by Kendra Mase
“I was j-just.” She shut her eyes again through the stutter. “Thinking.”
“It does the best of us in.”
Kit snorted before she sniffed. “So stupid.”
“No.”
“It is. All of this. I was just so stupid. I went to the market and met these people from the school.” She shook her head. “I’m fine alone. I like to be alone.”
“Can’t relate.”
“It’s your fault,” she gritted out between her teeth.
At that, Jack raised his eyebrows. “My fault?”
He’d done a lot of things, especially in the past few months, but he couldn’t think of anything specific to her.
“You and her.”
Queen.
“I was fine being alone, and then all of a sudden, for a little while, I wasn’t.”
Jack paused, letting her go on.
“I was fine before I met you, and I just wanted…” She shook her head again, but Jack wanted to know. What was it? What did she want? “It’s so ridiculous, but for a second, I felt like I was meant to be here. That I was meant to live in Ashton and be someone with you all, but then no one called, and I got it.”
“Avril took off not long after we went out together that night and hasn’t been making any calls either.” He guessed that didn’t mean he couldn’t have. But he was busy and if she needed someone…
Jack’s forehead creased as he focused on her.
“I get why no one actually wants to be around me. I’m just—”
“Not just.”
“Yeah. Just.” Kit lifted her head and finally looked at him, and when she did, he swore he saw her take another sharp intake of air, as if just realizing he was in front of her for the first time. “That’s all I ever have been. Just.”
He stared at her for a long moment, his hands still on her knees. He wondered if they were talking about the same person here. He basically ran out of the house after her. He was the stupid one, turning back to Pen to begin with instead of her, who looked like he did right before he did something stupid, standing on the staircase and making promises she couldn’t keep.
His jaw clenched.
“Obviously you wouldn’t get it.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re beautiful. Everyone fawns all over you and your naughty, sexy grin. People pay for you to beat them and say thank you after. Charismatic and charming man who probably has had girls fighting to get into your bed if they weren’t willing to share.”
Jack fought his own snort of amusement. “That only happened two times, max.”
“Of course, you wouldn’t understand.”
“Understand what?”
“What it is like to be no one. Out of everyone in the world, I am no one’s favorite. For all I can tell, no one can stand me. And little do they know that at this point, the feeling is pretty mutual. It’s not like I ever had friends before. I barely even had a family. My own parents didn’t want me and made that pretty damn clear when they left out the front door without a word. Emilie barely even wanted me until I ended up on her doorstep. She’s probably looking for a way out.”
“Kit.” Jack looked at her hands, balled in fists.
To be honest, right now, he didn’t want to get too close. Fire started to burn in the sadness and something else he couldn’t decode radiating in her. That thick honey feeling.
“Don’t say it’s not true,” Kit said. “It is. I am nothing.”
“You are not.”
She shook her head.
“Don’t believe that for a damn second, Kitten.”
“You don’t know me.”
No. He didn’t, but that truth didn’t sit well with him either, as he held on tighter. “I know that you’re a liar.”
She looked at him. Good. He would keep talking as long as she kept looking at him, even like that, with thick lashes and mascara dripping.
“Or maybe you just don’t own a mirror, because fuck, Kit, you’re beautiful.”
She snorted.
“Don’t make that noise at me. I’m serious. You’re a badass little drinker who can somehow manage their liquor better than, well, anyone I’ve really met. You are funny as well as talented. To top it all off, you’re smart and know what you are doing with your life setting up a website for Emilie’s shop. Kitten, look at me, I may be exceedingly dashing minus the whole height thing.”
“You’re the perfect height.”
Jack fought a smirk. “What? You want to play this game then?”
“The pity-me game, of course. We fight until we see whose life is worse. Ready? I am an almost twenty-nine-year-old man-child who ran away from home to go to college in the city. I proceeded to get kicked out of that school to work on crappy film sets as a lighting guy for a few months, since that was all I was qualified for before Avril came along. I’ve never lived alone because I can’t stand the quiet, and currently because of this I am living in the guest room of my best friend who put me in the friend zone with a little tender touch after I confessed my drunken, yet at the time, very real love to her.”
Katherine lifted her head, eyes locked on his.
“I can’t even go home for my parents’ anniversary, because I am a big fat coward and am afraid that after all these years, they aren’t going to like what they’ll see. Sometimes I don’t like what I see either. You got me thinking about it all with your deep, well-meaning questions you asked.”
He could’ve gone home a million times, but didn’t. And now he barely even knew his six-year-old nephew, let alone the few other nieces that came along after his older brother. The other day, he ended up finally calling his sister-in-law back. She tried to convince him to come home, that this was the year, but he couldn’t. It was too late and—
“I’d go with you.”
Jack looked back from where his eyes drifted toward the lamppost. “What?”
“To your parents. I’d go with you.” She took a deep breath as she recovered. Each word was slow, thoughtful. “They call themselves your family. They’d like what they finally get to see.”
