Chapter 40 Kiera
KIERA
My heart thundered in my chest as I held Leo’s gaze. Was this a terrible idea? What did she even want to know about me?
I swallowed hard as I considered the proposition. Maybe I should take it at face value. She clearly has a crush on me…maybe this is her way of trying to bond.
But even given what little I did know about her, I knew that it was a naive thought.
My roommates — all three of them — clearly had a host of secrets they didn’t want me digging into.
And if this quid pro quo was what it took to get a peek into Pandora’s box, did it really matter what she was looking for?
It’s not like I have any real secrets anyway.
“Okay.” I nodded. “I’ll bite.”
The smirk on her face turned into a full-on grin “That’s what I like to hear.”
She grabbed a smaller wrench from beside me before heading back to her workstation. “Shoot. What do you wanna know, Princess?”
I bit my lip as I considered it. There were so many things I wanted to ask, but now that each inquiry invited Leo to pry just as hard, I wasn’t sure how far I wanted to take this.
After a moment, I settled on a softball question. Something that would let me test the waters while still digging up some useful information. “How’d you become a doctor so young?”
Leo hummed her approval, arms flexing with each twist of the wrench. “Well, like I said, I’ve always been a bit of an overachiever. Mom was Navy and Dad was Army, so when I graduated high school early at sixteen, they were happy to sign off on my enlistment papers.”
“Sixteen?” My eyebrows shot up. “At sixteen I think I was busy shoplifting at the mall.”
“And that’s why you’re not a doctor yet,” Leo winked.
“Okay, so at sixteen, they just handed you a scalpel?”
“Sorta,” she laughed. “I took an ROTC educational delay and became a combat medic.”
Noticing the way my brows had furrowed, she elaborated.
“Essentially I was active duty, but able to put off some of my active duty requirements while I was still learning. I finished undergrad at nineteen, and then med school at twenty-two. Had a year-long residency, and then they shipped me out to combat to be a real doctor.”
“Wow, that’s…”
“Intense? No kidding. The medical stuff comes in handy every now and again, though.” She flicked her eyes down to my hand, before smirking up at me. “Now if you’re satisfied, it’s my turn.”
“Ask away.” I swallowed down my nerves as she pursed her lips in thought.
“Okay, Miss Kiera, I’ve got something. What’s the deal with you and your mom?”
“What deal?” I frowned. “There is no deal.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You’re a terrible liar, darlin’. The fact that you’re hiding out in the woods with a bunch of strangers and haven’t taken one of her incessant calls tells me that there most certainly is a ‘deal.’”
“I’ve taken one of her calls.” I crossed my arms before Leo tilted her head. “Ugh, fine. I don’t know, it’s complicated. She’s bored and desperate to feel like a better parent than she was, so she calls to check-in and tell me what a terrible job I’m doing with everything.”
“How sweet,” she muttered through gritted teeth as she worked a particularly tough bolt.
“No kidding,” I scoffed. “I think she thinks it’s constructive? But it just makes me spiral out. I love her, but she’s the last person I want any life advice from.”
“Why?” Leo asked, but I waggled my finger at her.
“Uh-uh, that’s a second question. It’s my turn now.” Rocking side to side on the work surface, I decided to push my luck a bit further. “What’s the deal with the house renovations? Like, why is someone like Dom wasting her time and money on that decrepit old thing?”
Maybe learning more about it would make the place seem less creepy. Or at least explain why it felt so familiar.
“If you think it’s decrepit now, you should have seen it a year ago.
” Leo shoved a handful of loose bolts into the pocket of her work pants.
“Dom bought it at auction, and let me tell you, the last owner left the place in ruins.
From the sounds of it, it was growing sentient mold by the time Valemont repossessed it.
She's been trying to make it livable again for years now, and she's almost done now. Mostly just some hold ups in the South Wing.”
“That’s why she won’t let me in there? How stupid….” I rolled my eyes.
“I don’t know, Dom can be weird. Concerned with appearances. I wouldn’t take it personally if I were you. She hardly lets me or Spence back there, either.”
