MAKE ME HATE YOU (Book one of the hate to love duet)

KimaniI came down those stairs with the worst attitude and I was not even going to pretend otherwise.My head had been pounding since this morning, my throat still felt scratchy from whatever bug decided to make me its home since Friday, and I had been stuck in this house for three days with nothing but medicine that tasted like punishment and television that stopped being interesting by Saturday afternoon. I was miserable and I had every right to be miserable and nobody was going to tell me differently.I gripped the railing as I came down the last few steps, my oversized sleep shirt hanging off one shoulder, my braids half pinned up and half doing whatever they wanted. I had not bothered fixing myself up because I was sick and this was my house and nobody told me company was coming.That was the first thing that irritated me."There you are," Jaxon said the moment I cleared the bottom step, and he was already smiling that big, annoying, unbothered smile of his like he had not just

KimaniSecretly dating your brother's best friend sounded like the plot of a book when I said it in my head. Something dramatic and exciting and slightly scandalous that happened to other people, the kind of situation you read about and thought well that girl should have known better. And it was all of those things. It was also how I ended up flat on my back on my own bed with Roan King hovering above me like the concept of personal gravity had simply never applied to him and he saw no reason to start respecting it now.He had carried me up those stairs like it cost him nothing. One hand on the back of my thigh and one arm braced across the back of my legs and I had spent the entire trip up telling him to put me down in a voice that kept betraying me by not sounding serious enough. He pushed my bedroom door open with his shoulder and crossed the room and dropped me onto my mattress with a gentleness that was almost insulting considering the confidence with which he had tossed me over

KimaniI had never panicked like this in my entire life and I wanted that on record.We had been doing this for a whole year, Roan and I, and in that entire year Jaxon had never once come close to finding us alone together. Not in the same room, not in the same car, not anywhere that would require an explanation neither of us was ready to give. I had been careful. I had been so careful that it had started to feel easy, like maybe this was just how it was going to be indefinitely, this comfortable secret with no consequences.And now my brother was at the bottom of my staircase with chocolate bars and a very straightforward question about the location of his best friend and I was lying on my bed with a hickey on my neck."He's coming up," I whispered, and it came out louder than a whisper because my chest was tight and my voice was not cooperating. "Get off me right now, Roan, he is literally coming up the stairs."Roan did not move with any urgency.He looked at me from above with tho

Kimani As much as I wanted to see him, I could not do it. That was what I told myself in the three seconds between Ashley asking the question and my mouth opening to respond. I could not walk into a formal interview with Roan King pretending to be someone else while he was currently giving me the silent treatment and I was currently trying to decide whether I was actually going to attempt to make him hate me. That was too many things happening in the same room at the same time and I did not have the emotional bandwidth for it. "Ashley." I turned to look at her properly. "Do you realize what you are asking me to do? You want me to walk into a professional interview setting, representing you, and conduct a full interview with the richest man in the country on your behalf." I shook my head. "I cannot do that. This is something you have been working toward since before I met you. You should be the one sitting in that room, not me." "I know what I'm asking," she said, and her eyes h

KimaniI looked at Ashley and said, "I'll catch you later," and I could hear in my own voice that I was not leaving room for a follow-up question, which was intentional because Ashley's follow-up questions in this moment would have been numerous and I did not have answers that I could give her in a public space with half my school still standing around being loudly invested in something that was none of their business.She grabbed my wrist before I could take a full step. "Kimani…""Later," I said, and I squeezed her hand once so she knew I was not upset with her, and then I walked.The crowd had not dispersed. If anything it had grown slightly, the way crowds do when something interesting happens near a main entrance and word travels the ten feet it takes to pull more people in. I could hear the comments continuing as I walked through them, and I kept my face forward and my pace even and I did not look at any of them.I stopped in front of him.Up close he was worse. That was the onl