Page 9

9

MASON

I was at the gym, flat on my back doing chest presses, and I couldn’t get Kai’s face out of my mind. His eyes, his cheeks, his lips—and the taste of him still lingering on my tongue. I grunted and pushed the weight up hard, hoping I could shove the memory out of me. No such luck.

What the hell had I been thinking? Kai was an arrogant, rich, know-it-all, and he annoyed the shit out of me. I didn’t like men. I especially didn’t like him. If I were going to be into men—which I wasn’t—it sure as hell wouldn’t be Kai Jacinto.

Not that he wasn’t good-looking. His face was all clean lines and precision, his brows dark and sharp, his eyes so damn intense. His nose gave him this serious, noble air. And his lips—fuller than they looked. I would know. I flushed just thinking about it. The point was, you didn’t have to be gay to admit someone was attractive.

I caught myself wondering, again, if he’d looked that good in high school or if it had taken time for his features to settle like that. Then—bam—a flash hit me. Kai, staring up at me, eyes wide and scared, my arm pinning him back against a wall. I dropped the weight back into the rack suddenly, the clang echoing in my ears.

Where the hell had that come from? I couldn’t call up any other details, but the image felt real. Too real. Kai had looked afraid, and I’d felt...what? Something hot and sharp in my chest. Like I needed to prove something. Needed to make him squirm.

Jesus. I wiped sweat from my forehead. Dana had said I’d bullied him. Was she right? Did I really do that to him?

The idea made my stomach turn. I probably owed him another apology. Definitely did. But I wasn’t looking forward to giving it—especially when Kai clearly couldn’t stand the sight of me.

But then, that kiss. He’d kissed me back. No matter how much he hated me, he hadn’t pulled away. That had to mean something. Didn’t it?

Or maybe not. Hell, me kissing him didn’t make any sense either. But I’d been overheated. Adrenaline crashing through my system. Looking for a release.

That kind of thing happened in the military sometimes. It didn’t mean you liked men, just that you needed to feel someone human. Your usual options weren’t there, so you reached for the next warm body.

That had to be it. Maybe I’d felt sorry for Kai. Maybe the memory of high school had stirred something in me, and I’d acted on impulse. Maybe it had been a pity kiss.

Since when have you ever pity kissed anyone ? my brain whispered.

I ignored it and gripped the bar again, trying to focus. I pushed the weight up again, and my phone buzzed. With a sigh, I lowered the weight and fished my phone out of my pocket. I had a text from Kai.

KAI

Mason, I need you

I found him standing inside the grocery store entrance, one arm folded across his chest, the other clutching his phone. His knuckles were white, and he looked pale. He was in workout clothes too, but his shorts were a lot shorter than mine, and they showed off the long, lean muscles of his thighs.

His eyes went wide when he saw me, and I walked fast to reach him. I had the impulse to pull him into a hug, but I stopped myself. He looked freaked out, but that didn’t mean he wanted comfort from me. Not that kind, anyway.

“My car’s out there,” he said, nodding towards the doors. “I couldn’t bring myself to get inside it and drive home.”

“That’s probably for the best,” I said. “Do you want to stay in here while I take a look?”

He hesitated, then shook his head. “No. I’ll—I’ll come with you.”

Trying to seem like he wasn’t rattled. I’d seen it before. He didn’t need to come, but I nodded. “Cool, that could be helpful.”

He kept looking around as we walked out of the store. He’d parked close to the entrance, so we reached his car quickly. I took in the cracked windshield, the giant rock nestled in it, and the otherwise untouched car. I walked around the vehicle, crouched down to check underneath, then asked him to pop the trunk.

“What are you looking for?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” I said. “Just…”

“A feeling?” he cut in with a dry, humorless laugh.

He’d wrapped both arms around himself now. Not from the cold—hell, it was still seventy degrees out. It was fear, plain and simple.

“I guess,” I admitted.

