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“Maya!” I reached for her slender arm. I didn’t want her to be mad at me. There was a reason why I didn’t bring this up with her before. Why I avoided it. I didn’t want to hurt her. Somewhere, between us being born and now, she and I had a bond. A fucking weird one that I wasn’t willing to bet on had I told her that I didn’t share those same feelings with her.
She pulled out of my grip. “Forget it, Kill. I get it.” Her shoulders sagged around her long curly hair. I could hear the shame in her tone. It wasn’t often that Maya bared a weakness, so the fact that she had right now made my heart, or my something, drop.
“I don’t want to hurt you, Maya. You know that.”
She sighed. “I know.” She sniffed, and I reached for her, tucking her beneath my arms and pressing my lips to her head. She continued. “I should have known that if you really wanted me, Killian Cornelii would have taken possession of me. Ever the starved wolf who is never satisfied.”
My body shook as I laughed into her hair, wrapping one of her curls around my finger. “I love you, you know that, right?”
She nodded, her face pressing against my chest. I could feel the dampness from her tears soaking into my Phillip Plein shirt. “I know, just, not the kind of love that I need.”
“Well.” She stepped out of my grip. “If it makes you feel any better, I’m not capable of any other kind of love.”
“I know,” she whispers as if it made her feel just that much better. “Come on, let’s get a drink.”
I flashed her my bottle of whiskey, and she laughed, her head tipping back. “Okay, me a drink, since I don’t drink that nasty stuff.”
“No.” I rolled my eyes, pulling her under my arm as we made our way back to the bonfire. “You just drink cheap vodka.”
“Hey!” She elbowed me in the sides, laughing. “I mean it.” Her laughter dies out. “Are we okay?”
I nodded, giving her one more squeeze. “Yeah, May, we will always be okay.”
“Okay,” she answers, tying her hair up into a messy knot. “Just give me some time, okay? To somehow get over my shit.”
“You have all the time in the world.” Just as the words left my mouth, I find Saskia. She was studying me closely, as if fascinated, or just trying to work me out. The flames haunting the night do absolutely nothing to eradicate the fact that she is, by far, the sexiest girl I have ever seen. There’s sexy, beautiful, hot, banging, and then there’s Saskia, whose beauty trumps all the mundane adjectives that the Oxford Dictionary can generate.
“I’ll hold you to that.” Maya winked, hitting me with her hip and then turning for the ocean, where she was ru I laughed under my breath nervously, my eyes still on Sass’s and hers still on mine. Everything ceased to exist around us, as if all of the words that we had never vocalized were being spoken in the language of eye contact. Finally, she broke away from me and looked down to the sand, wrapping her arms around herself. She always wore clothes that covered her body, as if she was trying to hide some crazy insecurity or using them as a defense mechanism to keep wolves like me at bay. Only this wolf will huff, and he’ll puff, and he’ll blow her house down… I shake myself out of the memory from a couple months ago. Okay, sure, two months isn’t all the time in the world like I promised Maya, but to be fair, these were the first words Sass and I had said to each other, and let’s be real, they weren’t exactly a declaration of fucking love. It’s no secret that I have lowkey pined after her a couple of times, and it’s no secret that she has shut me down every single one of those times. By not so much as saying a word. She just ignores me. Later that night, we were all on the top deck of the ship. A few people were in the pool, but Keaton, Ky, and I were in the hot tub. “Where the fuck are the lovebirds?” Keaton brings the rim of his beer to his mouth. “Don’t know,” I answer, resting my head back against the top of the spa and gazing up at the sky. “Nonstop” by Drake is thumping around us loudly. “Pretty sure King is trying to get her pregnant.” Keaton splashes me and I rear forward, laughing. “Not fu “Well, to be fair.” I swipe the water off my face. “I’m pretty sure her having a baby would make us all an uncle, not just you.” Keaton pushes up from the edge of the spa and climbs out, flipping me off. “Fuck you.” He reaches for his phone that’s on the ground and reads through it. “Who you texting and how do you have service way the fuck out here?” He flips me off again and walks away, just as Callan, Sass, and Kenan start walking toward us, drinks in hand. For a second, I’m almost certain Sass won’t get into the hot tub, but she does, her body sliding beneath the water. Damn shame to hide that body. Callan slides over to me. “Hey.” I cringe, and I must show it because I can hear Ky chuckling in the background. Motherfucker. “’Sup.” I purposely pull away from her. I don’t fucking know why. Can’t really pinpoint the exact reason why I don’t want her touching me right now, and I’m not willing to say it’s because of another girl’s presence. Callan notices, but rests back against the spa. “I’m excited about Australia, I’ve never been.” “It’s beautiful,” Kenan says, shaking his head. “When you get past all the things that can kill you.” Kenan is someone I can’t quite put my finger on. With his boyish features and charming wit, I almost feel bad that he’s in Midnight Mayhem and surprised that he hasn’t been eaten alive yet. Early days. Callan laughs. “I once watched a documentary—” and I drift off. I wonder if she purposely came into this spa just to piss me off. My eyes go to Sass, only she’s already watching me. Music is playing in the background with people screaming and yelling in their drunken stupor, and then there’s just her and I, and this complicated web of tales that our eyes continue to tell. I slightly raise my eyebrows in question, seeing if she’ll take the bait. She diverts her gaze away from me and takes a sip of her drink. Ky bumps me beneath the water with his foot, throwing me a questioning look. I don’t fucking know. I answer back with a shrug. Saskia Royal is complicated as fuck, but the hurdles that she is throwing out at me is only training my stamina, and when I finally reach that finish line, she better fucking run. Kenan lifts Callan over his big shoulders and takes her out of the spa. I watch as he tosses her into the swimming pool as he yells in whatever the fuck it is and smashes his chest with his fist King-fucking-Kong style. The kid is fu He has juice and balls. Maybe I underestimated him. Ky climbs out of the spa next. “I’m all for threesomes, but this is one I’m not touching.” Once he’s out of earshot, I whisper out playfully. “What’d I do?” She doesn’t answer, only rests her head against the spa, her eyes up at the sky. “You think you’ve done something wrong when a girl doesn’t bat her lashes at you.” “Quit the fucking games, Sass. I couldn’t care less about that. I don’t care if I’m not your type—though you’d be fucking wrong—but I do want to know why you hate me.”
