my throat. “I’ll be there.”
We walked to the elevator together in a silence that wasn’t comfortable but also wasn’t tense. It didn’t feel like we were fighting, but it didn’t feel as easy as it should have to be with my best friend.
There was a group of four people waiting for the elevator already, and we all crammed into the small space.
When the elevator doors opened on our floor, Kelsie stepped out first and headed down the hall without waiting for me to get clear of the mass of people.
She’d already reached her room by the time I was out of the elevator, stepping inside without even glancing back at me.
My teeth ached as I ground them together, not even sure why I was so annoyed.
As I stomped down the hallway, my mind turned over everything that had happened today and what exactly made me feel like this.
I knew it wasn’t just that she seemed to be running away from me just now.
It was the way the whole evening had gone.
In my mind, I tried to rationalize everything that had gotten under my skin. On the surface, it all seemed petty.
First, she didn’t save me a seat at dinner.
I firmly told myself to get over it. Maybe there weren’t two seats available by the time she arrived. It wasn’t as if she had to make a spot for me at her side. It was just something that we usually did because we liked sitting beside each other, sharing inside jokes and food.
But she shared her food with a stranger instead.
I also didn’t like the way that Ryan’s cousin openly flirted with her all night.
Even though I knew that it was probably harmless, and Kelsie wasn’t the type to fall for a man with a silver tongue like that.
Although I knew there was no reason for it to bother me if she did.
She was free to date whoever she wanted.
But why did the idea of that make my blood rush in my ears and a cold sweat break out on my forehead?
I shook my head and headed toward my own room, planning to change into pajamas before going to Kelsie’s. Sweet snacks and comfortable clothes were the way we usually did movie nights, and I was feeling desperate for that tradition right now. Anything that felt normal between us.
Just before reaching my room, I passed an alcove with an icemaker and a vending machine.
Stopping in my tracks, I backtracked and approached the vending machine, smiling when I saw Kelsie’s favorite sweet snack, Reese’s Pieces.
Fishing out a dollar from my pocket, I bought a bag and continued to my room, feeling confident in the fact that I now had a peace offering for her.
This movie night would be just the thing to return to normal.
But twenty minutes later, I was surprised when my knock on Kelsie’s door resulted in Jess opening it and greeting me with a smile.
“Hey, Damien,” she said, stepping back to let me into the room.
I looked around and saw that Jess wasn’t the only one intruding on our movie night. Her husband, Cody, was here too, along with the other bridesmaid, Angela, and her twin sister who just arrived on the island this evening.
“Oh good, you’re here,” Kelsie said, looking much more relaxed than she was when we were talking one-on-one in the lobby. “You’re the last one to arrive.”
“I, uh, I didn’t mean to keep everyone waiting.”
She must have picked up on the confusion and displeasure in my voice because she stepped closer and placed a hand on my arm. The contact sent a jolt through me.
“Everything okay? You still want to have a movie night, right?”
I did, but I wanted it to be just the two of us. I wanted to sit next to her on the couch and tease her when she hid from the scary parts in the movie and tell myself that we were still Damien and Kels, still the same people we’d always been.
“Sure,” I said. “Here, I got you a snack.”
I held out the Reese’s Pieces, and her face softened. I got my first genuine smile all day.
“Thanks,” she said, taking the snack from me. “Come on, I already ordered the movie. Have you met Angela’s sister, Heather?”
I followed Kelsie into the sitting area, where there was a couch, a loveseat and an armchair in front of a TV mounted on the wall.
I was introduced to Heather, the identical twin of Angela.
They shared the exact same green eyes and heart-shaped face.
The only difference I could see was that Angela’s brown hair was long and wavy while Heather’s was straight and cut to shoulder length.
She also had streaks of bright pink among the brown locks.
As I shook her hand and made small talk, everyone started to settle into seats.
To my displeasure, Kelsie was on the end of the couch with Jess beside her.
Cody sat on Jess’ other side, while Angela and Heather took the loveseat.
That meant that I was left with the chair, sitting as far from Kelsie as possible.
The movie started and I glanced over to see Kelsie sharing her snack with Jess. Just like so many other things that had happened tonight, this bothered me for reasons that I couldn’t explain to myself.
Forcing myself not to stare at her, I focused on the TV as the movie started. It was a ghost story with plenty of jump scares and gore, just the kind of horror that Kelsie and I loved to watch. We were fifteen minutes in when the first scary scene came up.
A woman was running through a haunted house while being stalked by an evil spirit.
It was intense, and one of the women on the loveseat even shrieked when the character on the TV was tripped on the stairs and dragged by an invisible attacker.
I glanced over at Kelsie and smirked when I saw that her face was buried in her hands.
Normally, I would have been seated beside her, and she would have turned toward me at the scariest moments, as if seeking my protection from the fake horrors. Instead, she raised her legs up onto the couch, knees bent in front of her body like a shield.
None of this felt right.
I fucked up by sleeping with her even worse than I feared. Nothing was the way it was supposed to be.
I was miserable throughout the whole movie, my attention shifting between Kelsie and the screen over and over again.
She didn’t look my way once.