Honestly, I didn’t expect to find anything on the car. Why bother with a tracker when the stalker already knew where he lived and worked? And explosives? Too risky. Whoever was doing this was focused on psychological damage, not collateral. Not yet, anyway.

I leaned over and peered at the rock in the windshield. It was huge, jagged. A piece of clear tape fluttered off one side of it in the breeze. My stomach dropped.

“Was something taped to this?” I asked.

Kai’s face twisted, and I didn’t think he was going to answer. But then he reached into the pocket of his shorts and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper, thrusting it at me.

“Can you open it?” I asked. “The fewer people who touch it, the better. Cops might want to check it for prints.”

He grimaced. “I don’t want the cops to see this.”

“Why not?”

He just stared at me. I sighed. It wasn’t worth fighting about. Not right now, anyway.

“Okay. But it’d still be helpful for me not to touch it. Can you show me what it says?”

He grumbled but unfolded the note. He held it out to me, and I leaned closer, squinting under the bluish parking lot lights. The message was typed.

Stop the center, or I’ll show the world what you did.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Why don’t you want the cops to see it?”

He hunched his shoulders. “I just…don’t.”

He was obviously lying, but I didn’t want to argue with him about it. He was in shock, and I could tell he wasn’t thinking clearly.

So I nodded and said, “Okay. Fold it back up. When we get home, you can put it in a Ziploc bag to keep it safe.”

And to keep him from touching it anymore, but I didn’t add that part.

Kai looked at me and asked, “Home?”

“Your home, I mean. It’ll be a while, since who knows how long it’ll take for the cops to get here, but I promise, I will get you home safely.”

He shook his head. “I don’t want to call the police.”

That was a line I wasn’t willing to budge on. “Kai, we have to. This is a crime. Even if it weren’t connected to everything else, it’s destruction of your personal property. It needs to be reported. Your insurance is going to want to see the paperwork before they’ll pay for a new windshield.”

Honestly, he was rich enough he could just buy a new car. Buy ten new cars. But still, we needed to report this.

His arms were still tight around himself, and I saw him shiver. “I can’t, Mason. Not tonight. I can’t handle going over everything again. It’s too much.”

“That’s the exact reaction your stalker is trying to provoke. They want you to feel hopeless. Helpless. You can’t give into that.”

“Can’t I?” he shot back. “You don’t know what it’s like, living every day waiting for the other shoe to drop. Wondering if today is the day someone crazy decides your time on earth is over.”

“I know more about that than you think,” I said quietly.

“Well, maybe I’m not as strong as you are,” he said. “This is fucking with my head. I know I’m supposed to do everything by the book, but right now, I’m this close to losing it, and if I have to go sit in Detective Myers’s office again tonight, I will scream.”

Honestly, that was fair. Myers had the emotional range of drywall—and coming from me, that was saying something.

I watched Kai closely. He did look close to the edge. Pale, tight-lipped, his hands twitching like he couldn’t settle. He wasn’t going to be able to think clearly until he got some rest.

“Okay,” I said finally. “Alright. We don’t have to call them tonight. Let’s get you home.”

He gave me a skeptical look. “Really? No snide comments about how you can’t trust me to call them unless I’m standing right in front of you?”

“I’m not being snide when I say that,” I told him. “I’m being practical. And I don’t need to say it, because I’m not letting you out of my sight tonight. I’m staying over, and we can call them together in the morning.”

It wasn’t quite as simple as that, of course. Kai objected to me staying at his house, though not as hard as I expected. He must have been more shaken than he let on. Still, it took us a while to get there. He didn’t want to drive his car, and he didn’t want me driving it either, so we had to call a town car to pick us up.

Once we got home—his home, not mine, I reminded myself—he still wouldn’t settle. He paced the whole first floor while I unpacked his groceries. I was horrified by the state of his kitchen. Not messy—just barren. His shopping choices were pure chaos. Milk but no coffee. Bread, but nothing to go on it. Eggs, but no oil, butter, or pan spray. A whole frozen chicken, but no sides. Very ‘ grocery list assembled during a low blood sugar episode .’