Jack thought for a moment, moving himself to sit beside her on the stoop. Like magnets, she leaned into him, limp and exhausted. “We’ll talk about that later. Right now, we’re focused on you.”
“I still think I won.”
Jack only hummed in response. Maybe she did.
“I just.” She caught herself. “I was alone again, and I just wanted to be normal. So, I decided to go out tonight. All this time I was never good enough—never anything. How hard is it to be normal?”
Jack shook his head with a scrunch of his nose as he looked up. The sky was dark and hazy. “Normal is boring.”
Kit said nothing. Her brow creased in concentration.
He ran a finger over it, and she didn’t flinch as he carefully lifted her chin up so she would meet his eyes.
God, he was an asshole.
“Be normal with me, then.”
Chapter Twenty
Katherine’s jacket and tote were still by the door, she noticed. She also noticed that the townhouse was a lot quieter than it was a few hours ago.
“I should go back home. I should get back to Emilie.” Katherine murmured down to herself. She’d been thinking it the whole ride back to the house. The night seemed to drone on over Ashton, a never-ending void of darkness as she looked out the window as they crossed the even darker river. In its reflection, she swore she saw a star, but when she looked up, all that was there was a haze of clouds.
Jack shook his head as he shut the door behind them. He turned the lock until it clicked. “Don’t worry about Emilie. I’ll call her in the morning if you want me to.”
She was probably asleep. Vaguely, Katherine nodded as she stumbled farther inside to the living room. Everything was back to its rightful place, as if no one was there at all.
The only people there now were her and Jack.
Glancing up at him, she caught him slowly assessing her, p
robably to see if she was going to have a major freak-out. Though it wasn’t the first time Katherine had ever had a panic attack before, they still managed to catch her off guard, slowly creeping up on her and then striking like a viper when she least expected.
They wrung her out like a towel, limp and exhausted.
His hands were so gentle as they found her again, leading her around to the other side of the couch. “Come here. Do you want to go to bed?”
She shook her head.
“Yeah, a little early yet for a Saturday, huh?” Jack agreed with her, though that isn’t what she meant. Dropped her down to sit, then he hauled her right back up again, leading her toward the steps. “My mistake, let’s get you cleaned up first. Good?”
She nodded again before she realized what he meant by that, they were back upstairs maneuvering through the hallway they were in earlier tonight. Katherine glanced at the wall she’d been pressed against by Devil’s hands before being led into Jack’s room. Opening his drawers, he filled her arms with soft cotton in every shade of navy and gray.
“You can use Queen’s bathroom if you want, through her room.”
Katherine was still staring down at the pile of clothes, forgiving in her hands as her fingers clenched around them. With a nod, she moved back into the hallway. What was she doing here? She didn’t let herself answer, didn’t have the energy to as she walked through Avril’s room at the one end of the hall. The ostentatious space suddenly felt comfortable, knowing where she was going.
Dropping her—Jack’s—clothes on the counter, Katherine immediately saw her reflection in the mirror. Lights brightened on either side. Black eyeliner and mascara dripped from where it was carefully laid, smearing down her cheeks. She let the water run, scrubbing her face before she noticed all the expensive cream cleansers and lotions in front of her. She smoothed each over her face until her skin was clear again, eyes remaining a little raw from tears and her contacts.
Blinking a few times, she reached up and carefully threw one contact and then the other in the trash. Obviously, she wasn’t thinking now, the world a blur.
“Jack?” she asked once, wondering if he was waiting outside the door. Hearing no answer, she called out a little louder.
Immediately, Jack appeared from where she craned her neck around the bathroom doorway. “What’s wrong?”
“Can you get my bag? It’s by the door downstairs. My spare glasses are inside.”
With a nod, he disappeared.
Letting the bathroom door mostly close again, Katherine kicked off her shoes and let them clang against the large clawfoot tub. It was a bathtub, truly, of dreams. She could imagine just filling it to the brim before slipping in with all the soaps lined up by the crooked witch window above.
Taking a deep breath, Katherine instead reached for the hem of her dress, tugging it upward to go over her head, but somewhere along the way, it was caught. Stuck, Katherine turned around to a deep chuckle.
She froze as hands unraveled her from wherever the fabric had caught on the loop of her bra, helping her tug the silk the rest of the way over her shoulders.
Jack stood in front of her, a small smile quirking the side of his mouth. Taking her dress, he folded it with surprising care before laying it over the edge of the tub. Then, slowly, Jack fell to his knees before her.
Katherine’s eyes widened at the sight. Something inside of her chest caught, and she wondered if he could tell she wasn’t breathing.
He started with the brooches. With ease, he pulled the metal away from the lace, pinned and unpinned. Then his arms reached around her, catching her eyes as he did. Deftly, his fingers unclipped her garter belt and put it next to her dress on the lip of the tub basin. One at a time, he pulled a piece of clothing off the counter, starting with sweatpants.
They were only slightly too big around her hips, cinching them inward as far as they would go. The oversized T-shirt slipped overhead. Once it passed her shoulders, Katherine tugged the hem down, oddly not shy in front of Jack. Or maybe that was just because she couldn’t fully see him, not until he slipped her bulky plastic frame glasses she only wore when necessary over her nose.
