“Sure, hun.” She gave me a wink. “I’ll get your orders in and be right back with that second drink.”
She walked away, and Brandon’s eyes followed her. I didn’t have to turn to know that he was looking at her ass. I clenched my jaw, ready for this date to be over with already.
“Here’s an idea. Don’t just assume things. I don’t need you to order for me. And maybe, if you’re on a date with a girl, you don’t stare at other girls’ asses and boobs. Total dick move, asshat.”
His eyes jerked back to mine and something flashed in them. It was dark, something I hadn’t seen in anyone else’s eyes before. It made me feel uneasy.
“Noted,” he muttered before taking another swallow of his drink.
I picked my phone up and sent a quick text to Alicia.
Date was a bad idea. This guy is a total douche.
She sent me an instant reply.
Call Gray!
That was the last thing I wanted to do. I told myself that I could handle this guy, but I pulled his name up on my phone anyway. Just in case.
SIXTEEN
Gray
Sweat rolled down my back, my shirt drenched like I had showered with it on, but still, I kept running, trying to get Kassa out of my head—if for only a minute.
It wasn’t working. Fuck, hadn’t I learned that by now? Nothing could get her out of my head. Not working out, not trying to fuck out the memory of how hot her pussy had been against my thigh and my hands, not distance, and sure as fuck not time. I had tried it all. Tried and failed.
Working out didn’t do shit for how hard my body got from just thinking about her. Fucking around with other chicks couldn’t even begin to touch how hot she had gotten me with the little foreplay that had happened in her bed. And the real kicker? Every time I got off—every goddamn time—guilt would choke me. It was like I was doing something wrong, like I was cheating on Kassa.
All I had been able to think about from the minute I had left her back in December was seeing her again. I hadn’t had a good night’s sleep during that time, because on the nights I’d actually fallen asleep, I had woken up and reached for her. All I wanted was to feel her body pressed against my side and her head pillowed on my chest, listen to the soft sigh of her sleeping beside me.
I hadn’t slept beside her any during the last few nights I had been home. No matter how many times she had promised me that things hadn’t changed between us, I knew that it was one she hadn’t been able to keep. Things were different now, even if from the outside they might have looked the same. She was more guarded around me now, but I couldn’t blame her for it.
If I had slit my heart open and poured out everything I was feeling to her and she had rejected me, I would have been more guarded too.
I had fucked up with her. It was all my fault, but I couldn’t fix this thing between us. Because there was only one way to fix it, and that was to give in to my feelings for her. I couldn’t do that though. I couldn’t risk hurting her the way I knew I would end up hurting her when it was all over.
“Dude, you sweat any more and I’m going to have to break out the mop and clean this shit up,” AJ chuckled beside me. He leaned against the front of the treadmill I had been on for nearly an hour now. “The way you’ve been running, it’s like something’s chasing you, boy.”
Nothing was chasing me. If anything, I was chasing it. Kassa hadn’t let me talk to her about whether she was actually coming back with me next week. Every time I had brought it up or tried to ease us onto the topic, she’d changed the subject. I was sweating bullets, waiting for her to put me out of my misery. I didn’t just want her to come back to Cali with me. I fucking needed her to.
I couldn’t handle another few months without her out there with me. Hell, I couldn’t last another week without her out there. My temper had been getting the better of me lately. Jace and I had been arguing more and more, having come to blows more than a handful of times in the past few months. I couldn’t breathe out there, not when she was back here in Virginia.
If she didn’t come back, then I was going to say to hell with it all and stay with her. It didn’t matter that Emmie Armstrong was in the process of signing Tainted Knights with one of the biggest record labels in the world. All of that could wait until Kassa was ready to move because I didn’t have the strength to walk away again.
I slowed the treadmill down to a walking pace and used the towel AJ had handed me to wipe my face and my neck.
“Kassa out doing the pre-graduation rituals tonight?” he asked as I took a long drink from my water bottle.
“She says she’s not up to that shit.” And fuck, but I was glad. I could vividly remember some of the things I had done the days before and after graduation, so I was weak in the knees with relief that she didn’t seem interested in partying and who the fuck knew what else.
“Huh. Well, she’s usually in here on Thursday nights. Where is she?”
> “Home. I’ll probably take her to dinner later.” And finally make her give me a straight answer about coming with me or not.
There was a thoughtful look on his face, his eyes clouding with something that made me feel oddly tense. “That Brandon guy isn’t here tonight, either, and he usually is. He’s been flirting with her a lot lately. Always asking her out. I told him to back off, leave her alone because she’s just a baby. But he only seemed more interested after our chat.”
My entire body tensed. “Who is the guy?”