Mind Games (Mind Games, #1)(28)

I laugh. “Wasn’t he worried I’d kill you in your sleep or something?”

“I don’t think he’d actually care.”

“Oh, poor James.” I scoot across the dark velvet of the love seat, scoot right onto James’s lap, wrap my arms around his neck. “Why do you care if he cares? Your dad is evil.” Is it the money? Can he not live without bottomless funds? Or does he actually believe in this shadowy network of power his dad is building? I need to know. I let myself ignore it for so long, but the why is killing me. The why of James working for his father. The why of how I can feel like this for him even though he is part of what did this to me.

He looks at my lips, leans in closer. I don’t need to know the why anymore. I don’t care. I’ll care again tomorrow, but now? I close my eyes, waiting, waiting, wanting his lips on mine.

He pecks my nose instead, then laughs. I open my eyes and glare.

“My dad is evil. But I’m a Keane. It’s my duty to care. I owe it to my mother.”

“So, are you finally living up to Daddy Dearest’s dearest wishes? Are you going to seduce me, James Keane?”

He pulls me in closer. “I’ve only stayed away from you this long because he wanted me to do the opposite. I can’t let him win, can I?”

“I won’t tell if you don’t.”

“But what about the Readers?”

“Oh, them? I think ‘I’m boinking the boss’s son!’ at them every chance I get. But only the ones who are in love with you.”

“You are evil.” But he looks at me like I’m not.

I know it’s wrong.

He’s a Keane.

He isn’t his father, but he will be.

He’s almost as good a liar as I am, and I am too drunk to sift through what he’s said.

It’s wrong, wrong, wrong.

But his hands are on my neck and in my hair and tracing my collarbone and it is wrong but it feels right, it feels like falling and I know the impact at the bottom will probably kill me, but I don’t care anymore.

“I’ve wanted to kiss you since that first night in the school. I’ve wanted to kiss you every single day since then.” He shifts me even closer. We are touching, touching everywhere and it’s wrong it’s wrong it’s wrong but right right now and I close my eyes and his lips are even better at the dulling than the drinks or the music. His lips light me on fire and dull everything else and I lose myself in them, and I am so happy and relieved to be lost I could cry.

We stumble out onto the street, wrapped around each other, and I am light-headed and my feet can’t trace a straight line, and I can’t feel anything.

Right or wrong or even my hands.

It’s glorious.

I laugh.

James nuzzles his face into the top of my head, breathing in my hair. “You’re amazing, you know that? I think I love you.”

I push him into the wall, grab his shirt in my fists, kiss him hard. Pull away. He is such a liar. “You don’t love me, you idiot. No one does. No one should.”

“That’s not true. I do love you. I’m just trying so hard not to. It would ruin everything. But you don’t make it easy, you know?”

I laugh and walk a few steps ahead. This late/early there is no one out but a car on the corner. Delivery van.

Idling.

It’s wrong, it shouldn’t be there, I know it shouldn’t. No one would deliver something right now on these streets. I turn to James. “Something’s wrong.” I know it in my stomach sloshing with drinks.

“Nothing’s wrong.” He reaches out to pull me into his arms and I jump forward and put my foot behind his, trip him as I shove him down.

Someone swings a fist where his head was.

I lift my foot and kick backward as hard as I can with my sharp heel (the sharp heels—I needed the sharp heels), and it slams into something and then there’s a wet give as it breaks through skin and someone shouts but it’s muffled. I yank my foot back and the shoe doesn’t come with it. I kick the other one off because now it will only slow me down.

Am I screaming? I should be screaming. James is shouting, trying to get up. The man who swung at James’s head pulls something out of his jacket and points it at James and I can’t lose James, I won’t, not now that I found his lips. I throw myself onto the man, wrap my arms and legs around him. He’s off balance and stumbling, and I sink my teeth into his shoulder as hard as I can.

I shouldn’t have had anything to drink. Annie was right. This is not a fight I should lose.

He slams me into the brick wall and the air leaves my lungs in a sad, drunken whoosh. I drop off and hit the ground on crouched legs. I need to protect James. I need to get them away from James.

I run (I can still run, I know how to run, I can do this) toward the opposite side of the street, away from the van. Glance back, they’ve left James, he’s up now and stumbling toward us, but he had even more to drink than I did and they are not drunk, they are definitely not drunk.

I can get away. I know I can. One of them has stopped, turned to face James. Does he have a gun? He might have a gun. I don’t know, I can’t tell.

If I run now, I’ll only be followed by one and I can take him down and get away.

I turn and spin past the man following me, dive for the knees of the man facing James. He falls; I am tangled up in him.