Page 14 of Kiss Me Honey Honey (To Love a Psycho #2)

Chapter thirtee n

You’re So Vain

Aaron opened his door on Saturday to find Mel standing there, wide-eyed and brimming with sympathy. Dark hair swept into a messy ponytail, the ends dyed a bright blue matching the streaks in her eyeliner, she’d spruced up her usual grunge attire. With ripped jeans paired with a cropped leather jacket, and the faint scent of her vanilla vape clinging to her clothes, she took in the disarray of Aaron’s room.

Aaron himself.

He looked like shit. He knew that. His usually immaculate hair was unkempt, hoodie rumpled, and eyes bloodshot from too many sleepless nights and endless hours scrolling through his phone. Mel stepped inside without waiting for an invitation, shutting the door behind her as Aaron slumped back onto his bed, refusing to move.

The room emulated his state of mind. A mess. Clothes strewn across the floor, empty snack wrappers piled on the desk next to his unopened textbooks, and a laptop screen still displaying half-filled application forms for other universities. His phone sat on the bed beside him, buzzing occasionally with messages he had no intention of answering. Nor the very formal and fucking bland email from Dr Kenneth Lyons to discuss his academic progress.

Prick .

Mel perched on the chair at his desk, crossing her legs, and held out her vape. “Here. You look like you need this more than me.”

Aaron took it without a word, inhaling deeply and blowing out the smoke in a long exhale, not even bothering to open the window. The faint trace of vanilla filled the air. Self-destruction had become his coping mechanism of choice. If the halls kicked him out for breaking the rules, then at least he wouldn’t have to decide to leave on his own.

“How you doing?” Mel asked, tilting her neck in that almost-sibling motherly way.

“Fine.” Aaron checked out her outfit, noticing the deliberate effort she’d put into it. “You off somewhere?”

“Got a date.” She grinned.

“Lottie caved, huh?”

Mel rolled her eyes, though the corners of her mouth twitched. “She says it’s not a date, but we’re grabbing drinks, so…” She shrugged and took the vape back, inhaling a puff before continuing. “Let’s call it progress.”

“Good luck with that.”

Mel’s grin faltered. “Have you heard from Taylor?”

“No. Nor do I want to.”

“What happened? I’ve never seen you like this. You’re usually so…blasé about everything. Taylor must have really hurt you.”

Aaron snorted, bitterly. “Taylor didn’t even touch the sides.”

“Oh.” Mel frowned. “So why close yourself off in here? What’s going on? I mean, fuck, Aaron, even Dr Dishy Lyons has noticed.”

Aaron’s chest constricted at the mention of Kenny’s name, but he forced his face to stay neutral. “Has he spoken to you? ”

“Yeah. He called me down after a lecture to ask where you were.”

“And what did you tell him?”

“That you weren’t well.” She handed back the vape. “Don’t you have some sort of agreement about attendance? Won’t they penalise you or something?”

Aaron shrugged, taking another drag and holding the vapor in his lungs before exhaling. “Maybe.”

Mel sighed and her movement ruffled the mouse on his laptop to life, the screen illuminating the latest university website he’d been checking out. She gasped, then moved from the chair to sit beside him on his single bed.

She gestured to the laptop. “Are you looking to transfer?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

“Why?”

“I dunno. Things aren’t working out here.”

Mel went quiet for a moment, softening as she looked at Aaron slouched on the bed. Then, to his surprise, she rested her head on his chest. Her hair smelled faintly of vanilla vape and cheap conditioner, grounding him in the smallest of comforts.

“Don’t go,” she said, uncharacteristically earnest.

Aaron blinked, surprised, and absently dragged his hand through her ponytail, smoothing the blue-streaked strands. “Why not?”

Mel sat up. “Don’t transfer to some other university just because everything feels too heavy right now. This is where you belong. Your friends are here. I’m here. You’ve got roots here, even if you don’t think you do. Don’t rip them out because you’re scared.”

Aaron let out a bitter laugh. “I don’t have roots. I don’t even know what that looks like. And I’m not scared.”