I made him sit and eat the sandwich he’d bought. He only got through half before claiming he was full. Fine. I was starving, so I finished the rest myself.

Eventually, I convinced him to go upstairs and lie down. He said he wouldn’t be able to sleep, and maybe he wouldn’t, but I told him to rest anyway. “Give your body whatever rest you can. I learned a long time ago that something is better than nothing when it comes to sleep.”

He eyed me warily. “Where are you going to sleep?”

That glare—like he thought I might try to crawl into his bed with him. I sighed. “On the couch.”

“There aren’t any sheets. Only one blanket. I have a guest room upstairs.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“There aren’t even real pillows down here. You can’t sleep on throw pillows all night.”

“I’ve slept in way worse situations than this. Compared to some of the places I’ve stayed, your couch is the Hilton.”

I meant it, though I didn’t lie down right away. Even after Kai went up with Bella, I stayed downstairs. The house was dark, no light from under his bedroom door. I walked the perimeter, checking windows, sitting silently near the front and back, watching the shadows.

Nothing moved. But I still couldn’t relax. And when I finally drifted off, it was into a restless sleep full of dark dreams and accusing eyes, a gnawing sense of failure gripping me like a vice.

The next morning, we were back in the same windowless interview room with Detective Myers, going over everything that had happened the night before.

“You left the car in the parking lot?” Myers asked.

Kai’s tone turned defensive. “I didn’t know what else to do.”

“We didn’t want to touch it until you had a chance to look it over,” I added.

“That’s all well and good,” Myers said, “but it would have been helpful if you’d called us last night, instead of letting it sit where anyone could get to it.”

Before either of us could respond, Officer Branscombe walked in carrying a cardboard carrier full of Starbucks coffees. “Whew. Coffee machine’s still broken, so I had to make a run. Brought extra cream and sugar—wasn’t sure how you guys take yours.”

She smiled brightly, setting the carrier on the table, but her warmth made my guard go up. Myers played the hard-ass, and she was the soft touch. Good cop, bad cop—even if we weren’t suspects, I’d seen the dynamic enough to know it by heart.

“Bunch of high school kids in line in front of me,” she said as she handed out the coffees. “Not sure why they weren’t in school. You should’ve seen what some of the girls were wearing. Crop tops, bra straps showing, ass cheeks hanging out of their shorts. Not that the boys were better. Looked like they rolled right out of bed. I guess I’m officially old, because seriously, how do their parents let them out of the house dressed like that?”

Branscombe shot a glance at Myers as she slid into her seat. “Bet you’re grateful your daughter doesn’t dress like that. Or your son. Speaking of which, how are your—”

“My son is fine,” Myers said, flat and sharp. “Now can we get back to business, please?”

Branscombe rolled her eyes at me and Kai, like she wanted us to know that she knew that he was being a dick—and that she was so much nicer by comparison. But all she said was, “Sure thing, boss.”

It was a good act. Old-school, but effective. Let Myers play the cold and procedural one and make us more grateful for Branscombe’s youth and approachability. They’d probably split up later to give us some time alone with Branscombe, see if they could shake anything new loose. But for now, we had to get through this interview.

“As I was telling Mr. Jacinto and Mr. Clark,” Myers continued, “we’ll send a team out to check out the car. We’ll let you know when we’re done, so you can hire a towing service.”

He looked between us. “Anything else you want to tell us about last night?”

I thought about the note on the rock and glanced at Kai. But he shook his head.

“No, I think that’s everything,” he said.

“And you still don’t have any idea who might be behind this?” Myers pressed. “None of your friends or associates acting oddly? No one reaching out to reconnect out of the blue? This kind of person usually wants to see the results of their efforts.”

