Thin Love (Thin Love, #1)(15)
“My car is at Kenner.” Two small strides and he again kept time with her. “You’re just a little ways from there in Graham, right? I’m going in that direction.”
That stopped her instantly. She didn’t recall mentioning her dorm. “How do you know where I live?” She didn’t remember, in fact, even telling him her name. But Kona Hale was resourceful and well connected. She’d figured he find out what he could about her despite her nondisclosures. When he only shrugged, avoided staring at anything but her frown, Keira sidestepped, making him look down at her. “You checked up on me?”
Kona widened his stance, defensive, preparing for something that Keira had no intention of starting. She had no desire to argue with this guy. She’d had enough of him for one night, but that didn’t mean she was going to walk away from him, letting him think it was okay to nose around in her business. She cocked one eyebrow, tapped her foot and Kona relented, let his arms hang loose and unclenched at his sides. “You wouldn’t tell me your name. I had to find out so I didn’t look like an * when we met tonight.”
Leann would never tell Kona anything. Besides, Keira knew her cousin had spent the entire day in the theater building preparing for the dance recital for her Advanced Lyrical class. The only other people that knew anything about her were her teammates. Most of them were giggling, stupid bitches that only ran because their team locker room was right next to the football team’s. Unbelievable, she thought, ticking off the names in her head of each girl she planned to bitch out. “You could have asked, you know.”
“I did.” Back again was Kona’s sigh and that time he added the slump of his wide shoulders. “You wouldn’t say shit.”
Flustered and more annoyed that their meeting hadn’t been as horrible as Keira thought it might be, she looked away from him, stepped back so that the temptation to roll her eyes left her. Tonight had been, not nice, no, but surprising. Kona was clever, she knew that by the brief mentions he made about his Calculus and Finite Mathematics classes. Keira didn’t like it, didn’t like him, and especially did not like that her assumptions about the beefy Volkswagen had been wrong.
“I’ll see you in class,” she told him, walking away before he could stop her. Keira wasn’t naive and just the small interactions she’d had with Kona told her he wasn’t the sort of guy who’d just did as he was told and let things lie. She knew for every step she made toward Graham, Kona made two.
But she wouldn’t look back, wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing she wondered if he was behind her. Keira didn’t know why he cared or what had motivated the change in his attitude. Maybe it was her temper in the cafeteria. She’d certainly hadn’t ever acted that furious in class, and in her mind Keira heard her mother’s cool, nagging voice telling her she’d waved a red flag right in the big bull’s face.
Keira pulled her cardigan tighter around her chest, trying to shake off the swift breeze rustling the large pine trees that lined the sidewalk. As she hurried over the wet pavement, she passed a girl, Bethany, she thought her name was, that lived two doors down from her and Leann. She only managed the nod because, again, her mother’s voice popped into her head.
The woman told her not to chat, not to become too friendly. “Other girls,” her mother would say, “are at the university for the same reason you are, Keira. They’re working on their MRS. degree.”
The sad thing was, her mother really believed that. She didn’t expect much from Keira, she never had. She wanted her daughter to keep fit. She wanted her educated because she believed that the best wives of doctors and lawyers were the ones who could carry on intelligent conversations. Keira wasn’t friendly by nature and blamed that on her mother’s constant niggles about other girls being competition. She knew that archaic mentality was her mother’s issue, not Keira’s, but the refrain of keeping yourself guarded, of seeing other girls as the enemy, kept Keira from socializing with anyone but her cousin.
When Graham Hall came into view, Keira slowed down, figuring by now Kona had given up and jumped into his car at Kenner. The sidewalk was completely empty and Keira relaxed, thinking of nothing but a hot shower and her warm bed. It was this thought, in fact, that kept her senses dull, kept her instinct silent as she walked near the dim alley between Graham and a row of married housing units.
She did not hear the break of limbs against sneakers or sense the shadow behind her until she slipped into the dark corner of the building. A stranger came at her fast like a whip and managed to grab hold of her backpack before she could react.
“Hey!” she shouted, more surprised than mad that the guy in the black t-shirt and worn jeans had managed to catch her off guard. “That’s my shit, you *.”
“Mine now, bitch.” And he took off, laughing over his shoulder as Keira followed. Her phone, her wallet, her keys were all in that bag and Keira didn’t rationalize the stupidity of chasing after the thief until she was right behind him, until he stopped short and lifted his fist ready to strike.
When his hand came forward, Keira dipped, moving out of his way to land a punch right on his chin. It stung, and she swung around, cradling her fist against her chest, ready to bite back the pain when he lunged forward.
“You wanna fight? Let’s tussle.” The guy wasn’t large, stood only a few inches taller than Keira, but the glint in his eyes was fierce, desperate.