He froze, confused, staring at me like I’d lost my mind.
Before I could ask him when he’d had time to shower and change, another Kai—my Kai—strolled in behind him in his wifebeater, grinning like an idiot.
Two of them. Identical.
My mouth went dry. My eyes darted back and forth between them, over and over, until my brain finally caught up. Twins. Of course.
But the dawning didn’t stop at relief. It slid darker.The memory crashed into me—Hog Heaven, the pulsing bass, the blur of rumrunners and neon lights. The stranger who’d pressed me against the wall, who’d kissed me like we had history when we didn’t. The jawline was the same. The grin, identical. But something in the eyes—one pair sharp and restless, the other softer, heavier with mischief.
Was it Kai or his carbon copy at Hog Heaven three years ago?
The question detonated in my chest, shattering every assumption I’d made about us. Heat rose in my cheeks, not the blush of desire but of humiliation. Had I hooked up with the wrong man then? Was I falling for the right one now? Or had this all been a mistake written in duplicate?
My head went light, hands numb. The carton of eggs slipped through my fingers, hitting the tile with a wet splat that echoed the chaos in my mind. The mess spread across the floor, yolk and shell scattering like the pieces of my certainty, impossible to put back together.
CHAPTER 9
KAI
My breath caught with a start, not so much from the commotion of Jasmine dropping a dozen eggs as from her petrified look. “What happened, babe? You okay?” I asked, crouching down behind her to grab the dustpan from under the sink.
Her whole body trembled like a live wire. For a second, I thought she might faint, her knees threatening to buckle.Her hands were clenched so tight at her sides her knuckles had gone white. The sound of the eggs hitting tile still echoed in the air, a wet splatter that didn’t seem big enough to justify the terror on her face.
She stood frozen, eyes wide like she’d seen a ghost. Her voice was thin, stretched tight. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just a little frazzled, I guess.”
She didn’t look fine. She looked like she might shatter if anyone breathed too hard. Her pulse beat visibly at her throat, her breath hitching in short bursts. Whatever she was seeing right now, it wasn’t this kitchen. She was somewhere else entirely—somewhere I couldn’t follow.
It was the same look she’d worn with a gun barrel pressed against her skin. A look I’d give anything to erase.
I wanted to drag her back to bed, bury her under the sheets, and work on today’s orgasm number one instead of watching her unravel in my kitchen. But she was wound so tight she might snap. So I dropped a knee to the floor, scooping the mess myself. “No worries.” I forced a smile up at her as I sopped the slick pile of yolks into the dustpan with a paper towel. “Frazzled is understandable.”
The smell of raw egg clung to my hands, sharp and sulfurous, a stupidly ordinary scent for a moment that felt anything but normal.
After what we’d been through, “frazzled” was the understatement of the century.
“Thanks,” she said softly, but there was an anxious edge in her voice. “I’m sorry I made a mess, and ruined our omelet.”
I dumped the shells and goo into the trash under the sink. “I don’t have much of an appetite, to be honest.” My stomach had been in knots since last night. No food was going to settle that.
Images kept flashing—her wrists bound, the sneer of the men demanding what I didn’t have. It was a wonder either of us could even stand upright, let alone think about breakfast.
“That’s a first,” Reef said from behind us, chuckling like he’d just delivered the line of the day.His voice carried that cocky edge it always did, but hearing it now made Jasmine flinch, her body tightening like a wire pulled too taut.
“Yeah, well, we had a little incident here last night,” I said, drying my hands. “That’s why Jasmine is so skittish.”
“Hi, Jasmine. I’m Reef.” He stuck out his hand, the easy grin not quite hiding the sharp way his eyes studied her. But Jasmine just stared at the hand like it might bite her. She flicked her gaze to me, and I saw it clearly this time—terror.
She was scared shitless because I’d just broken our pact. We’d agreed: not a word to anyone. And now I was blabbing to my twin.The warning in her eyes gutted me, but I couldn’t pull it back. Reef and I didn’t keep secrets. Not ever. And I couldn’t start now.
“Sorry, I didn’t introduce you,” I said, stepping into the awkward silence. “This is my twin brother, Reef.”
“I gathered that,” she said, finally lifting the corners of her mouth into a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “Nice to meet you.”Her tone was brittle, like glass ready to crack. The words didn’t match the storm in her eyes.
Reef left his hand out a beat longer before dropping it, brow furrowing. “You look familiar. You local?”
“I guess so.” Her voice trembled just slightly. “I’ve only been here a few months officially. Does that count as local?”
“Since you’ve been coming down for years, we’ll waive the thirteen-month requirement,” I joked, trying to lighten her mood.