“You do. And you are scared. Because you don’t recognise them. Want me to tell you what roots look like? They look like this.” She pointed at her own chest, then pouted. “Me, being upset if you’re not here. Because you matter. You’ve made a difference in my life, and I know that might not mean much to you, but it’s true.”

“I’m not sure I have.”

“You have.” Mel crossed her legs as if she were about to tell a story. “When I started here, I was this undecided, scared little thing. I didn’t know who I was, or if I even belonged. And then you come along, all sass and sarcasm, and you kinda showed me it’s okay to just…be myself.”

Aaron found it hard to believe all that. Having not meant anything to anyone before, nor had any real friends, and carted around so often, with a name change here and there, he’d had nothing more than fleeting, low-level acquaintances. He’d been close to Jayden for a while, a bloke from his half-way house in London, but that’d been more to do with being slung together through similar circumstances than anything else. And whilst he still got the occasional text from him, checking in every so often, Jayden’s life had moved on. Loved up and happy. He didn’t need Aaron’s shit. No one wanted it.

Especially not Kenny .

And Mel didn’t deserve it.

“Think you’re giving me too much credit.”

“Maybe. Or maybe you don’t see it because you’re too busy wallowing in self-loathing to notice.” She gave him a knowing look. “I know it’s been a crap year for you. First, that thing with Rahul. Then your counsellor turned out to be a murderer. Then the court case, and then you were stuck here over the summer by yourself. And now, people are dropping dead all over the place. Weird shit. I get it. But if you leave, sure, you might get to start again somewhere else, but you’ll also have to start over finding a friend as awesome as me.”

Aaron snorted, lips twitching in the faintest smile. “I think this place would be better off without me.”

“Why? Is it you killing everyone? ”

Aaron barked out a laugh at that, shaking his head. “No.” At least not intentionally. With his own hands. But maybe inadvertently. By association.

“Then why would it be better without you?”

Aaron sighed. “I don’t know. I’m…toxic. Everything I touch turns to shit.”

“That’s a load of crap. And you know what I think?”

“No, but I have a feeling you’re gonna tell me.”

“We’ve done a year and a bit of learning about behaviour, right? And I think this is exactly what Dr Lyons was talking about when he mentioned learned patterns of behaviour.” She pointed at him. “Life has taught you—through circumstance and shitty people—that the only way to deal with things is by yourself. That’s why you’re always trying to retreat, to close yourself off. It’s what you know. But just because that’s what you’ve learned doesn’t mean it’s the right way to handle things.”

“What’s the ‘right way’ then?”

“Lean on people who care about you. And I know that’s hard for you because you’ve had no one to lean on before. You do now. You’ve got me, for starters. And I’m not going anywhere, even if you are a stubborn pain in the bubble butt. But you have a great arse. Taylor was always commenting. So go shake it! Not for him. Not for anyone else. Just for you. Remember how you used to? Actually…” Mel then stood. “Up!”

“What?”

“You’re coming out. With me. To the bar.” She grabbed his arm, yanking him to his feet.

“You’re going on a date, Mel. And it’s not even with a bloke I can steal from you.”

“Ha ha.” She marched to his wardrobe and threw it open, rifling through his clothes. “Lottie already said this isn’t a date. So this can work both ways. One, if it’s not a date and you come with me, then I won’t make a fool of myself. And two, if she was only saying that, and she’s disappointed that you’re there, then I win.” She grinned over her shoulder.

“So all that stuff about this being for me…?”

“Was a lie.” She went back to rifling through his clothes. “You’re putting on something that doesn’t look like it’s been dragged through a gutter, and you’re going to look hot. End of discussion.”

Aaron groaned, but a faint glimmer of amusement tugged at his chest as he watched her rummage through his wardrobe. In her own way, she was right. Somewhere along the way, he’d lost touch with himself. Forgotten who he was. Or maybe he’d never really known. But there had been moments, hadn’t there? Times when he’d done things purely because they made him feel good. One of those things had always been dancing. If he were in London, he’d already be at Inferno, losing himself in the music and the energy of the crowd. So why was he here, wallowing in his room, obsessing over Kenny and Heather, when he could be out shaking his tail and remembering what it felt like to just be himself ?

