Chapter 28: Not Like Kevin's

Lunch with Stephen was supposed to be a distraction — a way to quiet my thoughts, fill the hollow ache in my stomach, and keep my mind from circling around the one person I couldn’t stop thinking about. But even as the food arrived, even as the chatter of the restaurant wrapped around us in a soft hum, I couldn’t focus.

My eyes kept drifting to my phone on the table. Every few seconds, I’d glance at the screen, waiting for it to light up with a message, a call, something. But it stayed dark and silent. Kevin hadn’t texted. He hadn’t called. Not even a simple check-in. I told myself it didn’t matter, that I didn’t care, but the truth was heavy in my chest, pressing harder with every passing minute.

“Expecting a call?” Stephen’s voice cut through my thoughts like a pin to a balloon.

I blinked, caught off guard. “What?”

He smirked, leaning back slightly in his seat. “You’ve been staring at your phone since we got here.”

“Oh.” I forced a small laugh, pretending to focus on the salad in front of me. “It’s nothing to be curious about.”

But even as I said it, my eyes betrayed me — flickering back to the phone again.

Stephen raised a brow, his fork pausing midair. “Are you expecting a call from Kevin?”

Just hearing his name made my stomach tighten. It was ridiculous how quickly my heart reacted, like my body hadn’t gotten the memo that I was supposed to be detached. I straightened my back and shook my head, trying to sound casual.

“No, no, I’m not. Why would I? It’s not like we’ve become so close since our parents got engaged.”

Stephen chuckled under his breath, stabbing a piece of chicken with his fork. “Then loosen up. You look like a lovestruck teenager who just got dumped by her first love.”

I smiled weakly, though the comment hit closer to home than I wanted to admit. My pulse was still uneven, and I tried to hide it by focusing on my food, but it was useless. My mind was too far away, trapped in the memory of Kevin’s voice, his expression earlier this morning, the way he’d looked at me — or rather, the way he didn’t.

Stephen’s next question came so suddenly that I actually choked on my food.

“But you’re not in love with Kevin, are you?”

I coughed hard, covering my mouth as my throat burned. Stephen’s expression immediately shifted to panic, and he quickly pushed his glass of water toward me.

“Jesus, Abby, I didn’t mean— here, drink.”

After a few gulps, I managed to speak again, though my voice came out sharp and raspy. “Stephen, what the fuck was that?”

He held up his hands, sheepish but still annoyingly calm. “I’m sorry. It just— I don’t know. The way you react to him, it’s… different. You approach things differently when it comes to Kevin.”

I clenched my jaw, forcing myself to stay composed. “Enough.”

The word came out quiet but firm. “I don’t want you speaking about him to me.”

“But has it ever occurred to you that your stepmother could be weirdly up to something?” Stephen said as I remembered the blood trail that led to his mother’s room, the cut on his mother’s arm, her worried expression about Stephen and I couldn't bring myself to talk about it or anything related to it.

“You mean like the same way you're up to something weird you don't wanna talk about in detail?”

That shut him up. Silence fell between us, and for a while, all I could hear was the soft clinking of cutlery from other tables and the faint hum of the restaurant’s air conditioning. I peeked at my phone again, subtly, pretending to adjust my napkin. Still nothing.

The emptiness of the screen mirrored the emptiness inside me.

My fingers began tapping against the table without me realizing, a restless rhythm that matched the chaos in my head. I tried to focus on the food, on the conversation that wasn’t happening, on anything else — but my thoughts kept slipping back to Kevin. To his eyes, his hands, his lips.

That last thought hit harder than I expected, and before I knew it, I was lost in the memory of how it felt — the taste, the warmth, the quiet thrill that came with knowing he wanted me too. My pulse picked up again, traitorous and wild. I didn’t even notice that my gaze had shifted until I caught myself staring at Stephen’s lips.

They were different — softer, maybe. Less sharp. The thought came uninvited: Would they taste anything like Kevin’s?

The absurdity of it almost made me laugh. Almost.

“You have a crush on me, don’t you?” I asked suddenly, my voice cutting through the tension like a dare.

Stephen froze mid-bite, eyes flicking up to mine. He looked startled, but not completely caught off guard — as if part of him had been waiting for that question.

He let out a quiet laugh. “Since forever,” he admitted, his tone almost too honest. “But not like you ever looked my way.”

I didn’t know what possessed me in that moment. Maybe it was loneliness, or confusion, or just that dangerous mix of hunger and emotion that made you crave something to fill the void. But my eyes stayed on his lips, and I felt something stir inside me — not desire, exactly, but curiosity. A cruel kind of curiosity that wanted to test something.

Before I could even process what was happening, Stephen moved. One swift step closer, then another — and suddenly, I was pressed against the wall in a quiet corner near the restaurant’s hallway.

His hands framed my face, his breath mingling with mine, and then his lips were on me.

It wasn’t soft or hesitant. It was desperate — like he’d been holding it in for years, like this was the only way to tell me everything he couldn’t put into words. His mouth moved against mine with heat and intensity, and for a second, I let it happen.

But almost immediately, I knew.

It wasn’t the same.

I didn’t feel that spark — that unexplainable rush that came when Kevin touched me. My heart didn’t race for the right reasons. Instead, it just hurt — like I was trying to force myself to feel something that wasn’t there.

I placed my hand on Stephen’s chest and pushed him back gently.

He looked at me, breathing hard, confusion written all over his face. “What’s wrong?”

I shook my head, swallowing hard. “This was a mistake.”

The words tasted bitter in my mouth.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, but I didn’t let him. I pushed past him, my footsteps unsteady, my heart pounding too loud in my ears. I could still feel the ghost of his lips against mine, and it made me sick — not because it was bad, but because it confirmed what I already knew.

Stephen could never be Kevin. No one could.

I stepped out of the restaurant, the cool air hitting my face, and wiped my lips with the back of my hand. Shame burned through me, hot and suffocating.

What the hell was I thinking?

Letting him kiss me like that — knowing full well that no one could make me feel the way Kevin does.