Demon Kissed - Katie May Page 0,91

intensity of her penetrating glare. “Don’t you fucking dare.”

“But—”

“Everyone is in love with you, Katrina.” For a moment—for a brief, brief moment—the anger bleeds from her voice, leaving behind only heartache and pain. Agony. Her long lashes flutter shut as she takes a deep, calming breath. “But no one is ever in love with me.” Like a flash of lightning ripping apart the night sky, vitriol returns to her fiery gaze. “How would it feel if I was with Zolroth? If I was kissing him, fucking him…” She allows her suggestive words to hang in the air between us like stagnant dust particles. Her smile is the slashing edge of a knife.

Jealousy churns in my stomach like a nest of hissing snakes. They coil around each other, becoming so incredibly tangled that no amount of corralling will pull them apart.

“You stole William from me,” she whispers, inching a step closer. “So I’m going to steal Zolroth from you.”

Janie’s ominous words are still circulating through my head as I rejoin the others.

I see Raz and Kastros still in conversation with the front desk worker, and William is engaged in a heated debate with Tim, Darrel, and Wade. When he catches sight of me, he whispers something to the others and makes an immediate beeline in my direction.

My heart jolts as he steps directly in front of me, flashing a brilliant smile. Before, I would’ve memorized every inch of his perfection and placed it in my spank bank to dissect later, but now, I can only muster up a tentative smile of my own in return. Over his shoulder, catapulting huge-ass boulders at me with her eyes, is Janie. She huffs and tosses her silky blonde hair over her shoulder before focusing on whatever Alanna is saying to her.

“Kat,” William breathes. “Um…I was hoping to ask you something.”

I can see Kastros and Raz returning to the group, both of them eyeing William suspiciously and with great trepidation. A part of me wants them to remain far, far away, but another part of me, a part I can’t name, wants them to save me from this conversation. I immediately shush that second part with an internal growl.

“What do you need?” I query. “Is it about the tournament? Did you get the rulebook Alanna emailed over?”

“It’s not that…” He shifts from foot to foot, repeatedly sliding his hands in and out of his pockets.

“What is it?”

I can hear the distinct pound of Kastros’s giant footsteps as he veers in our direction. William’s eyes widen as he stares at the vengeance demon over my shoulder, and I see a trickle of sweat on his forehead.

“I was wondering if you wanted to go out with me sometime while we’re here,” he says at last, and the footsteps behind me abruptly stop.

Did…?

Did William Washington just ask me out on a date? An actual, honest-to-God date? Like, with dresses and flowers and kissing?

Ohmygawd.

I wait for the flurry of butterflies that I always expected to feel when I dreamed about this moment, but they don’t immediately come. I chalk it up to nerves as I stare at my crush’s handsome, heavily tanned face.

“You…want to go…onadatewithme?” The last several words blur together as my tongue trips over itself in shock. I can feel heat rushing to my cheeks in mortification as William’s smile grows. It’s apparent he finds amusement in seeing me flustered. I clear my throat with the intensity of a dying hyena and attempt to adopt a nonchalant (totally not nonchalant) posture. “I mean, you want to go on a date with me?”

Janie’s face briefly flashes in my mind—the genuine pain in her eyes when she accused me of stealing William—but I wash that image away in an ice-cold wave. She has been nothing but a jealous, nasty bitch to me since elementary school. She doesn’t deserve my sympathy.

Besides, I’ve been in love with William Washington for years. Don’t I deserve this? Don’t I deserve just one date with the guy I’ve been pining for since I first learned what a vibrator was?

“I heard that on the last day of the tournament, we get a few hours of free time,” William states. “And I was hoping I could maybe take you out for dinner?”

“I… Yes!” I all but scream. Hoping to regulate my volume, I tack on, “I mean, of course. I would love to go on a date with you…Willie.”

Willie?!? Did I really just steal his ex’s nickname for him?

This is why you’re single, Kat.

If William noticed