Kai shrugged helplessly. “No one that I can think of.”

He shot me a glance, one I couldn’t interpret. Was he asking for backup? Or pointing out, not so subtly, that I was the only one who’d shown up unexpectedly in his life recently?

I didn’t respond. Just gave Myers the blankest face I could manage.

Myers sighed and nodded. “Well, like I said, we’ll do what we can. Please keep us informed if you think of anything else.”

Branscombe walked us to the front of the station, and I mentally congratulated myself for my prediction.

“I don’t know if Myers mentioned this,” she said as we moved towards the doors, “but I checked the CCTV footage at the theater. The cameras weren’t pointed directly at you when the attack occurred. You can see the commotion at the edge of two different cameras, but that’s about it. And unfortunately, they don’t catch anyone sprinting for the exits or acting suspiciously.” She grimaced. “I’ll be honest—the footage is grainy enough that it’d be hard to make out anyone’s face, even if you had been standing front and center.”

“Thanks,” I said. “We appreciate you checking anyway.”

“Yeah,” Kai echoed. “Thanks.”

She looked at us hopefully. Waiting for one of us to suddenly spill our guts, probably. But it didn’t happen, and with a little sigh and a wave, she walked away.

Kai was quiet as we stepped outside, but after a moment, he turned to me and said, “I don’t think I said it last night, but thank you. I know I wasn’t exactly polite when you left yesterday. I wouldn’t have blamed you if you didn’t want to deal with me again.”

“It’s fine,” I said. “I don’t mind.”

“Really?” He arched an eyebrow. “We haven’t exactly had the most…cordial interactions. I didn’t think you liked me.”

I wondered if he was thinking about the kiss, or the fight before it. Or after it. Or any of the other conversations we’d had so far.

“It doesn’t matter whether I like you or not. It was the right thing to do.”

“Ah,” he said. There was something in his expression I couldn’t read, but it vanished before I could figure it out. “Just doing your duty?”

“Something like that.”

I wasn’t the most honorable guy. I was working on it, though. I knew I’d never make up for everything, but that didn’t mean I got to stop trying.

“Well, I guess this is goodbye,” Kai said, pulling out his phone to summon a car. “Unless you want a ride back to Georgetown with me.”

I tilted my head. “What are you talking about? Of course I’m going back to Georgetown with you.”

“Why?” he asked. “I don’t know where you live, but you’re closer to a Metro station here than where I live.”

“I live in Columbia Heights,” I told him, “but that doesn’t matter. I’m going back to your place and staying there.”

“What? Why?”

“Because you’re in danger. And I’m not leaving until I know you’re safe.”

That wasn’t that simple either, obviously. Kai objected, but I pointed out he’d already called a security service last night. He was going to have a bodyguard either way, and I wasn’t leaving until the other one showed up.

Kai argued that he had to go to work. That he couldn’t be a prisoner in his own home.

“Fine,” I told him. “I’ll go to work with you.”

He gave me an incredulous look. “Don’t you at least want to change out of your workout clothes?”

I gave my armpit a quick, discreet sniff. Not great, but not awful either. “I’m fine for now. I’ll have Dana drop some clothes off later.”

He glared at me. “I don’t get it, Mason. Are you trying to make up for high school? I thought you said you couldn’t remember any of it.”

I winced. I couldn’t stop thinking about that vision—the one of me pushing him against a wall, his eyes wide and scared.

“Some of it might be coming back,” I admitted.

He looked surprised. “Like what?”

“It’s hard to explain,” I said. “But are we going to stand outside the police station all morning, or do you have things to do?”

Kai sighed as the car pulled up. “Fine. Get in, if you insist.”

The morning wasn’t efficient, not by any stretch. We went back to Georgetown first so he could let Bella out and grab his briefcase. Then we took another car to his office.

The receptionist’s eyes went wide when she saw me walk in with him.

“Told you I knew him,” I said, grinning.

