In Love With Him

Chapter 28

Kennedy’s POV

I felt so f*****g stupid.

Of course he regretted it. Why wouldn’t he? He was drunk. I mean, it was obvious, right? The kiss didn’t mean anything. Just one of those sloppy, alcohol-fueled lapses in judgment. And I had actually convinced myself—even for a second—that it might have been something more.

I blinked rapidly, trying to keep the tears from spilling over as I climbed the stairs, each step heavier than the last. I was not going to cry. Not over this. Not over him.

I got to my door and stood there for a moment, trying to breathe through the storm building inside my chest. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Lock it down.

When I opened the door, the scent of coconut body spray and sleep hit me. Marty was already sitting up, rubbing her eyes, while Finn flopped over dramatically with a groan.

But they had this sixth sense when it came to me—like bloodhounds for emotional distress.

“What happened?” Marty asked, eyes narrowing instantly. “You look like someone kicked your puppy.”

“Spill,” Finn demanded, already sitting up straighter, hair a wild mess.

I groaned, kicking the door shut behind me. I hadn’t even said anything yet.

“Seriously, I can’t have any secrets with you two.”

“Damn right,” Marty said.

“Now talk,” Finn snapped, folding his arms like a disapproving auntie.

I sighed and dropped onto the bed between them, staring up at the ceiling. It took me a second, but I finally told them the truth. “Dominic came home drunk last night… and he kissed me.”

They both gasped so loud it was like I’d just told them the plot twist in a horror movie.

“He what?” Marty nearly shouted.

“He kissed me. Really kissed me. Like…” I trailed off, remembering the way his lips moved with mine. The way his tongue asked permission. The way he held my face, my waist… Like I was fragile and the only thing that mattered all at once.

“So what’s the problem?” Finn asked.

I took a shaky breath. “This morning… he said it was a mistake.”

Silence. Then—

“I’ll cut him,” Marty declared flatly, already reaching for her phone like she was about to Google “how to stab someone with an eyebrow pencil.”

I let out a scoff and shook my head, though my heart felt like it was collapsing in on itself.

“No stabbing,” I muttered.

Marty and Finn exchanged looks, then turned to me in unison and said:

“f**k him.”

That got a real, honest laugh out of me. Just a short one. But it helped. It cracked the wall I was building around myself.

Marty suddenly jumped off the bed and marched over to my Bluetooth speaker like she was preparing for war. “Enough sadness. Time for recovery.”

She linked her phone to it and seconds later the opening notes of “New Rules” by Dua Lipa blasted through the room.

“One, don't pick up the phone...” Marty sang loudly and off-key, pointing at me like a backup dancer. “You know he's only calling 'cause he's drunk and alone…”

Finn joined in dramatically, spinning like a backup dancer and pretending to hold a wine glass. He fake sobbed against a pillow before belting out the chorus with pure diva energy.

“I got new rules, I count 'em!”

I shook my head, biting the inside of my cheek, trying not to smile—but failing miserably. Their ridiculous dancing. Their dramatics. It was so stupid. So them.

And it was exactly what I needed.

Marty pulled me up off the bed with both hands and yelled, “You’re not sitting there like a sad little Victorian ghost, b***h. Dance!”

So I did.

I laughed. I twirled. I sang every line with them. I let myself forget, even for just a few minutes, that my stepbrother had kissed me and then tossed it away like it meant nothing. I let myself feel something other than disappointment and shame.

As we danced and screamed the lyrics like we were headlining a stadium tour, I realized something—

I had people who loved me. Who showed up. Who didn’t make me question my worth.

Dominic might have made me feel like I wasn’t enough…

But in that moment, spinning around in my room with my two best friends, I remembered that I was.

---

Dominic’s POV

I felt like absolute s**t.

I didn’t mean for it to come out that way. Not at all. It wasn’t a mistake—not the kiss itself. f**k, that kiss was everything. What I meant to say was I shouldn’t have kissed her while I was drunk. Not like that. Not when she deserved so much better.

And then it hit me.

Hard.

Fuck.

I sat straight up, heart stuttering in my chest.

That was her first real kiss.

She told me that night in her room she hadn’t had her first kiss yet. She was waiting for the right moment, the right person. And now I… I ruined that for her.

I groaned and ran both hands down my face, dragging them roughly across my skin as if I could scrape off the shame clinging to me. My skin burned. My stomach twisted. My head throbbed harder.

What the hell was I thinking? Why did I say it like that?

I let my head fall onto the cool granite of the kitchen counter with a thud. The pain in my neck pulsed harder, like it agreed—I deserved every damn bit of it.

Then I heard it.

Footsteps. Angry ones. Stomping down the stairs.

I slowly lifted my head just in time to see Kennedy storming toward the door with Marty and Finn behind her like her personal secret service agents. She didn’t even glance my way. Not once. It was like I didn’t exist. Like last night never happened. But her friends?

Oh, they looked.

Marty, who always looked like she could kill someone for fun and then steal your eyeliner, locked eyes with me. Her gaze was deadly. Ice cold. She dragged her middle finger across her throat in a clean cut motion, eyes never blinking.

Message received.

Then there was Finn. His eyes did a slow sweep of me, top to bottom, like he was sizing me up for the courtroom—or maybe a grave. Then he scoffed. Actually scoffed, lifted his chin with a dramatic flare, and turned his nose in the air like I wasn’t even worth the effort.

They both disappeared out the door behind Kennedy, who never once looked back.

And me?

I groaned again, dragging my hand down my face.

Well done, Dominic. You kissed the girl you’re not supposed to want, made it special, then immediately told her it was a mistake.

Real smooth.

I leaned my elbows on the counter, cradled my pounding head in my palms, and sat there stewing in my own guilt.

It was supposed to be her moment. Her memory. Her first kiss. Not something stolen in the middle of the night by a drunk i***t with too many feelings and not enough self-control.

And now?

Now I was the villain in her story.

Maybe I deserved Marty’s death glare.

Hell, maybe I deserved to be cut.

I deserved all of it.