“Almost having fun?” Kai asks, sounding like he’s the one confused by us.
“I feel like I’ve been transported into another time or universe,” I say on a reluctant breath as I take the blunt from his hand. “But when in Rome…”
“This is actually Tomahawk,” Hale says as he walks back in, shivering and shutting the door behind him. “Rome is in Georgia or something,” he adds.
I stop hesitating and take a very long pull off the blunt before coughing like an idiot for five minutes. Reese takes her turn while I try to recover.
It’s the first time I’ve ever smoked pot. It’s definitely not a date I’ll ever forget. And at least I don’t need the vodka now.
Wild Ones Tip #113
We keep the things we like. Just a warning, in case you don’t want to be kept.
Chapter 4
KAI
*******
I’m fucking brilliant, because the girls are finally relaxing and not shrieking or staring blankly at us when we’re being perfectly good dates. The deer was definitely a stupid idea, but Hale doesn’t date much, so he went a little over-the-top.
I could have just as easily brought over some thawed deer meat instead of spending four hours hunting for the “perfect” meal for the night.
Reese is giving us the scoop on where they normally live…which is all the way on the other side of the country. In Rhode Island. Who comes to Tomahawk from Rhode Island?
“So the horror writer chick was your grandmother?” I ask, confused but trying to follow the conversation. “And she’s from the other side of the country?”
Piper is very fucking stoned as her head lulls to the side, eyes glassy and a little squinty as she grins like I’ve said something amusing. She’s found a lot amusing in the past hour.
“Yes,” she says a little slowly. “But she wasn’t a horror writer…exactly.”
I should have warned them I only grow the really good shit, but I didn’t know they were first-timers. I’ve never met weed virgins before.
I make the cheesy stretching move before placing my arm on the back of the couch behind Piper, and she just grins broader.
She really does look a shit-ton different when she’s not trying to die, even though she still looks tired. Her nose is still red and she’s sneezed half a dozen times or more since I’ve been here, but she looks a hell of a lot hotter when she’s walking among the living.
I’m glad she wasn’t in the water longer. Shit could have actually gotten bad real damn fast.
She leans forward, eating another cabob, tearing into the deer meat she probably didn’t think she’d like so much. She should thank the epic THC levels for loosening her up.
“So what exactly was she?” I ask, moving in just a little closer, my eyes falling to her lips for the fifth or sixth time in the past few minutes, reminding myself I can’t actually kiss her until the end of the date.
“She wrote horror romance, sort of. There was a lot of sex and blood and cult-like packs. She had a very small fan base, but she managed to scrape by and write the books she wanted to,” she goes on.
Reese laughs, distracting me for long enough to see Hale dangling straws from his nose and mocking some weird animal sound that sounds nothing like any animal I’ve ever heard.
My attention returns to Piper as she leans forward, grabbing a book from the coffee table. When she leans back, she’s magically sitting a lot closer. I’ll say she moved and not me, though I’m really not sure which one of us moved.
She adjusts herself so that her side is touching mine, and I remain cool about it. It’s rare girls sit so close to me. Wilders terrify the majority of women.
I have no idea why.
“So you don’t even know how long you’re going to be in Tomahawk?” Hale asks Reese as she props her feet in his lap and just smiles at him.
“No,” she states with no follow-up.
“We came to decide if there was any use in keeping the cabin. Gran left it to the two of us,” Piper adds.
“Doesn’t really look fancy enough for you two,” I muse as I look around at the small, multi-purpose room we’re in—living, kitchen and dining.
“We’re taking turns sleeping on the couch,” Reese says on a groan as Hale actually starts massaging her feet.
As her head lulls back, and she shoots him a lazy smile, I dart a look at Piper’s feet, considering doing the same. She’s wearing shoes, and she moves her feet under the table when she catches me eyeing them.
Guess she doesn’t like her feet rubbed.
Her loss. My hands are fucking magic.
“Our mom and our dad have always made fun of Gran, so we just knew her as the embarrassment they said she was,” Piper says as she stares at the picture of the woman on the back of the book.