Kai rolled his eyes. “Don’t get too comfortable.”

There was no danger of that. His corner office had a leather sofa, but it was off to the side and impractical for what I had in mind. I grabbed the only other chair in the room—a swivel chair from hell that squeaked every time it moved—and dragged it over near the door.

I planted myself in it, five feet from the entrance and ten from his desk. It jabbed me in the kidneys, offered no back support, and sank every time I adjusted the height. But I stayed put.

“What are you doing?” Kai asked, glancing over his computer.

“Sitting.”

“I can see that,” he said. “But why there? The view’s nicer by the windows.”

“From here, I can see anyone who comes into the room. And I can put myself between them and you, if necessary.” I frowned at the windows. “Have you considered moving to a different office until this is all over? I don’t like all that glass behind you.”

He tossed a pen down on his desk and gave me a long look. “Okay, what is this? Do you miss the Army? Is this an excuse to play the hero and reenact your days overseas?”

“No,” I said sharply. “It’s me taking the threat against you seriously, even if you refuse to. And I was in the Marines. Not the Army.”

“Oh, pardon me. My mistake.” Kai shot a look over his shoulder at the windows, then back at me. “But I seriously doubt my stalker hired a sniper to take me out from two office buildings away.”

“You never know.”

He rolled his eyes—again—but didn’t argue. In fact, he barely spoke to me the rest of the day. He had two meetings, both in his office, both with employees who threw me wary glances and wisely said nothing when he told them to ignore me.

I kept myself busy. Texted Dana to bring some of my clothes over to Kai’s place that evening. Ordered groceries to be delivered too, since his kitchen was a barren wasteland. And I started researching security systems—how many cameras we’d need, where they should go, what kind of window sensors made the most sense, and which companies had the best monitoring services. I’d need his sign-off eventually, of course, but by the time the workday wound down, I felt confident I could turn his house into something that at least approximated secure. Whether he cared or not, I would sleep better knowing I’d done it.

At some point, he took a call from the security company he’d contacted the day before. He didn’t tell me who it was, but I wasn’t an idiot—it wasn’t hard to figure out what was happening from the bits of his side of the conversation I overheard.

“Yes, thanks for calling back… I appreciate it, but I think I’ve wasted your time… Yeah, no, it turns out I don’t need… Right, no, I understand. But in this case… Mm-hmm. Right… Yeah, thanks. But I think I’m all set.”

When he hung up, he glanced over at me. I couldn’t read his face. Still couldn’t tell if he’d decided I wasn’t as awful as he thought, or if he was just keeping me around because he wanted someone to yell at until this was all over.

The ride back to his house was quiet, and we pulled up right as the grocery delivery guy was dropping bags off on the front steps. Kai stared like he’d never seen food before.

“What’s all this?” he asked.

“Food,” I said, grabbing the bags. “Your kitchen situation is too depressing for words. If I’m staying here, I’m going to eat real food.”

Bella practically danced around my feet as I brought the bags inside, her nose twitching like crazy. I could feel her tail whapping against my leg as she nosed one of the bags.

“Sorry, girl,” I said, lifting it out of reach and setting it on the counter. “No kale for you.”

“You ordered kale?” Kai asked, eyebrows lifting.

“What?” I said, pulling out produce—grapes, oranges, tomatoes, garlic. “You act like that’s shocking.”

“I just… I don’t know. I guess I’m surprised it’s something you eat.”

Heat prickled in my chest. I reminded myself I was here to protect him, not start fights. Still, every time I thought we were getting somewhere, his attitude slapped me in the face again.

“Why?” I asked tightly. “Because I’m too poor? Or because I’m too stupid?”

“Forget it,” he said. “Order whatever you want. I’m going upstairs to work some more.”

Fine by me. The less I saw him, the less chance he’d get under my skin. Not that he wasn’t already there. At this point, he was practically building a two-story vacation house under my ribs.

