Thin Love (29 page)

Keira blinked and the image of the redhead and Kona’s mouth on her chest had her squirming. “You do what you want. I will too.”

The smile dropped from his face.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“You think you’re the only one to notice me? You think I don’t get offers? I have choices, Kona. You’re not my only option.”

“Who, Keira?” His voice was calm, too calm and Keira knew that expression; she recognized his anger, the vivid, suspicious imagination. She guess that inside Kona’s head were paranoid images that probably made his stomach roll: Keira’s mouth on an unfamiliar chest; her hands sliding up shoulders, arms, too small to be his. He took a step closer and Keira didn’t back down from that frown, from the hard, uneven breath that shot from his flared nostrils. “Who?” His voice was louder then, so sharp and demanding that Keira flinched at the sound.

But she wasn’t a coward and she’d never been threatened by his temper. In fact, most times, she responded to it, got off, just a little bit, on it. More than she’d like to admit, she loved making that temper worse.

“None of your fucking business. Just go, Kona. Leave me alone. I’m leaving. Maybe I’ll stop by a bar. Maybe I’ll make a call.”

“Like hell you will.”

She didn’t bother responding to his jealous command, didn’t even give him the annoyed little glare she normally leveled at him. Instead, Keira shook her head, intent on putting space between them. But she barely managed two steps, maybe three before his grip was on her arm, spinning her around, giving her no space, no chance to back away from him.

“Don’t you walk away from me.” Keira could see the wild desperation in his eyes; the possessive nature that flicked forward. It thundered a dichotomy of emotions into her mind—rage, insult, passion.

“What the hell is wrong with you? You’re acting like a crazy person.” She jerked back from him, spilled beer on his shirt and Kona’s hold loosened. “I’m not yours, Kona. I’ll
never
be yours.” She knew the lie was weak, pathetic, she knew that the temper stirring on his face was growing and though she knew it was stupid to provoke him, she couldn’t help herself. Some dark, quiet part of her loved how eager, how frantic he looked.

Kona’s frown was severe, and from his body, Keira could feel his rage, the quick whip of anger that she loved seeing from him. She was playing with fire, standing so close to it that she felt her skin blister. She stepped back, their burning glances hard, challenging before there was enough space between them.

“Where are you going?”

Keira felt drunk, fueled by insult, by lust and the words were out of her mouth before her brain had given them permission to leave. “I’m going to check on those other offers.” She walked backward, a calculating, forced mock of a smile on her face. “You know Luka looked good tonight. Maybe I’ll go see what he’s up to.”

Keira could not take that look, the quick slap of frustration, rage, something she put out of her mind as quickly as she glanced at it, turning from him, knowing that it was Kona’s shout of rage echoing in the alley, bouncing off the bricks and empty pavement. She could feel him coming, each step getting faster and the bottle in her hand lowered, as Keira readied herself for his hands on her arms, to do battle and not think of the consequences.

When he spun her around, jerked her toward him, Keira lifted the bottle, a threat, a promise that put a quick, taunting smile on Kona’s face. “Gonna hit me, Wildcat? Go ahead.” Kona slapped his own face, swelling up to her, daring her to react. “Do it, you little coward. Hit me.” Another slap, another step and Keira’s temper broke. He was too large. Too much altogether and Keira lost her sense, let reason shift from the forefront of her mind. She wanted that condescending smile off his face.

Keira swung hard and the bottle in her hand cracked against Kona’s cheek. It took him to the ground and when he looked up at her, eyes wide, confused, Keira fell to her knees. “Shit. Kona. Oh God.”

Blood poured from his cheek and Keira tasted the bitter, sour tang of vomit on the back of her tongue.

What did I do? What the hell did I just do?

She couldn’t touch him. There was too much blood and even though Kona reached for her, needed someone to steady him, Keira retreated, scrambled off the ground.

“Keira, wait…” Kona held his hand against his face and that sick taste in her mouth doubled. Behind her she heard the scatter of activity; the quick thunder of feet on the pavement and then Luka was next to Kona, cursing, scared, glaring at her.

