My cousin forgotten, I back away from the main door and step closer to the car, keeping my steps quiet to ensure she doesn’t hear me coming. She’s scrubbing the leather seats, wearing that black ball cap she loves so much, the same oversized shirt she wore to school today, and a pair of those little black shorts she wears to work. She looks hot—not just hot hot but sweating hot—and fuck me, the way the backs of her thighs are shining with a light layer of sweat, the way the tight fabric of her shorts stretches across her ass in this position… It’s making me a little crazy.
As I watch, she crawls backward out of the car, slams the back door shut, and crouches down to grab the hose on the ground. Before she turns it on, I say, “You know I could’ve snatched you by now and covered your mouth before you could scream.”
She yelps and jumps a fucking mile, spinning on me with her grip tight on the hose. She looks ready to hit me with it, but then she looks up at my face, and her shoulders drop a couple inches. Just for a second, she looks relieved it’s me and not some stranger, and it makes my teeth clench. A few hours ago, her relief over seeing me would’ve made me happy, but now it just pisses me off. Everything about her is pissing me off. The way she looks, the way she’s looking at me, the way she’s not mine and probably never will be.
Nails digging into the palm of her free hand, she steps back when she catches whatever expression is on my face. Her gaze moves over my shoulder, checking for my car, I’m guessing. When she doesn’t find it, she cuts her eyes back to me, over my face, my chest, and the tattoos on my arms. I’ve changed into black sweats and a black T-shirt since she saw me at school earlier, meaning she can’t tell whether I’m me or my twin.
“Kai…” She sounds hesitant, and I tighten my jaw, ignoring my pathetic disappointment over the fact she doesn’t just know it’s me.
She takes another step back, and my feet automatically move closer before I can stop them.
“Kai,” she says again, more sure of herself this time, her eyes widening with panic and fear.
“You lied to me.”
Chapter 9
HAILEY
Shit. Shit, he’s so close. Too close. Too close to me…too close to my apartment…too close to my brother…
How does he know where I live?
I don’t ask that question, or any of the others swimming through my head, because I’m too focused on the glare on his face, the one that wasn’t there the last time I saw him or any of the other times. He’s…he’s not looking at me the same. I don’t know why that knots my stomach. I shouldn’t care what he thinks of me and I don’t, damn it, but there it is, twisting me up inside and making me feel…scared? Guilty? Sad?
Fuck that.
The only thing Kai Kingston makes me feel is rage, so it’s probably a good thing he feels the same way about me now.
His blue eyes narrow as if he’s trying to see through mine, those four words echoing in the too small space between us.
You lied to me.
Finally snapping myself out of my temporary paralysis, I shake my head with a small, disbelieving laugh. This entitled prick. Even if I did lie to him, which I didn’t, not really, I owe him nothing. Not an explanation. Not an argument or a fight. Not a goddamn thing.
“What?” he asks, taking yet another step forward, using his body to stop me from walking away. “You gonna act like you haven’t known who I am to him the entire time I’ve been chasing you? Damn it, Hailey, you’ve always known.”
“And?”
“And,” he echoes angrily. “Why didn’t you say something?”
That bitter laugh slips out of me again, and it’s me moving closer to him this time, tipping my head back to meet his eyes head on. “What did you expect me to say? I don’t care who you are to him or anybody else. I don’t care that you’re his cousin. And I don’t owe you shit.”
“The fuck you don’t,” he snaps, quickly shutting his mouth as if he didn’t mean to say that.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he mutters, glancing down at the cleaning supplies on the ground beside us. “What are you even doing?”
“Wait, what did you mean?—”
God, that look. It cuts into me like a knife to my throat, and it’s not hard to see why everyone’s scared to breathe around him when he acts like this. Like he’s got no problem ruining my life if I so much as open my mouth without permission. Like he’d enjoy it, even. He looks so cruel and menacing right now, the bad boy Kingston brother wearing his all black clothes, his inked body, his dark hair falling over his eyes. And that glare…
“What are you doing?” he asks again.
“Cleaning Derek’s car,” I say dryly, doing my best to hide my anxiety with sarcasm.
He stares at the hose as if he’s never seen one before. “Why can’t Derek do it himself?”