1. Kirin #2
With that answer, there were plenty of questions he could have asked, but he only nodded.
Silence stretched between them, the animosity rising from her shoulders until it dissipated when his attention shifted to the lake.
After a while, it felt as natural as breathing to be sitting beside this stranger, which was another curiosity he’d never experienced.
He soaked up the quiet, letting the balm of the lake recharge him and calm the stress he could feel creeping around the edges of his consciousness.
Tomorrow he’d be doing the grocery shopping to stock the house for the next month and finishing reading the textbook for his dreaded Social Life and Media class.
It was vital he kept his GPA up, and he’d heard enough complaints about the class to know Professor Nadae was a hard-ass who liked to give a different project every year, so nobody could prepare in advance.
The only common thread was the need to know the textbook front to back.
He’d been reading every chance he got in hopes it would make whatever insane project was coming his way more manageable.
Another ten minutes passed before she sighed, and he glanced toward her as she unfurled herself to stretch her limbs.
When she stood up, he realized he was right about her height.
Muscular legs stretched as she rotated her feet.
Dark running shoes tied with shiny laces glinted with every turn of her ankle.
After a few more moments of stretching her legs, she turned, stretching out her hands like they were stiff from holding herself in such a tight ball.
“Are you okay?” he asked, taking in the stiff way she moved when she walked toward the old running trail he suspected she’d used to get down here. His question caused her to pause, her back straightening as if someone had slid a rod down her spine until she looked at him.
“I’ll be fine.”
“Do you have a name?” he pushed, wondering if he’d lost his damn mind trying to talk to her when she clearly wasn’t interested.
And yet he wanted to know more about her.
Part of him wanted to know everything, even if it was just because she wasn’t interested, which was rare, maybe unheard of, for him.
“Yes.” She moved to step away again, but he got up, closing the gap.
“I’m Kirin.” He offered her a hand.
“Okay.” Another step back. She ignored his hand, and he chuckled, dropping it.
“And you are?” He closed the gap with a small step, inadvertently forcing her to take another step that had her face turning a little more toward the moon and the light it offered.
A long sigh slipped between her lips, and the fingers of her right hand pinched the bridge of her nose as she squeezed her eyes shut. Thin gold rings on her fingers shone as her hand dropped to her side. Those golden eyes opened to pin him again.
They were like an amber fossil, or a glass of whiskey in front of a fire. He wouldn’t forget those eyes. That was for damn sure.
She grimaced. “Rose.”
A fitting flower. No doubt the woman has thorns.
She widened her eyes. Are we done here? clear in her expression even as he ignored it. “Are you attending Montgomery?”
She stopped again, staring at him as if he were a fool.
“Not going to tell me? Fair enough.” He smirked, and when he edged closer, she backed towards the trail.
All the movement was giving him a clearer view of her once his eyes adjusted.
If he thought she was stunning before, then seeing her in the full moonlight nearly toppled him.
She was lithe and strong, definitely an athlete, and he wondered what she played.
If her height was anything to go off of, possibly basketball, volleyball, or maybe even rowing.
He knew almost every athlete in this school, either personally or through channels, but he didn’t recognize her, and that meant she was probably a freshman.
When he met her gaze, he flinched at the fire there. He wasn’t hiding his perusal of her, and damn, she looked pissed about it. Her brows lowered enough to shadow those mesmerizing eyes he knew would haunt him. Her disapproval was little more than a flash of pale teeth as she responded.
“Add to your tally.”
He blinked, wondering what she meant until he remembered the comment about knowing all the beautiful women.
The realization had his chest warming, his fingers tingling with the want to touch her.
Yet another foreign feeling this mystery woman was conjuring in him when she kept his gaze.
She was practically daring him to look away before she turned on her heel and started up the trail.
He didn’t stop her this time, just watched her climb the worn path, those strong, long legs eating up the distance fast until she disappeared.
It felt like his world had tilted, like that brief encounter was the start of something, even if he had no clue what it could be.
He didn’t hate it, and that alone should have had him shutting down anything close to curiosity.
He needed to focus on his game this semester. The last thing he needed was an attraction to a freshman. Fortunately, he didn’t have much overlap with freshmen outside of his own team, and not seeing her would probably kill his interest.
Probably.
He frowned and turned toward the lake, looking at the fallen tree he’d spent so much time on without really seeing it. Now all he saw was Rose, curled up on the far end, which was a bad sign for his theory about losing interest.
Kirin took a deep breath and slid his hands into his pockets.
This was no good. He needed to force her into a box, to minimize her to a sexual attraction and nothing else.
He saw this as nothing more; he wasn’t at all intrigued by her lack of interest. He definitely didn’t want to know her last name to confirm he was right about her being an athlete, or see her in daylight to find out what her eyes looked like in the sun.
Nope.
Kirin rocked back on his heels and looked over his shoulder at the running trail.
He was fucked.