“What the fuck, Keira? You did this? Are you crazy?”

Kona pushed against his brother as he got to his feet and Keira moved around them, ran for her car, tears blurring the light above her and the outline of her Sunfire just feet in front of her. “I… I’m sorry,” she said, over her shoulder. “I’m so sorry.”

She dropped her keys, trying to unlock it, trying to hurry as Kona shouted at Luka, as he tried fighting against the small crowd that had gathered.

“No, brah,” she heard Luka tell Kona. “Let her go.”

And the last thing she heard before she shut her door and fired up the engine was Kona’s ragged voice screaming her name.

Keira couldn’t sleep. Her mind was pumped full of adrenaline and guilt, her heart twisted like someone had a grip on every inch of the muscle.

She hated Kona.

That’s what she told herself. Hate was easy. Hate, she was used to. She had practice with pushing her feelings down deep, with ignoring any semblance of affection. She should never have wanted him. Wanting only led to disappointment.

But the girl tonight with her arms around Kona, with her lips rubbing precariously close to his ear, had Keira questioning those repressed feelings she’d felt over the past weeks. God knew how much she wanted Kona. She liked his kisses. She loved the way he looked at her. She loved the way his skin smelled after he’d run to the library with no time to shower after practice.

He did things to her body that she wasn’t used to. They’d flirted. They’d made out and afterward, each time, she felt her body burn. He never pushed. He never asked for more than what she offered and it drove her insane.

And Kona’s mouth, his hands, his skin made her wonder why she held him off, why she hadn’t pushed, hadn’t asked for more. Keira closed her eyes and long red hair, shattered the darkness. The girl had been actually pretty, not like the familiar, vapid clones on campus. She stuck out. Of course Kona would take what she offered. The thought of it made her sick. Keira knew he wouldn’t change. Weeks and weeks she had lied to herself, had repressed the knowledge that he was a beautiful, popular athlete who could have his pick of anyone he wanted. She hated that Kona made her doubt herself, made her feel somehow subpar. But even through her anger and pain she had to acknowledge that if the last weeks had told her anything, it was that Kona wanted her too. Maybe not forever, but he definitely wanted her.

He wanted her like air, like breath. He’d showed her in every lingering glance, in the small movement of his fingers down her neck, in the calm, settled way he rested against her chest while she raked her nails through his hair.

Keira tightened her eyes at the memory of his lips on her neck. Her traitorous nipples hardened, and her skin felt fevered as she lay in her bed remembering what his tongue had felt like on her neck, his fingers just under the clasp of her bra, working inside her, making her come so hard she thought she might pass out. A quick shudder moved across her skin and Keira had to turn on her side, pull her knees up to shake off the sudden hum that throbbed between her legs.

She couldn’t shake the image from her mind or the feelings from her body. Kona might want Keira, but that didn’t mean he wanted only her. There were over a two thousand available girls on campus. It seemed like they all were after Kona. What was she compared to them? She was one of the crowd. One of the many.

And tonight, with him acting like a maniac, her getting aroused, so needy by his anger, brought back the sudden, ugly image of Kona on the ground with blood pouring from his cheek.

Aggressive tendencies.
That’s what the doctor had told an eleven-year-old Keira she was fighting against. It was that buried, angry thread of rage that Keira had experienced the moment her mother had flippantly broke the news to her: “Your father put a pistol to his temple and killed himself, Keira.” And not ten minutes later, “Try not to carry on at the funeral.”

Her mother had made it clear that she was to hide what she felt; told her that tears were something only infants were allowed and so Keira swallowed up that grief, the rage that being left without her beloved father had kindled in her heart. She stowed away that anger, those tears, because that is what she was expected to do. That’s what ladies did. They shouldered others’ burdens, and ignored their own.

