Read Online Kindred by J. A. Redmerski - Free Book Online Page A

territory, like being the keeper of a dark secret and you’re paranoid everyone around you knows you know more than you’re telling.
    “So why’d you change the subject?” Isaac says, catching me off-guard. “You’re not getting away with it that easily.”
    “Get away with what?” I really did forget what we had been talking about before.
    “That independent wall,” he reminds me.
    “Fine, you win,” I say, looking across at him. “But only under one condition.”
    His lips tug into a surprised, subtle grin. “Oh really?” he says, reaching across the table and enclosing both of my hands underneath his own. He pulls my hands up and brushes his lips across the tops of my fingers. “You know, I’ve never done well with conditions. They make me feel all…restricted.” He kisses the fingers on the other hand and I melt further into the seat.
    But I have to pull my hands away before I fall completely under his spell and so I move back against the seat again, playfully pushing him away, though the tips of my fingers graze his for longer than they should.
    “Will you stop that?” I can’t help but smile. “Manipulation is a villainous trait, you know.”
    Isaac chokes back a small laugh and his blue eyes grow a little wider.
    “The condition,” I begin in my most authoritarian tone, “is that you can’t buy something just because I happen to mention that I like it.”
    He crosses his muscular arms in front of him and just looks at me. I wait a few seconds longer for his objection, but apparently, I still have the floor.
    “When we go somewhere,” I continue, “it’s like I’m tip-toeing around everything I say—I didn’t really want the leather purse that much.”
    “Yes you did.”
    I blink, stunned.
    “ No I didn’t.”
    “Yes, actually you did,” he repeats. “Your words were: ‘I frickin’ love this purse, Zia—look at the little skulls on the inside.’”
    It’s funny, but stings a bit, how he called me out, but I pretend not to be fazed. “I was talking to Zia,” I say, now crossing my arms to mimic him. “It’s what girls do; we fall in love with pointless stuff all the time, but in reality we only love it as long as it’s new. I was totally over it after the first day I carried it to school.”
    That isn’t entirely the truth, but when he looks at me that way, with that trademark sexy, confident smile, I tend to babble a lot.
    “Fine,” he says, uncrossing his arms, “I won’t buy you anymore purses.” He rolls the peppermint package between his fingers and places it on the plate. Even that insignificant movement seems calculated, as if he’s only pretending to be giving me my way.
    “No,” I lean up fully and reach across the table, taking the front of his shirt into my fist. “Not just purses, Isaac. Otherwise, I’ll start saying how much I frickin’ love stuff from Tiffany’s and Louis Vuitton.” I pull him toward me by his shirt and press my lips against his, tasting the peppermint without having his tongue in my mouth.
    We break the kiss at the same time, pulling away from each other barely two inches, his shirt still wedged in my fingertips.
    “Adorable,” he says and a little girlish grin spreads across my face, though I’m not sure if he’s being affectionate, or mischievous. Isaac is good at that; unreadable when he wants to mess with my head because he knows it makes me crazy.
    I don’t have time to figure it out as the waiter interrupts the moment, approaching gradually and then placing Isaac’s drink and the check on the table. He takes our finished plates away.
    He forgot the to-go box, but I don’t say anything.
    “Thank you,” Isaac nods, moving his hand over the check before I can see the total and annoy him with my futile objections about him paying for it.
    The waiter nods and strolls away, leaving us alone again.
    Pulling out his wallet, Isaac fingers through his bills and chooses a ten for the tip, placing it near the half-full