Dead of Summer - Page 123

“I’m not going to knock you off the branch, Summer,” Kayde informs me, voice withering. “I am, however, seriously considering how I could fuck you up here.”

Yet again, I’m glad he can’t see the flush in my face. “I’d say maybe we shouldn’t, since I think I missed some blood during my shower,” I admit in a small voice. “But uh, I guess that’s not much of a turnoff for you, is it?”

Kayde is silent for longer than I expect, and when he moves, it’s simply to open his arms and gesture for me to lean forward. I don’t even have time to think before my body just…responds. Before I know it, I’m leaning into him; his arms wrap around my torso and scoot me forward until my body is flush against his. “You can relax, baby girl,” Kayde promises me in a soft murmur, his breath tickling my ear. “I won’t let you fall, and I won’t let anything happen to you.”

“Why is all this shit happening this week?” I whisper, my hands clutched in his shirt. I squeeze my eyes shut and hate how much better this feels, and how much warmer I feel instantly. As if it hadn’t been the weather at all, but the lack of Kayde’s touch.

I really can’t be this hung up on him already.

I really, really can’t.

“Because bad things come in clusters,” Kayde answers reasonably. “Not always, but sometimes. And by the way, Kinsley asked me to tell you that Liza texted her.” I hold my breath as he pauses, and find comfort in the soft motion of his fingers on my exposed shoulders rubbing small, soothing circles on my skin. “Emily is going to be okay. She has a broken arm, cracked ribs, and a concussion. She’ll need surgery, but she’ll be fine, okay?”

Suddenly I let out a breath I feel like I’ve been holding for hours, and the rest of me gives in to sag against Kayde. “Fuck,” I mutter, eyes closed hard. “That’s…okay, at least she’ll be fine. At least she’s…” Alive sounds so morbid, so I don’t say it.

“Would you like me to remind Shawn why we don’t talk to kids about dangerous trails? Explain to him why we don’t show them where they are?” His voice is cold, and while I doubt he cares about Emily, it means something that he’s willing to do it because it means something to me.

I move just enough to stare up at him, trying to read his expression. “No,” I say at last, shaking my head. “No, it was a stupid mistake. He feels bad about it.”

“Does he?” Kayde’s brows rise incredulously, and he pins me with his gaze. “Does he, Summer?”

No.

The word echoes in my mind with no hesitation, but I press my lips together and refuse to let it come out of my mouth. Shawn doesn’t feel bad. Shawn doesn’t care. His performance earlier for Kinsley and me had seemed genuine, sure, but I cannot force myself to believe that he actually cares about what happened. Even if he’d taken the blame, admitted it was his fault, and begged us not to hate him for almost getting Emily killed.

It had felt so real, and so genuine, that I’m starting to think I’m an asshole for not believing him or accepting that he does actually care about the kids at Camp Crestview.

“We’ve got to figure out the Grey situation,” I mumble instead of answering his question. I can feel his arms on me, and when Kayde shifts to nudge my face upward to his, I let him.

“I can help you with that.” His lips brush mine on every word, and I suck in a lungful of air from the oxygen we’re sharing between us. “I have some ideas on how to get him to leave. And a few for if he doesn’t take the hint.”

“You’d do that?” Hope blooms in my chest, and I clutch onto his shirt more tightly. “You’re not afraid of him?”

That gets me another round of the look, before he scoffs in indignation. “I’m not afraid of an eighteen-year-old baby of a killer, no. Did you see him before? He was terrified of me. He may hide it okay, but if I put pressure on him, I think he’ll leave.” The confidence and arrogance in his tone seems to drip from every word, but I find that this time, I don’t mind. Him being so confident makes me worry a little less. “But tell me, sweetheart…” He nips my lower lip, surprising me into a gasp. “What do I get for it?”

What does he get for it? I blink once, then again, baffled at his question. “You get, uh, karma points?” I offer weakly. “Which, given the rest of your shit, I’d think you’d want.”

“I’m not interested in karma. Divine or otherwise,” my sociopath assures me with another soft bite.

It’s hard to think straight when he does that. Especially when his hands massage my hips and pull my shirt up a bit so he can touch the skin beneath it. “What do you want?” I breathe at last. “You know I’ll give you anything, Kayde. I always do.” I give him everything, my brain corrects, but I recoil from the thought because I’m definitely not ready to face it. Not yet.

“Simple. I want you to love me.” The words have me pulling back, and I stare at him with wide eyes. “Will you love me, sweetheart?” He leans forward until I’m pressed against the trunk again, and his hands grip my thighs on the limb under us. It’s easy for him to push the fabric of my shorts up as far as he can, and teasingly, Kayde tickles my stomach at the line of my waistband. “If I chase him away, will you love me then?”

“I don’t think…” I stare at him, utterly taken aback. “I don’t think that’s how it works, Kayde. Pretty sure I have to love you for you. I think.”

His bemusement is clear, and seconds later, he dips his fingers into my shorts to press his fingers to my slit. “I don’t like being up in a tree,” he muses, his hand slipping free so he can rearrange my legs to be over his. I hook my knees around his thighs, needing some security that I won’t fall off from a random bout of stupidity on my end. “It’s hard to play with you when I have to hold you up here and keep you from falling.”

“Excuse you?” My eyebrows shoot upward. “This is my tree, and I do fine staying in it on my own. I don’t need you to hold me up, Kayde.”

He just eyes me, his gaze narrowed, and drags me further over his lap until I’m straddling him properly, and I can feel that something about our conversation has him at least a little excited. “Think you can ride me up here, then?” he purrs playfully. His hand comes up to stroke through my hair, and I shudder at the feeling of him between my thighs.

It’s an understatement to say that I love Kayde’s cock. He rocks against me, one arm around my waist to keep me in place. It’s more teasing than anything, though when he buries his face against my throat and bites down hard with a growl, the lightheartedness of his movements evaporates.

Instead, it’s replaced with possessiveness and a touch of desperation from my end. Especially when he bites down harder and all I can do is wrap my arms around his shoulders to meet the movements of his body with mine.

“I’ll take care of Grey for you, Summer,” Kayde finally murmurs, pulling away so he can speak directly into my ear. “But I worry for you. I worry that we’re not seeing everything.” There’s a touch of frustration in his voice, and I suck in a breath at a sharp roll of his hips.

“What do you mean?” I ask with a whine, fingers digging into his shoulders and scratching against his skin.