Page 90 of The Very First Night

“Well, isn’t that just adorable.” The smarmy voice that carries from the doorway causes my skin to crawl and I know without looking up exactly who found us alone in the kitchen.

I feel Kat tense against me.

“It’s none of your business, Elijah,” I say without looking at him. Despite the awkwardness of the situation, I refuse to pull away from her.

Elijah made his choices—some shitty ones, at that. Kat has made it crystal clear since this semester started that she isn’t interested, but he hasn’t seemed to catch the hint.

“The fuck it’s not,” Elijah spits with vitriol as he strides into the kitchen.

I look up—his date is nowhere in sight, but Marcus and Jenna suddenly appear in the doorway.

Elijah sways slightly on his feet, just in an undershirt now. The smell of alcohol wafts off of him as he slurs out a string of curses. “So that’s why you won’t talk to me then, huh? I mean, I figured you’d fuck someone else eventually after how pathetic you were, but Tanner?” He laughs mockingly.

“Elijah, that’s enough,” Marcus says in a low voice, but as Elijah steps further into the room, it becomes clear there is no calming him down.

Lucky for me, I don’t give two shits about the trust fund baby’s feelings. I release my hold on Kat and walk around the counter to face him. “Where’s your date? Or did she come to her senses too?”

Elijah lets out a big, bellowing laugh, but judging from the look on his face, he is anything but amused. “Come to her senses? Please. I’m Elijah fucking Hanas. And who the fuck are you? Oh, right. Some scholarship nobody whose parents had to take out student loans to get you into a state school.”

It’s not the first time he’s made comments alluding to the fact that he feels he’s better than me because my parents are upper middle class and his dad is the great Governor Hanas. The part he fails to consider, though, is that there are few opinions in this world I care about less than his.

“Guys.” Marcus tries again to put a stop to things before it gets out of hand, but Elijah doesn’t back down and I’m sure as hell not giving him what he expects—for me to bow down to him.

I don’t pay him any mind; that’s how little his words matter.

Except he keeps going. “Sounds like my parents were right after all, though, right, Kat?” His lips curl up into a smirk. “Just another whore from Dublin like your mom. I’m sure you’ll spend your life working at the same sad little diner. It’s pathetic.”

There are a lot of things Elijah Hanas has said over the years in an attempt to get under my skin, most of which I never batted an eye at. However, hearing him call her a whore has me seeing red. My feet start moving of their own volition.

Elijah’s head snaps to the side as a tightly clenched fist collides with his jaw with a loud crack.

It takes me only two seconds to process that the punch I was planning on landing never happened because someone else beat me to it.

Jenna now stands hunched over with blood streaming from her balled fist. A whine breaks past her lips.

It all moves rather quickly after that. I rush over to Kat, who appears to be in shock, her mouth hanging open as she stares at the man who’s hurt her so many times.

“Go upstairs.”

I expect her to fight me on it, to say she doesn’t need coddling, but she just nods and does as I ordered.

“What the fuck!” Elijah yells before splitting blood onto the kitchen floor. “Marcus, your bitch just?—”

“Get the fuck out!” Marcus, who I have never seen yell—ever—gets in Elijah’s face and shouts, “Get the fuck out of this house. I want your shit out before the end of the weekend, but for tonight, leave!”

“You can’t kick me out. I’m on the lease.”

“And I know enough about you to tank your dad’s campaign for reelection. You want to play chicken? Because I promise you, tough guy, you’ll lose. You and I will talk tomorrow, but right now you need to go.”

Elijah either realizes Marcus is right or simply decides this isn’t a battle worth fighting. Either way, within seconds he’s out the front door without even looking for the girl who came with him.

FORTY-THREE

KAT

How? How did I just stand there and say nothing?

Elijah actually said that, and I said NOTHING.

---