“You and Spence aren’t locked up in your rooms all day though.” I frowned. Leo’s response felt earnest, but something about the whole thing felt off. Whatever it was must not be something Leo knew about.
Instead of digging in my heels on the point, I cleared my throat. “That still doesn’t answer what she wants with the house…”
Leo shrugged. “I’m not a hundred percent sure. I imagine that if I had her kind of money, though, I’d take up some sort of project now and again to pass the time. It’s good to stay busy.”
“Fair enough,” I nodded.
“Okay, if it’s my turn, I still want to know what your mom did that makes you not want her advice.”
“What didn’t she do?” I scoffed. “She’s like, chronically dating these loser guys with deep pockets and always surprised when it ends in heartbreak.
She keeps begging me to marry Gabe so that he can be our meal ticket.
She’s possibly the world’s worst mother.
Like officially, clinically, if there was a designation for that, I truly think she’d take the cake.
She can barely hold a job and has been borrowing money from me as long as I can remember—” I winced as that last part left my mouth.
It was a sensitive topic, one I didn’t like talking about, but Leo just had a way of making me feel like I could share anything with her.
I bit my cheek as I waited for the inevitable questions about it, but mercifully, Leo let it drop. “Your turn, darlin’.”
Before I could think of something, a thick bolt fell from the car and clattered to the ground. Looking down at it and then back up to her, I tilted my head. “You sure you know what you’re doing there?”
Leo grunted a laugh as she reached to stabilize a loose part. “Do you really want to burn a question on that?”
“Nope, nope.” I shook my head. “Okay, the tattoo: does Dom have it too?”
“Yep.” Leo nodded. “Everyone in Violence does.”
I nodded quietly. I’d never seen the tattoo on her. I had seen Dom’s bike around the property, but it was hard to imagine her being a part of a motorcycle club — mainly because that would require some sort of cooperation. In my experience, Dom wasn’t the kind who played nice with others.
“Where is it?” I furrowed my brows, causing Leo to lift hers.
“You’re not convincing me that you don’t have a crush on her.”
“Shut up! I’m straight!” I swatted a hand at her uselessly. “And even if I wasn’t, that brooding asshole is so not my type.”
“Oh please, Kiera, you’re a ‘straight girl.’” She put air quotes around the phrase. “Your whole schtick is being into assholes.”
“You’re pushing it, doc.” But even as my eyes rolled, I knew she was right. Gabe was as big an asshole as they made. “Seriously, are you going to tell me?”
“You’ll have to ask Dom if you want to know. Ask nicely, and I bet she’ll even show you.” Leo wiggled her eyebrows, laughing at the heat rising in my cheeks.
“You’re so barking up the wrong tree. Now ask a question, before I change my mind.”
Leo pursed her lips, looking up from her work to catch my green eyes. “When you walk up the stairs, how would you rate that pain?”
“What?” My brow furrowed, the question almost enough to give me whiplash.
“Do you find stairs to be painful?” The slight rephrasing of the question hardly helped at all.
Searching my mind, I tried to quantify what it felt like. Each step felt like a concentrated effort, something I needed to focus on to keep my balance and to not cause myself more pain.
I settled on, “the normal amount. Why?”
“That’s a question.” Before I could revoke it, Leo continued. “Because there is no normal amount.”
My mouth fell open slightly, and Leo was moving on too quickly for me to question it. “Ever kissed a girl?”
Of fucking course she’d ask this. I could have lied and saved some face, but somehow, I got the feeling that Leo was keeping things honest with me, and I didn’t want to sully that with a lie. “...Yes.”
“Seriously?” Her jaw dropped in a scandalized grin. “Tell me everything.”
“Just once!” I groaned. “And don’t get excited. It didn’t mean anything. We were just practicing for when we finally kissed boys.”
“Kiera, do you realize how fucking gay that is?”
“I’m not gay!”
“That’s what they all say.” She laughed, grabbing a couple of jack stands off a nearby shelf. “Listen, I have to hand it to you. Your commitment to being wrong about this is really admirable.”
