Kai picked his sweatshirt up off his chair and tossed it to Arion. “Do it now,” he commanded.
And from the tone and the look on his face, he wouldn’t allow her to disobey.
“Fine,” she spat out and got up.
But I grabbed the sweatshirt and yanked it out of her hand, throwing it back on the table.
Kai glared at me.
“She’s fine,” I told him, more as an order rather than a statement.
He rose up out of his chair, the hint of disdain on his face as he picked up the hoodie. “Not every woman in this world will be for your personal amusement,” he bit out, staring down at me. “Someday one of them will be your kid, and you’re gonna damn well worry when she’s drawing the wrong kind of attention.”
“You teach your daughter to hide in everyone else’s world,” I shot back, “and I’ll teach mine everyone else exists in hers. Go fuck yourself, and leave the kid alone.”
I wasn’t sure where the hell I was coming from, because if Banks walked out of our room like that, I’d lose my shit. But with Winter…
Nothing she did would be wrong. It was their fault for looking.
He straightened, breathing hard but not blinking.
And grabbing the sweatshirt again, he turned around and headed toward Winter.
Fucker.
Kai and I weren’t friends. We were brothers. In every way except biological. Whether we liked each other or not, we were family, and we had each other’s backs.
But that didn’t mean we liked each other, either.
He was the noble one. The voice of reason in our little group, and while I sometimes envied his happy house, I knew there would be a time when he’d have two choices—and he wouldn’t choose me.
Noticing Arion still next to me, I looked up at her. “What are you waiting for?”
Her lips tightened into a line, knowing I was referring to Marko Bryson, and finally, she walked off, either to get to work on him or tell me to piss off and to get back to her friends. Either way, I didn’t c
are. I just wanted her gone.
I turned my eyes back on Kai, watching as he approached Winter and the girls around her parting to let him in.
Winter’s smile faltered as he leaned in and she listened to whatever he was saying. She pulled back a little, her spine straightening and her head bowing in embarrassment.
My fingers closed into a fist.
Then he took her hand and held the sweatshirt up to it, so she could take it and put it on.
But much to my surprise, she shook her head and waved him off, adding a small smile for good measure. Instead, she reached out to touch the brick column of the pool house, using it to feel her way as she left.
He watched after her, threw a look at me, and I just shook my head at him. She wouldn’t cover up, but now she was leaving the party good and humiliated. Great job, asshole.
He threw the sweatshirt back over to the table, and I turned my eyes over to her, watching her trail the perimeter with her hand grazing the hedge line. How long did it take her to map out a new place in her head? She seemed pretty self-sufficient. Even at school already. Of course, she’d be familiar with her home the most. If she followed the hedges around the corner, they would take her all the way back up to the house.
Standing up, I took Kai’s hoodie and walked, making sure to go slowly as I slipped away from the party and down the small incline, away from the noise and eyes.
Winter walked along the line, rustling the green leaves as she brushed past them on her way back to the house, and I pulled on the sweatshirt, masking my scent as I dove through an opening in the line to the other side of the hedges.
I slowed to a walk, my heart suddenly hammering as I saw the white of her shirt through the leaves, not one foot away from me. I put out my hand, following hers where it grazed the leaves on the other side.
I closed my eyes for a moment, walking with her and following the path with my hand as I heard the blood pump in my ears. My head started to float a little, and the world seemed to tilt under my feet.