Lost Stars (The Jewel Project #3)

08.2|| The Longest Flight

Kay sat on a giant round cushion placed in the airport waiting area, right in the middle of a semicircle of shops. A few other commuters shared the seating with her, chatting happily to each other. It sounded so weird, so inappropriate that people could still be happy.

She should be, too. Angie was alive and well. About to get her heart crushed into a million pieces. Kay looked at her trembling hands. If Kyle had died, she'd rather had died with him than have to go through what Angie was about to. She knew she should call her friend, tell her the news, but she couldn't. Fortunately Sam had offered to do it instead.

"Hey." Kyle crouched in front of her, an ice cream in his hand. "I got you ice cream."

She looked from him to the cone. It was sweet, but she didn't want ice cream. "Where are the others?"

"Mostly searching for food." He licked the edge of the cone to stop the cream from dripping down. "Here."

Kay took the ice cream, but kept her eyes on him. How could he act so normal? Act. She'd been such a shitty girlfriend. "How are you?"

He frowned. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, Tom's your brother, not mine and still, through all this, you somehow ended up comforting me when it should be the other way around."

Was his brother. Her heart tightened at the thought because she'd loved Tom, too, as a friend and as a brother. Because he'd made Angie happy, because he'd been the only person to tell her that Kyle loved her and they'd find each other again when everyone else kept telling her to move on...

"Hey." He put his hand on her cheek. "I know you cared about him, too. And about Angie."

She shook her head, her eyes filling with tears. "I feel like I'm breaking down worse than I should. If you can keep it together, then so should I."

Kyle winced and looked away from her. "To be honest, I'm mostly in denial."

Kay tilted her head. Ice cream dripped on her hand. Damn, she really didn't want it right now, but she started licking at it to prevent it from melting all over her. "Talk to me," she said, her mouth full. Ugh. She passed the cone to him.

He took it and studied it carefully, as if it were the most fascinating thing on the planet. "It's still there, you know. The darkness. Trying to sink its claws into me, take me out. This is my way of fighting it."

She had no idea what to say to that. She just shivered. Kyle shrugged and took a bite of the ice cream before passing it back to her.

"I wish I could actually help you."

"You are helping." He bit his lip, his forehead scrunched in confusion and pain. "I'm just... If it wasn't for Sam's feeling, I wouldn't have believed it. Because it's stupid. I mean Eddie was on the same plane and he survived."

A spark of hope filled Kay's chest as she watched him. He was right. But Sam... If Tom wasn't dead, then what did Sam feel? She shook her head and took another bite of ice cream. It was painful to her teeth, but she wanted to finish it as fast as possible.

"How am I helping?"

"Are you kidding?"

No, she really had no idea. She took the final bite of the cone just to find that her hands and mouth were unbearably sticky. "Great, I don't even have a napkin—"

Kyle took her face in his hands and kissed her. Her entire body instantly relaxed and she circled her hands around his neck, trying not to get ice cream in his hair. She enjoyed the warmth, the pressure, kissed him back timidly, expecting him to pull away any second. He didn't. He just rose higher, pushing her back on the cushion, towering over her. The pleasant warmth turned into raging fire.