“You’re deluded,” I laughed. “Your desperation for this to be a thing has blinded you to reality.”
She shook her head, “Whatever you say, sweetheart. Come talk to me in a few years when you’ve got an undercut and a septum piercing.”
“Is that gay?”
“Super. And that’s a question.” Leo smirked as she dropped one of the jacks down.
“No fair!” I pouted.
“Never said I’d play fair.” I wanted to be mad, but she was too goddamn charming, and she knew it too. “If you had to chose between me and Spencer, which one of us would you fuck?”
“Neither. Straight.” I tilted my chin down to meet her gaze.
“‘Neither’ isn’t an option. You’ve gotta choose.”
“I really don’t.”
“You really have no idea? After everything you saw the other night?”
My mind flashed back to the dark living room. The way their bodies writhed for my pleasure, desperate to meet my every command. I couldn’t help imagining what it would be like to have the tables turned, to let them touch me instead of each other.
“Neither.” I swallowed hard.
“Fine, then I get another question.” Leo wiped her gloves against her workpants as she crossed the space between us. “Can I have a kiss? Y’know, since it doesn’t mean anything?”
“Leo…” I sat up straighter as those warm brown eyes locked on mine.
“Just a question. Any answer is fine, Princess.”
My heart beat a bit harder at the boldness of the suggestion. A part of me wanted to do it just for the bit. Another part was curious what it would be like.
“Come,” I beckoned to her with a finger.
She closed the distance between us easily, eyes glimmering with excitement at the prospect. But as she leaned closer, I turned my head to the left and tapped my cheek. “This is all you’re getting.”
“Works for me,” she muttered, voice husky against my skin.
I’d been expecting a peck, but I should have known Leo wouldn’t waste the opportunity.
Cupping my cheek with one hand, she pressed her lips on the other soft and slow, letting her lower lip drag ever so slightly as she kissed me.
I had to bite my lip to hold back a sigh as the tip of her tongue pressed against my skin, bringing forward thoughts far too dirty for this garage.
After a long moment, she pulled back, hovering just out of my reach. “Well? Not even a flutter?”
My eyes darted down as I straightened the hem of my shirt, “Nothing.”
“Shame…” She let her eyes linger on my lips for a second before turning away, taking a seat on a rolling stool at the edge of her workstation. “I believe that makes it your turn.”
I took a deep breath, trying to calm my pulse enough to think of a normal question. Nothing about being gay, nothing that would leave me more confused. “Tell me more about your family.”
It felt like an innocent enough question, but the way her spine straightened and her eyes dimmed made me realize I’d struck a nerve.
“Not much to tell. Don’t have any siblings, don’t speak much to my parents.
Didn’t have the happiest of childhoods if the early enlistment didn’t already make that clear. ”
My chest tightened. What were you supposed to do when you accidentally brought up someone’s traumatic childhood. Give them a hug?
A hug is the last thing I’d want if I were her.
So instead of moving to comfort her, I nodded. “Damn that’s rough. Sorry your parents kinda sucked. We can talk about it if you want to.”
“Thanks,” Leo huffed, shaking her head. “It’s nothing new though. They’ve always kind of sucked, which means I’ve had a lot of time to figure out how to deal with it. And I’ve got Spencer and Dom. Fucked up as they are, that’s all the family I need.”
She took one last look under the chassis before wheeling over to the lift’s control panel and slowly lowering the car to the ground. “What about your family? How come you don’t talk about your dad?”
As the lift whirred, so did my mind. I’d wanted to be honest with Leo, but him… he was off limits, even within the four walls of my own mind. If I thought about him, I had to think about everything I lost, and I’d already learned the hard way that looking back never brought me any good.
By the time the whirring stopped, my hands were shaking in my lap. Tears bloomed in the corners of my eyes, catching me completely off guard. I blinked them back as I pinched the skin on my wrist, trying to keep myself grounded long enough to respond. “I think I’m done playing.”