Page 2 of Revenge
“I appreciate the sentiment, chibisuke, but it’s either this or nothing.” Haruka bent down and his voice was low and sultry in Eli’s ear. The cute, fluffy ears should have nerfed Haruka’s seduction powers by fifty percent, but instead, he gave off a wolf-in-sheep’s-clothing vibe that was really working for Eli.
Haruka was right. Itwasbetter than nothing. But only by a tiny margin.
“Fine. But take the hood down.” Eli jumped up to bat at the hood, and Haruka pulled it down to let the ears dangle down his back. Eli wasn’t even paying attention to the way his second favorite hoodie was straining at the seams. The damn thing could burn in hell, for all he cared. But maybe it could wait until Haruka wasn’t in it anymore. “AndI’m walking in front of you.”
People would still be able to see the small of Haruka’s back, though…
Haruka laughed and pulled Eli into his chest, rubbing his face against Eli’s hair like a big cat. “Have I ever told you how much I love this side of you?”
Maybe Eli could give Haruka his other shirt as well…
No. It was only slightly longer than the hoodie, so if he gave it to Haruka, he’d be in two crop tops. He leaned back against Haruka’s embrace to examine the zipper and confirmed his suspicion that the hoodie was one deep breath away from bursting. Eli’s shirt was made of lighter material than the hoodie, but he doubted the structural integrity of the zipper would hold out against adding another layer under it, no matter how thin.
If Eli made him wear it, all he would accomplish would be giving the campus a gorgeous eyeful of Haruka’s chest when it burst out of Eli’s hoodie. And since Eli’s shirt was tighter than his hoodie, it would be plastered against every last inch ofHaruka like a second skin. All Eli would accomplish would be making Haruka even sexier and making himself uncomfortable from being half naked on campus.
“It’s amusing that you think I would let you run around in public without a shirt.” Haruka didn’t sound amused. He sounded murdery, and his face didn’t look any better.
“Fine. Let’s just get this over with.” Eli took Haruka by the hand and dragged him out of the changing area.
When they got outside, he saw Kamakura leaning against the wall, keeping a lookout for suspicious people. He gave Haruka’s new attire a raised eyebrow but kept his thoughts to himself.
“I’m starting to have second thoughts about getting a new wardrobe full of smaller clothes. Though I suppose it still comes with some benefits. At least I don’t have to worry about that tracker Kamakura put on me,” Eli teased. If he could make himself laugh, the whole situation would be way more tolerable.
Kamakura stood up straight in alarm and abandoned his casual position by the wall. “You told him about the tracker?”
Wait. “There really was a tracker? Haruka, I thought you were joking!”
“I told you he’s as bad as I am.”
“It was only for emergencies,” Kamakura said hastily.
“That doesn’t make it better. Way to make me feel like an expensive poodle, or a fugitive, Kamakura.” Eli glared so Kamakura would know how seriously he’d fucked up. Then he turned down the glare because Kamakura had plenty of good reasons to be worried about Eli and was really just trying to do his job. Still. “That’s super uncool, but I’ll let it go. I mean, at least you aren’t tracking me anymore…right?”
Kamakura and Haruka shared a loaded look and then both glanced away suspiciously.
“Right?” Eli asked again with a note of desperation in his voice this time.
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to, Eli,” Haruka said, finally.
Kamakura didn’t say anything and refused to meet Eli’s gaze.
They couldn’t have gotten all of Eli’s clothes. He would have noticed. That meant one of them must have tagged his shoes. They’d better not have snuck a tracker into Eli’s favorite pair of Sailor Moon Vans. He wouldn’t part with those even if someone had stuffed a bomb into one of them. Maybe he was better off not thinking about it.
This whole thing was a joke. He was sure of it. Some weird inside joke between Haruka and Kamakura. Just two people who could barely stand each other sharing a joke at Eli’s expense…
No. He was better off compartmentalizing the whole thing. But before that happened, a tiny bit of revenge wouldn’t hurt. Well, it wouldn’t hurt Eli, anyway.
And Eli had just gotten a wonderful idea.
Kamakura had taken to dressing more casually after their return to America. It made him stand out less, which allowed him to be better at his job. At least this had been Eli’s excuse when he’d told Haruka about it. In reality, Eli just wanted his bodyguard to feel more comfortable and part of the family. They were cousins, after all. Sort of. Today he was wearing a dark red Henley and jeans. And since he was of a similar size to Haruka…
“Kamakura, you’re ridiculously oversized just like Haruka. Lend him your shirt!”
“I don’t want him in my shirt.”
“I don’t want him without a shirt.”
Kamakura and Haruka gave each other twin dirty looks. Their mutual dislike had grown into frenemy territory—with more emphasis on thenemythan thefren. Kamakura had grown more vocal about his thoughts toward Haruka, and, interestingly, Haruka had grown more tolerant. It might have had something to do with the way Kamakura had saved Harukaduring the Helios incident, or it could have something to do with the wholethey were cousinsrevelation.