He pushed them up a little farther with a single finger. “No longer blind.”
Katherine gave him a small grateful smile, looking down at herself. She felt like she was coated in the world’s comfiest blankets. He was dressed similarly. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Good?”
She shook her head, not yet trusting herself to speak.
“Good,” Jack answered for her. “Let’s go back downstairs then and continue this party, shall we?”
Party? Following him out from Avril’s room, immediately Katherine’s gaze caught on the Queen’s vanity. A large planner folded to the month prior was laid out. Grabbing the heavy bound pages as she walked, she watched the muscles in Jack’s back move as they made their way to the living room. Blankets were spread over the cushions, the electric fireplace under the television on and pulsing with warm air.
“Sit,” Jack ordered, standing in front of the couch.
Not willing to argue, Katherine did as she was told.
Another blanket was draped over her. Pulling it to her chest, Jack smiled. He flopped down next to her, but not before reaching for the glass of water on the table. Handing it to her, he waited for her to take a long sip before putting it back.
“Not going to lie, I think I like these turns of events,” Jack groaned as he got comfortable. Raising the remote, the television flicked on.
His eyes narrowed toward her hands. “What do you have there?”
Oh. Katherine looked back down at her lap. Avril’s two-year planner still sat there. “I may have gone looking for you first at DuCain.”
“When?”
“Tonight.”
“Tonight?” Jack’s eyebrows raised.
“I didn’t find you, obviously. I needed to get out of the house, away from Emilie, who was also mad at me and I was mad at you so, it all sort of fit.”
He didn’t say anything, knowing that she had more.
“When I was there though, I ran into Nik and they told me that you weren’t really working anymore,” explained Katherine.
“I needed a break.”
She’d heard that one before from someone else in this house. But this time, tucked in on either side, she wasn’t as nervous to ask questions. “What do you mean?”
Jack shrugged a single shoulder as he glanced toward the television. His eyes worked side to side as if trying to figure out an answer himself. “Like I said before, when I found you earlier. You brought up a lot of questions for me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s a good thing,” Jack assured. “Or maybe it is. I don’t know. I just dropped a few shifts, is all, trying to figure it out. I called an old friend I used to live with and asked if he still knew anyone working in photography. I just got home from another smaller wedding today and walked into all this.”
“You mean the party without Avril?”
He nodded before running a hand down his face. “That’s the one. Pen seemed to take it upon herself to fill her shoes.”
To that, Katherine said nothing. She looked back down at Avril’s planner, opening it back up and skimming through the first few pages of her contact information and random names listed that made no sense to her. She never knew Avril had a public relations representative.
“You left before I came back out to see you in the hall,” Jack said.
Katherine replied with the first thing that came to mind. “You left me in the hall.”
“I did.” Jack paused, looking at her. “I wanted to make sure that Pen left before I talked to you. I told her to leave and take her friends she invited with her, minding of course that one of them was with you in that hallway.”
Mouth dry, Katherine nodded. Right. “You’re mad at me too.”
His eyes narrowed. “Why would you say that?”
“Because of
how you looked at me when I was with Devil.”
“I’m not mad at you.”
For some reason, she couldn’t believe that.
“Honestly, I would be the most hypocritical person in the world if I was mad at you, Kit. There is nothing wrong with wanting someone, even acting on it,” Jack breathed a sigh as his lip curled. “Even if it was Devil.”
“What is your problem with him?”
“I just don’t like the guy,” Jack said.
Katherine raised her eyebrows.
“He used to work at DuCain. He was the old me, in a sense. The big Dominant of DuCain who got the calls. The guy who made the money. He gave me a hard time when I started.”
“Is that all?”
“He was this asshole who thought he had everyone in the palm of his hand with a snap of his pudgy fingers,” Jack went on. He didn’t have to think long for insults. “He’s basically a trust-fund kid who wanted to turn bad when the rest of us are just this way, trying to live the best life we enjoyed or knew how. Luckily, he left only a little after I started. He unfortunately pops back in now and then whenever he gets bored and wants to ruin lives, I imagine.”
“Is his name really Devil?”
Jack rolled his eyes.
She’d take that as a no. “So after, you came back out into the hall for me?”
“I did.”
“And I wasn’t there.”
He nodded.
“I’m sorry,” Katherine said before she realized. “But you found me.”
“I did.”
“Thank you.”
He shook his head, waving the mention away. “At first, I thought maybe you didn’t want me to, but I just—I have this feeling sometimes, and you showed up here.”
“You were worried.”
He paused before he nodded.
“Thank you.”
“Stop.”
“I mean it,” Katherine said, and she did. She wasn’t sure what she would’ve done, what would’ve happened if he hadn’t shown up. Would she have let herself be pulled into Oliver at that party? Or would she have ended up outside for air, crawling home and crying on the pull-out couch, trying to be quiet so as not to wake Emilie?