If you dislike him so much, why’d you move in with him?

I ignored the thought and turned my attention to the food. If Kai thought I didn’t know what to do with kale, I’d prove him wrong. I’d cook the best damn dinner I could and make him eat his words with a side of lemon-herb chicken.

An hour later, I set two plates on the corner of the dining table and called up to tell him dinner was ready.

He came down looking suspicious, like he didn’t recognize the scent of herbs and garlic. Bella followed close behind him, tongue out, eyes pleading, even though she’d already gotten her dinner.

“What did you make?” he asked, eyeing the spread like it might explode.

“Lemon herb chicken piccata,” I said. “Over creamy pasta. With kale.”

If he noticed the jab, he didn’t comment on it.

“You didn’t have to cook for me,” he said instead.

“I wasn’t going to make all this and then not invite you. Just sit and eat.”

I’d set the plates so we didn’t have to look directly at each other. It was still awkward, but manageable. We ate in silence for a while. I caught him sneaking a few surprised looks at his plate, like he couldn’t believe it tasted good.

“What are these?” he asked finally, spearing a little green sphere. “Some kind of pea?”

“Capers,” I said. “You’ve never had them?”

“I don’t really cook.” He shrugged.

“You don’t have to cook to know what capers are. They’re classic rich people food. I can’t believe you’ve never heard of them.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” he said flatly.

I was starting to realize that despite the amount of money he clearly had, Kai didn’t spend much of it on himself. He certainly wasn’t spending it on gourmet meals, not if the moldy takeout I’d seen was any indication.

We finished the meal without another word. Afterwards, he helped carry dishes to the kitchen. I found out fast that he didn’t know how his dishwasher worked. I handed him the job of storing leftovers, only to learn he didn’t own a single storage container. So we dumped the food into Ziplocs. I made a mental note to add containers to the next grocery list.

We didn’t talk much, but the cleanup had its own kind of rhythm. Shared work built camaraderie—even something small, like cleaning up after dinner. By the time we were done, Kai had even stopped glaring at me like I was a roach in his cereal.

He was heading for the stairs when I called out, “Hey, actually, I wanted to talk to you.”

He turned, one eyebrow lifting. “That sounds ominous.”

“It’s not. But I wanted to follow up on some of the things the cops said.”

I walked over to the couch and sat, trying to look relaxed. Kai hesitated, then sat at the other end. Bella flopped on the floor between us with a little sigh.

“Okay…” Kai said, eyeing me warily.

“You keep saying you can’t think of anyone who might be behind this—”

“I can’t,” he interrupted.

“I know. But I wanted to take you through the process again.”

“What, you wanna play detective now too?”

“No. But I’ve got experience getting information from people who are sure they don’t know anything. Sometimes asking on a different day, or having a different person ask, can yield the intelligence you need.”

“Jesus, what were you, a spy? An assassin?” Kai scoffed. “‘ Yield the intelligence you need .’ Who talks like that?”

I reminded myself that I was trying to help him, not throttle him, and said, “Humor me, would you?”

He let out a long, dramatic sigh, clearly putting on a show about how little he wanted to participate. But eventually, he said, “Fire away.”

“Okay, let’s start with your family. You’re still on good terms with both your parents?”

“Yes.”

“Do either of them have any enemies?”

He stared at me like I’d asked if they’d taken up naked skydiving. “Enemies? You realize how insane you sound, right? Normal people don’t have enemies.”

“Your dad’s a congressman, isn’t he? Could this be the work of one of his political opponents? Or a disgruntled coworker? Or some crazy person who dislikes your mom? She’s still on TV, right?”

“Yes to both,” he said slowly, “but no, no crazies in their lives, as far as I know.”

“As far as you know? Have you even told them what’s going on?”

He shifted uncomfortably. “No. I don’t want to worry them.”

I just looked at him.

“What? You tell your parents everything that happens in your life?”

