CHAPTER FOUR - Liar

It took me a minute to realize what I was doing.

Kissing Michael.

I jerked away and stared at him. Both of us were breathing hard, and he whispered, "I'm so sorry."

All I could do was stare at him. "I-"

He stood abruptly. "I get it if you don't want to talk to me anymore," he said. "I shouldn't have kissed you... I'm sorry."

Michael started walking back towards the way we came, but before he could disappear, I jumped up and grabbed his hand. "Wait," I said.

He raised an eyebrow. "What?"

I swallowed. My breathing was still uneven, and my heart was beating hard. "Um, I'm assuming the hike is over."

He smirked. "No shit."

I laughed breathlessly. "But we can still hang out, right?"

Michael looked surprised. "Do you still want to?"

I grinned at him. "You're not that bad of a kisser."

He flashed me a fleeting smile. "I still shouldn't have done that."

I pulled him closer to me so that he was in front of me, our toes touching. I was still holding onto his hand. "Promise me one thing."

"What?"

I looked straight into his eyes. "Nobody knows about anything that happened here."

Michael nodded. "Promise." He freed his hand from mine and looped our pinkies together. "Pinky promise," he said, and I laughed.

He gently squeezed my hand once before dropping it and starting to head back to the car. "Let's head back," he said. "Not much else to do in the great outdoors."

We walked back to the car in a comfortable silence. Having left the doors unlocked, Mikey opened the door and hopped in, already buckled and blasting the stereo by the time I got in.

"Someone's eager," I teased, and he shrugged.

"I like my music," he said, turning up the volume even more before driving out.

As we got closer to BCC, Michael got edgier. He turned his stereo down. He started to tap the steering wheel anxiously. After we'd parked, he slammed the door and aggressively hit the lock button on his car's remote.

"Is everything okay?" I asked, not understanding his sudden shift in mood. He seemed anxious to get away from me.

Weird, since he'd practically begged to kiss me earlier.

Michael nodded once. "Fine."

I grabbed his arm and yanked him to a stop. "Why are you getting closed off all of a sudden?"

His lips pressed into a tight line. "Regret."

I raised an eyebrow. "Regret? You regret telling me?"

"Yes."

I dropped his arm. "Well that's fucking fantastic. Nothing you can do about it now except for act like you hate me, right?" I muttered, walking past him back towards BCC, leaving him behind me.

I didn't hear Michael come up behind me. "Elle, it's not you-"

"Great," I snapped, not turning around.

His hand curled around my arm. "Hold on, please, let me explain."

I glared at him. "What?"

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, making it stick up in a distractingly attractive fashion. "It's not that I regret telling you. I just regret telling. In general."

I frowned and asked, "Why?"

Michael chewed his lip. "There are a lot of people who'd betray my trust," he muttered unwillingly. "And I'm just kinda scared that-"

I cut him off with a smile. "Who do I have to tell? Everyone who knows me knows you and knows everything already. And I wouldn't tell anyone anything. Promise."

He sighed. "I was really fucking scared, telling you."

My eyebrows knit together, and I repeated, "Telling me? Scared? Why?"

"I was scared you were gonna hate me afterwards," he admitted.

We continued walking into BCC. "Why would you be scared I'd hate you?" I murmured.

Michael shrugged. "I mean, you know. You don't really like me as it is, and by confirming that I was a player-"

"Was," I interrupted. "And that's what matters to me."

His eyebrows lifted in surprise. "That's really all that matters to you?"

"I have no reason to care about your past. Only as much as it affects me," I said. "Don't stress over it."

He sighed. "Elle, where the hell have you been my entire life?" he asked.

We were about to round the corner to the entrance to my cabin when Michael pushed me against the wall. "Michael?" I asked, feeling nervous.

"Don't worry," he whispered, leaning close. "Nobody will see us."

Like I was even thinking about that. He was right there.

I forced myself to breathe evenly. "That's not my problem."

His lips, inches from mine, curved up into a crooked smile. "What? I thought you said I wasn't a bad kisser," he murmured, bending his head so that his mouth was nearly against mine.

Breathing normally was no longer an option.

"I don't want-"

Michael abruptly let me go and stepped back. "If you don't want anything, I won't make you do anything." He bit his lip.

It was embarassing, standing there with my back against the wall, practically a hyperventilating mess just because he'd gotten close to me.

Damn, hormones.

I grabbed the front of his shirt in my hand and pulled him closer to me so that we were nose to nose. "Next time you decide to be a tease, give me a warning," I said, winking and letting him go.

Michael growled, "Damn it, I thought I was going to get to kiss you again."

I rolled my eyes and started walking to the door. "Yeah, yeah, maybe later."

I could hear the grin in his voice. "Count on it."

I flipped him off, gave him a smile, and walked into the cabin. It was so much easier to be myself around him.

Only to find Kat sitting on her bunk, staring at me.

