Page 111 of Chasing Xander
“For the first time ever, I really do.” He smiled. “I’ll catch up with you tomorrow.” He turned to leave, then stopped. “Hey, Finn. Thanks for everything you’ve done for me. I’m sorry if I let you down in there.”
“I’ve never been prouder of you.”
There was a brief pause, and then Xander grinned. “This is getting too mushy for me. I’m outta here, dude.”
The sound of Finn’s laughter followed him as he took off at a jog toward Kylie’s residence hall. His heart raced the closer he got to her room, praying she was there because if she wasn’t, he highly doubted she would answer his phone call or messages. The need to fix things between them consumed him, and he wouldn’t rest until he had her in his arms.
“Kylie!” He banged on her door. “If you’re in there, please open up. I need to talk to you.”
Silence.
He rested his forehead on the door and closed his eyes. “Kylie, please. I’m sorry about the other night. Please open the door so we can talk.”
“Xander?”
He spun around to find her coming down the hall. Her hair was wrapped up in a towel, and she wore a thin robe, carrying her shower caddy. He sighed with relief. Walking up to her, he took her face into his hands and pressed his lips to hers.
“I’m sorry,” he said, staring into her eyes.
She pulled away from him and opened her door, leaving it open for him to follow. His stomach dropped at her cold demeanor. She wasn’t going to forgive him easily, and he couldn’t blame her.
“How’d the vote go?” She put her shower caddy on the edge of her desk, then faced him, arms crossed.
“There wasn’t a vote.”
Her eyebrows shot up. “What? Why? Does that mean you get to stay in the frat?” Hope filled her gaze.
“I realized it didn’t matter. The whole reason I joined that fraternity was for the parties and the women. And because I was trying to hide from what had happened with Trisha.” He frowned, hating how stupid he’d been as a freshman.
He swallowed hard and took a few tentative steps toward her. “Everything that frat stands for, every reason I joined…it doesn’t matter to me anymore.” He took her hands and brought them to his mouth, kissing each one before holding them over his heart. “Only you matter, Kylie.”
Her bottom lip trembled, and her eyes were wet with unshed tears, but she remained silent.
“You’re not going to make this easy, are you?”
Her mouth twitched as if she wanted to smile, but she didn’t.
He licked his lips and continued. “Those things I said to you Friday night… That wasn’t fair to you, and I am so, so sorry. Your feelings matter to me more than anything else in this world. Please don’t ever doubt that.”
He cupped her cheek, and she leaned into his hand. He smiled softly, hoping he could make her understand. “I know you feel guilty about me missing classes to take you home, but I made that choice on my own. And it killed me, Kylie. It killed me to know you blamed yourself. On top of everything else, I worried about you, about the toll all that guilt was taking on you.”
“Xander…” she whispered.
“You buried your grandmother. You stood up to your father. God, that night I saw you curled on the floor, sobbing and shaking…” His chest ached at the mental image of her like that. “You had too much to deal with, and I couldn’t stand the thought of you also blaming yourself for my choices.” He took a deep breath. “Iwantedto take you home for your grandmother’s funeral. I want to be that guy for you, because I love you. I—”
She silenced him with a kiss. He wrapped his arms around her, relief flooding his senses. Her tongue eased into his mouth, playing with his, teasing and dueling for dominance. He pulled the towel from her head and then speared his fingers into her damp hair, holding her in place so she couldn’t get away. He never wanted her to get away. She had become his reason for living and breathing.
“I love you, too.”
He kissed her again, harder, deeper. He’d never said those words to a woman before, not even as a ploy to get one of them into his bed. And he was so glad he hadn’t, because Kylie was the only one who deserved to hear those words from him.
“When you left here, I thought that was it, that we were over.”
“Oh, baby.” He smoothed the hair from her face and placed a lingering kiss on her forehead. “We are so far from over. We’re just getting started.”
She nodded and snaked her arms around his waist. “I told Celeste I’d hang out with her tonight. She’ll be here soon.”
“Celeste can wait.” He toed off his shoes and then yanked off one sock, which he proceeded to hang on the outside of the door. “Tonight, you’re mine.” He closed and locked the door.