Mel tossed him a crisp black button-up. “Wear this. And these.” She threw a pair of slim-fit jeans onto the bed, the ones that were more rip than denim.

By the time Mel finished fussing over him, fixing his hair, making him swap out his battered trainers for combat boots, Aaron barely recognised himself. He’d replaced the scruffy appearance he’d been favouring of late with someone who looked put together. Almost confident. The man he’d used to be.

Mel appraised her work with a satisfied nod. “Sexy as fuck.”

Aaron caught his reflection in the mirror, tilting his head and raking a hand through his quiff. Yeah. Sexy as fuck. He’d fuck him. But, then again, he wouldn’t let him. Because he was a tease.

Mel grabbed his hand and tugged him toward the door. “Everyone is gonna want a bit of you tonight! ”

They left his room where the first years on his floor were gathered in the communal area and downing their Bargain Booze efforts. But Mel looped her arm in with his to trudge across campus to the bar and dragged him through the crowd, weaving between groups of students shouting over the noise.

“There she is.” She nudged Aaron and grinned.

Lottie, perched at a high table near the back, sipped on a cocktail, smiled and waved as they approached. The dim lighting of the bar caught the golden undertones in her wavy shoulder-length blonde hair and her hazel eyes lined with a precise flick of eyeliner, faltered when she noticed Aaron.

So this had been a date.

“You didn’t mention you were bringing company,” Lottie said, tone carefully neutral, but her brow furrowed in disappointment.

Aaron propped himself against the table with a casual smirk. “Don’t mind me. I’m just here to enjoy the fine ambiance of sticky tables and cheap drinks.”

Mel shot Aaron a look, but turned back to Lottie with an exaggerated shrug. “He’s been holed up for days. Thought it’d do him good to get out. Besides, it’s not like this is a date, right?”

Lottie’s lips pressed into a thin line, her response delayed long enough for Mel to suppress a victorious grin.

“That’s what I thought,” Mel said breezily, falling onto a stool and motioning for Aaron to do the same. “What’re we drinking?”

Lottie’s initial tension melted away after a few rounds, and Aaron relaxed as the alcohol worked its way through his system. They laughed about Mel’s relentless pursuit of Lottie, swapped ridiculous student stories, and bemoaned the state of campus catering. It was almost…normal. How it should be. Not him seducing his professor, a man double his age and talking about deadly kissing and murder and Child fucking A .

When the conversation lulled, Mel tugged Aaron’s sleeve. “Let’s go downstairs.”

“The basement?”

“Club night, baby. It’s LGBT night! None of the straights will be in. Come on.”

Aaron knew exactly why Mel wanted to go down to club night. So she could make a move on Lottie. But because she’d been so kind as to drag him out of his hovel, he agreed, and the three of them drank up and made their way to the stairs which led to the union club.

The bass thudded louder as they descended and the air grew hotter, thicker, the room a haze of coloured lights and bodies moving in sync with the music. Yeah. This is where he belonged. Hidden among the sea of bodies. And the three of them stepped onto the dance floor where Aaron let the music envelop him. The bass vibrate through him, and the beat churn in his veins. Exactly how he liked it. Loud. Mind numbing. He closed his eyes, tilting his head back as he moved, swaying and twisting with a fluidity he hadn’t felt in months.

He let go.

And danced like the whole world was watching. Every roll of his hips, every sway of his shoulders, every deliberate gyration steeped in a confidence he hadn’t realised he’d lost. And though eyes lingered and whispers followed, none of it mattered. This was for him. Only him.

Heat clung to his skin, beads of sweat tracing paths down his neck and back and the press of bodies around him, faceless and nameless, added to the intoxicating rush. The pulsing bass reverberated in his chest, drowning out every thought but the beat. He closed his eyes, surrendering to the rhythm, and for the first time in weeks, the knot of tension that had taken root inside him loosened.

This was why he danced. Why he loved it. Because here, beneath the lights and the music, he found freedom. The kind that stripped away the weight of everything else. The kind that gave him back the control he so desperately craved. Every movement reminded him he was alive, that there was something in him no one could take.

And for now, that was enough.