Startled, I said, "Kat, what are you doing here?" I was flustered. "I thought you were all at the beach?"

"Turns out, I've got a new curfew this year," she muttered, her mouth twisting sourly. "No beach for Kat."

Hoping she hadn't heard anything from outside, I said, "That sucks. They're really doing that?"

"That was an awfully short hike you had," Kat mused, and I froze in the middle of finding a more comfortable outfit.

I looked up from the drawers. "Well, yeah. My dat- erm, ride wanted to head back early," I said, averting my eyes back to my clothes, shifting through them without seeing them.

Kat said, "You and Michael hit it off really quickly, didn't you?"

I was silent.

Kat continued, "Yeah, he's like that. Charming. Endearing. So, so bad, so twisted that you can't help but want to make him good. He's a player, but you just want to try and make him yours. He's a challenge, and it's appealing."

I swallowed hard. "Sounds like you have experience," I muttered, changing into a t-shirt and shorts.

"Too much experience," she said with a sigh. "I tried, Elle, you know? I tried to make him better. I tried to get him to stop sleeping around, but he just can't do it. It's who he is. He can't change."

"But you still like him." The words flew out of my mouth before I could think about them.

Kat laughed. "I guess I do. I don't know. Maybe because he's one of the few people I actually liked sleeping wit-"

"Michael said you guys never slept together," I interrupted. "That you guys just messed around about it but never actually did it."

Kat raised an eyebrow. "Did he really? That dirty bastard!"

"Sorry?"

Kat's dark eyes were solemn. "He's a liar, Elle. I know he's attractive, God do I know, but please save yourself. He's a liar, a cheater, and he won't change. He refuses to. I think he gets as much of a thrill lying to girls as girls do trying to fix him. He's broken and nobody can fix him." she sighed. "I'm sorry if you liked him or something. I know I liked him immediately. We hooked up on our second day together. And then a couple times after that."

I dropped my dirty laundry into the bag and sat on my bed. "He lied to me."

"He lies to everyone, sweetie. Michael Clifford has never been honest in his life."

I looked up at her. "I refuse to believe that," I whispered. The way he'd looked in the woods, so open, so vulnerable, so honest...

He'd also been really earnest for me to believe that he and Kat had never slept together.

What the hell?

Kat sighed. "Believe it, girl. Yes, he's hot. He's a bad boy, he's a rebel. He actually deserves to be here. This place is the closest thing a screw up like him can have for redemption."

Michael Cifford.

Now the liar had a last name.

I shook my head. "But he kissed me."

"WHAT?" Kat yelped. She looked at me with wide eyes. "Wait, wait, wait. He kissed you?"

I nodded. "He took me out to the forest cos he knew I wanted to go hiking, and then he just kinda sat me down, told me why he came here, and then he kissed me!" I had no idea why I was telling Kat everything. I didn't open up to strangers. I didn't open up to people, period.

I was doing a lot of opening up today.

I was panicking. "I can't believe he would do that. But he acted like he cared! He's the only person who's ever even tried to show he cares and I thought he did." I deflated. "I thought he did..."

"He might, but not for anything more than getting in your pants," Kat said sadly. "He doesn't date. Not Michael Clifford. He sleeps with girls and then leaves them. Romance isn't in his vocabulary. You're either a screw or a nobody to him. There's nobody he really cares about."

"He cares about you guys?" I suggested, grasping at straws.

Kat laughed. "Ha! Have you seen the way he treats me? I'm an ex-screw, even lower than a screw. That bastard actually thinks I'd go and sleep with him if he asked. I think he's cute, yeah, and I try not to be bitter because I also slept with him, several times, but I mean... how can I not be bitter sometimes? And now I found out he's already going out with you when I slept with him just last week... Idiot."

"Kat, I'm so sorry."

Kat shook her head. "Don't worry about me. I know him. I might be powerless when I'm around him, but I always know it's nothing more than sleeping around. He messes with my body, I mess with his. But you... I think he's messing with your head."

"He is," I moaned, dropping my head into my hands. "What am I going to do about it?"

"Stay away from him. Please. I just... nobody else can get hurt by him. He's a douche and he doesn't deserve someone like you. He needs someone as screwed up as he is. He needs that."

I lay down. "I can't."

Kat sighed. "Think it over. We're going to be seeing everyone later at the mini-bonfire after dinner. You'd better come! It'll be so much fun. A roaring fire with marshmallows and chocolate and ooooh I think we might even-" she rambled, returning to the Kat that I remembered.

"Bonfire?"

"Michael will be there."

"Doesn't matter."

Kat said, "I think that you need to understand. Michael will do what it takes to hook up with you. He's been reading you lately. Trying to figure out the best way to lure you in. With me, its pick up lines. With Julianne, it's winking. Just too many damn games he plays. One day, he's gonna lose."

"I hope so."

Michael Clifford.

Well, at least now the bane of my existance has a last name.

[A/N Photo is Michael's expression when bantering with Elle]