Pills helped when necessary, as did years of therapy, but then Kona Hale entered her life and that angry little girl forgot that she was supposed to breathe when rage hit her. She forgot that she should count, let the anger pass. He brought it out in her with little effort and tonight had been the catalyst, the tipping off point of frustration and heat, and desire denied, that sent Keira over the edge.

It wasn’t an excuse. It didn’t allow for reason or tell Keira that swinging a cold bottle at Kona’s face was in the least understandable. She felt like a freak, an unhinged monster and Kiera buried her face into her pillow, hiding from her guilt. The tears came again, harder, sharper than the ones she’d cried the day before when had Kona left her room.

Leann’s bed lay empty. Michael got her attention on weekends. Michael got her cousin’s attention most days. But it was Saturday night, game night, and Leann’s priorities were on her man and not her unbalanced, violent cousin. Keira understood that. But it didn’t make her feel any less alone.

Anger, lust, shame, they all coiled together, shot straight to Keira’s core, aching, throbbing and she felt stupid and unstable and thought she should touch herself, maybe hit something, to try to release the pent up feelings inside. She didn’t know which she wanted more - the emotional release or the physical one.

The clock on her bedside table blinked three a.m. and Keira wondered if Kona had been patched up, if he’d calmed, if he’d left the bar bloody, but not alone.

I’m so fucking twisted.

That throb got worse when she remembered Kona’s lips on her skin, his knuckles inside her just two nights before and she lay on her stomach, slipping her fingers beneath the shorts she wore. She rubbed twice, felt her pulse against her fingers and then her door slid open and she shoved her hands under her pillow.

“You didn’t stay at Michael’s?” she asked, expecting her cousin’s sleepy reply. But then large hands settled on her hip, a larger body slid in behind her on the bed. For one split, frantic moment she thought to scream in sudden fear at the intruder in her room, but then she caught a familiar scent, sensed his unmistakable presence. Her fear turned to shock that he was there, that he had been able to sneak into the dorm without catching the RA’s attention, but he moved so quickly, so soundlessly and felt so warm, so comfortable that her shock quickly faded.

He didn’t speak for several moments, didn’t do much else but move his huge hand around her waist. She didn’t move, didn’t turn around, willed the bed to swallow her up.

“I’m so fucked up. I’ve always been fucked up.” Kona brushed a kiss against her neck and Keira squeezed her eyes shut, trembling when the smell of his skin and his hot breath made the throb worse. His voice was low, soft and she could tell that whatever he’d been drunk on earlier that night had left his system. “I shouldn’t have touched the redhead.” His hand pushed against her stomach, and her back was flushed against his chest. “I shouldn’t have touched Tonya Lucas, not after you stayed with me at the hospital. I don’t know why I’m the way I am. I don’t know why you make me so scared of everything I feel, Wildcat.”

“Don’t call me that.”

He ignored her. “I shouldn’t have let her touch me.”

Feeble deflection seemed all Keira had left; it was the only thing that kept the guilt from suffocating her. “You can touch whoever you want, Kona.”

She felt his stiffen behind her, then exhale, the breath cooling her hot skin. “I can’t. Not anymore.”

“Why?”

Hard thighs and the feel of rough denim against the back of her legs made Keira tremble and when Kona’s brushed one kiss on her shoulder, that tremble transformed into a shudder. “You know why.”

Keira rolled onto her back so that she could look up at him and her eyes went directly to his cheek, to the bandage across his face and the bruise that shadowed behind it. She caught her gasp behind her hands, eyes instantly filling, then pouring with hot tears that she didn’t wipe away.

Kona caught each one, the undamaged side of his face denting with his tiny smile. “I’m okay. Seven stiches. It was nothing.”

“God. Oh, Kona.” Keira tried to cover her face, didn’t want to see it, didn’t want Kona to see how gutted her shame made her.

“Shh. Stop now.” She let him pull her hands down, let him kiss her forehead. She’d do whatever he wanted, whatever he needed and right then, he seemed to need her head under his chin, his fingers in her hair. “I deserved it.”