When Aaron opened his eyes, the music’s rhythm thrumming in his chest, he caught Mel and Lottie in the throng, wrapped up in each other, arms entwined, eyes locked with a kind of unspoken connection that made the world around them vanish. Despite everything swirling inside him, it made him smile. A fleeting, bittersweet curve of his lips. How great would that feel? To dance with someone while falling in love?

He twisted on the spot, sweeping his gaze over the sea of bodies, lights flashing across moving forms. Stupidly, idiotically, he caught himself searching. For a man. For the man. The one he shouldn’t have been thinking about. And the memory clawed its way back, sharp and relentless. The first time. The pull, the heat, the intensity of Kenny watching him across the crowded floor at Inferno, capturing him and putting him under his spell when it had meant to be the other way around. But that was before he’d known how Kenny would drag him into this maelstrom of misery, confusion, and tormenting vulnerability. All because of one thing—one thing that had built him up and torn him down in equal measure.

It had to be love, didn’t it? What he was feeling. This horrendous ache .

The thought seared through him like acid. Love. Unwanted. Uninvited. That’s what had done this to him. Stripped him of his armour he’d spent years building. Stalking Kenny had meant to be a game. A shadowy indulgence to feed his darker cravings. And that one reckless, lust-soaked night in Inferno had supposed to have been nothing more than a tease. A taunt to satisfy his need for control. But now, here he was, eyes scanning the crowd for a trace of him. For a ghost of what they’d shared. He knew better. He knew what love had already cost him. Yet still, it pulled him under, merciless and unrelenting.

He thought about crying.

Would anyone notice? Everyone was too wrapped up in their own lives to care how he was unravelling right there on the dancefloor. People had died because others hadn’t noticed, so what would it matter if he shed a tear?

But there was someone watching him. There, on the edge of the dance floor.

Taylor .

Their eyes locked, and Aaron’s pulse shot through him like a live wire. Of course Taylor would be here. This was his night. He ran the society that made money from these events. The unofficial king of LGBT nights, standing over the crowd like it was his own private yacht party and everyone else was just along for the ride. Insufferably vain , Taylor looked every bit the golden boy he always did. But his expression was different this time. Less polished arrogance, more raw emotion as surprise flickered across his face, chased by a flash of anger, and, beneath it all, a shadow of something darker. Despair.

For the first time, Taylor didn’t look untouchable. He looked like he was drowning.

Good .

Without thinking, Aaron turned back into the throng of dancers, jaw tightening as he refused to let Taylor see even a hint of hesitation. Or for him to think Aaron’s anguish was about him. He shouldn’t be allowed to drug him, or even know that one of his friends had, and not expect consequences . So he set eyes on the nearest man, a tall guy with dark curls and a loose button-down already damp from the heat of the room, and grabbed him by the waist, pulling him closer.

The guy responded instantly, hands finding Aaron’s hips and they moved together. Aaron let his body take over, grinding provocatively, every shift and roll designed to draw attention. He tipped his head back, eyes fluttering shut as he let the music guide him, Taylor’s stare burning into him.

After a while, he noticed the bloke’s lips curve into the shape of a kiss, leaning in as if it was inevitable. But as the space between them closed, Kenny flashed through Aaron’s mind. Uninvited, yet always there. This time, though, it wasn’t desire that followed the memory, it was a warning.

“A kiss is disarming,” Kenny’s voice echoed in his head. “It’s vulnerable. You never expect death to come from something so… intimate.”

Intimacy. That’s what he had with Kenny. Real, raw, and terrifying in its depth. He didn’t even need his kiss to feel it. Because it was in every glance, every breath they shared. And, fuck, he wanted that back.

The thought hit him harder than it should’ve, cutting through the alcohol-fuelled haze and the thrum of music. So Aaron shoved the bloke away, the heat of the moment dissolving into frustration. His heart pounded, not from lust, but from something far more dangerous. Need.

He pushed his way through the crowd, leaving the kiss, the stranger, and his own emptiness behind. Now he’d even lost this . The chance to dance and fuck with strangers, leaving Kenny as the only thing that could ever fill his hollow void.

But Kenny didn’t want him.