“I’m not currently being stalked,” I said, but I let it go. The truth was, I barely spoke to my folks outside of holidays and birthdays these days. Our home life had been unstable when I was in high school and it hadn’t gotten any better since then. Dana had more of a relationship with them than I did.

I moved on. “What about you? Any disgruntled coworkers? Former employees?”

“Again, not that I know of.” He spread his hands. “I really have been through all of this already with the police.”

“You really don’t think there’s anyone you’ve worked with who might hold a grudge?” I pressed. “You run a big company. I’m sure you’ve had to fire someone who didn’t take it well.”

“Not really,” he said. “The only person I can think of is my ex-partner, Brent Garrick. But he owes me for not taking him to court. He wouldn’t do this.”

“What did he do that you could’ve taken him to court for?”

“Embezzled company profits,” Kai said, tone flat. “I found out before he could do too much damage. But we were about to go public. I didn’t want a news story breaking about instability between the founders, so I replaced what he stole with my own funds.”

“Is that legal?”

“We were still private at the time. No shareholders to report to. It was the cleanest way to handle it. And Brent knows he got off easy. He wouldn’t push things like this.”

“Alright. How about your personal life? Any old friends you had a falling out with? Exes? Relationships that ended badly? Even if it was years ago, it could still be relevant.”

“You want my entire relationship history now?” Kai asked. “Should I throw in my social security number too?”

“Just answer the question.”

He sighed. “No. No ex-friends plotting revenge, no ex-boyfriends trying to make my life hell. I’m on decent terms with everyone I’ve dated. Except one guy, but trust me, he’s not behind this.”

“Why not? Who is he?”

“His name’s Kevin, and we dated junior year of college. Ten years ago.”

“Some people hold grudges a long time.”

“Yeah, but he went through ‘ conversion therapy ’ after school.” His tone dripped venom around those words. “Found God. Disavowed his former life. It’s not him.”

“That sounds exactly like someone who would have an axe to grind,” I said.

“It’s not him,” Kai snapped.

“How can you know that?”

“I just do, okay? God.” He leaned back, exasperated. “I’ve been through all of these questions already, and I have no more idea who might be behind this now than I did when it started. Why can’t you let it drop?”

“Because the answer has to be in your past,” I said firmly.

“Maybe it’s not.” His voice rose. “You’re the one who told the police they should be looking into hate groups and extremists. Maybe this whole thing isn’t my fault, actually.”

“I never said it was your fault—”

“Didn’t you?” he said, turning on the couch to face me. “God, you’re as arrogant as always. Either I brought this on myself by firing someone or being a shitty boyfriend, or I brought it on myself by being gay and existing.”

“I never fucking said that,” I shot back, sliding towards him, pointing a finger at his chest. “And if you think I’m arrogant, take a long look in the mirror. Maybe you brought this on by being a prick.”

“Then fucking go home,” he shouted, leaning towards me now too. “I didn’t invite you here, you just barged into my life and refused to leave.”

“Because you refuse to take this seriously,” I growled. “One minute it’s, ‘ Mason, I need your help, someone threw a rock at my car ,’ and the next, you act like I’m the bad guy for suggesting you should take basic safety precautions. At least make up your fucking mind.”

“Well gee, Mason, I’m sorry,” he said with a bitter laugh. “Sorry for not having a textbook, crystal clear reaction to someone threatening to kill me. My apologies if it’s taking me a minute to adjust. Not all of us spent the past decade shooting at people and being shot at in return.”

“Attempting to kill you,” I corrected through gritted teeth. “Not just threatening. Attempting. This is exactly what I mean—you keep pretending it’s less than it is.”

“And you still won’t explain why you can’t let it go,” he shot back.

“Explain?” I surged forward, grabbing him by the shoulders. “You want me to fucking explain?”

I stared at him, furious and helpless, just wanting him to see—to get it . And then, all of a sudden, Kai’s lips were on mine.