As Jess and I headed out the door, I felt someone fall into step with me and turned to find Nate.
“Well what did you think about the class? She seems like she’s going to be pretty tough, huh?” He playfully bumped my shoulder and smiled.
“Well I happen to have the inside scoop on her, and I believe we can handle anything she throws at us,” I said to him.
“Well, if you have the inside scoop, it looks like we’ll be spending a lot of time together in there then. We may need to partner up on a few projects,” he joked back.
As we exited the class, we ran into Landon who quickly whisked Jessi away while she giggled a farewell to me, and something about catching up with me later. I shook my head and laughed at the two. You would never have known they just met a few days ago from the way they were with each other.
When I looked away from Jessi and Landon’s retreating figures, I saw Kane. He was leaning against the wall, his arms crossed over his broad chest. His arms completely fascinated me, thanks to the intricate designs of the tats adorning them. I couldn’t believe I’d never really noticed tattoos before Kane. Each one was like its own miniature work of art. Kind of like when you see people go to art shows and stand there and stare for long periods of time on one particular painting. I could do that with Kane’s tattoos. I wanted to know all about them. I wanted to know if each one held a secret story behind it, or represented something special in his life. And if I was being completely honest with myself, I just wanted to know Kane. All about him, every detail.
When we finally locked eyes, Kane pushed off the wall and strode toward Nate and me. His eyes kept shifting back and forth between the two of us, before finally settling on me as he finished his short walk.
“Hey” —He scratched at the back of his neck—“I thought I’d see if you wanted to grab a cup of coffee or something. If this is your last class, I mean.” He cast his eyes back toward Nate, who was currently glaring at Kane. Man, boys could be so weird sometimes.
Clearing my throat to get Kane’s attention again, I said, “Um, sure. That sounds great. I just need to run back to the dorm and drop my things off. I should also tell Jessi where I’ll be. You want to meet me on the front steps in fifteen minutes or so?”
A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips, eliciting a smile from me too. “Sure. See you in fifteen.”
Once again being caught up in Kane, I forgot about Nate standing right beside me. Man, I’ve got to stop doing that. Not really knowing what else to do, I blurted, “Oh! This is Nate, by the way.” Then I paused, remembering my earlier conversation with Nate. “But wait, I guess you already know each other, don’t you?” I glanced back and forth between the two of them.
“Yeah, we know each other,” Kane stated flatly as he glared at Nate.
Weird. I’d just figured they were friends. Looking at Kane and the way he was staring at Nate, I was quickly retracting that thought.
“Long time no see, bud. How’s it going?” Nate nodded toward Kane. Acting as if Kane wasn’t scowling at him as he spoke.
Kane’s eyes looked Nate up and down, almost as if he were sizing him up. Kane had a good two to four inches on Nate and was definitely more built. If they were to ever go toe to toe, my money would definitely be on Kane.
“Good,” he clipped out before turning back to me. “Go put your things away. I’ll be waiting out front.”
He turned and headed back down the hall, toward the exit doors without even a goodbye nod toward Nate.
“Well, that went well I think,” Nate chuckled at Kane’s retreating figure.
“Yeah, what was up with that?” I questioned. Kane obviously didn’t care too much for Nate; but Nate, on the other hand, was acting as thought Kane didn’t just blow him off.
“I don’t really know. We used to be brothers—as in fraternity brothers. We actually were pretty close a few years ago. That’s why we rushed together. Then Kane started to change and pull away from us. We let him have the space he needed, but after a while he came to us and told us he was leaving the frat. Kind of shocked us all to be honest. He would have been president if he’d stayed.
After he dropped the frat, he got his own apartment and kind of kept to himself after that.”—He paused—“Well, I guess kept to himself isn’t the right term.” He stopped again and looked around the now emptying hall. “How do I put this? He still has plenty of company these days, but only in the form of women. It’s not surprising to see a different girl leave his apartment every night.”
I could see Kane being the ladies’ man type. With looks like that, I’m sure women were always throwing themselves at him but that didn’t excuse douchebaggery behavior. It was kind of weird though, he’d never given off those vibes to me. He’d never actually hit on me either. Flirted a little here and there, but never actually came on to me, I don’t think.
Maybe he didn’t find me as attractive as the company he usually kept. Which I couldn’t lie, that stung a little bit, even though it shouldn’t. I barely knew him and never got hung up on guys anyway. I don’t know what my deal was lately. One look from a pair of gray eyes and I was completely flipped upside down. That wasn’t me. I needed to put a stop to whatever was happening, like now.
This coffee date was going to go a whole different direction then what ‘ol Kane probably had planned out in is head—big or little one. Nope, Kelsey Rien was not the type to do the walk of shame out of someone’s apartment. This was something that I was going to make pretty damn clear.
After a quick goodbye to Nate, I headed off toward the dorms. The sooner I was rid of this bag, the better. At least in high school you had lockers. Lugging this stuff around was going to take some getting used to.
Not feeling like waiting on the elevator—which always seemed to take forever—I decided to take the stairs. Our dorm room was just a few doors down from the stairwell and was a whole hallways walk from the elevator bays, but ascending three flights of stairs with all my books and laptop might not have been the brightest idea on my part. With each step I took, waiting on those damn slow elevators sounded better and better.
Finally making it to our floor, I walked the short distance to our room and turned the knob. Jess should already be back, she was probably taking a mid-afternoon nap to be honest. Waking up early and Jessi never did go well together. Slowly pushing open the door, I fully expected to see Jess lying in her bed, softly snoring away after a hard first day of class. What I did not expect was a pale, bare ass as it pumped away at my best friend.