Текст книги "Double Clutch"

Автор книги: Лиз Реинхардт

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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 18 страниц)

“I’ll text Kelsie and tell her so they can meet us after if they want,” I said, and even as my thumb danced over the keys, I felt a slow burn of satisfaction when I imagined Saxon sitting in the theater, plotting. I wouldn’t think of him, even once for the next two hours. “Done. Let’s go.”

“Where is this place?” He zipped up his coat.

“Right around the corner.” I put on my scarf and hat.

“Wait a minute.” He slid his phone out of his pocket, held it up, and aimed at me. “You look really cute. I’m going to take a picture of you. Smile.”

I did and he snapped the photo, then turned it so I could see.

“I do look pretty cute. Come to think of it, so do you.” I slid my phone on. “Smile,” I ordered. He did, and the picture of him was perfect.

“Wow.” He studied the shot over my shoulder. “That chip in my tooth is huge.”

“No it isn’t.” I kissed his chin. “It adds character.”

“Well, enjoy it while it lasts. Once I get a job with some dental coverage, I’m getting rid of all of this character.” We ran out of the lobby and were in the chilly afternoon before I could ask him why his dad didn’t cover him dentally and when the last time he’d been to the dentist was.

I was coming to realize anything I thought I wanted to ask Jake, I probably didn’t, both because I wouldn’t like the answer and because he wouldn’t want to talk about it with me.

We ran down the street. I liked the way the wind blew my hair back, and I had to swing my hand up to the top of my head to keep my hat from flying off. Jake’s boots thumped on the pavement next to me, and if I could have taken those few seconds and folded them up to keep, I would have. They were pretty much as close to perfection as I’ve ever gotten in my life. It felt like I was running right on the line between being a little kid and being an adult. I felt free and happy and giddy, but also loved and wanted and wanting all at once. The air in our lungs made our hearts beat hard and fast and our skin turned pink and went cool.

It was over almost before it started. Suddenly we were over the line and nearer to being adults, and that had its own appeal.

The restaurant was dim and warmly romantic, complete with a bubbling mountain fountain peppered with little porcelain pagoda houses and Chinese fishermen and women all over it. Red paper lanterns with gold symbols and tassels hung from the ceilings, and there were two walls of tiny booths and a few tables scattered in the middle of the room. A girl with shiny black hair and large yellow teeth brought us to one of the booths and set menus in front of us.

Jake shrugged out of his coat, and I watched the way he moved out of his clothes with a particular interest that reflected deeper things I wanted and felt.

“Do you come here a lot?” He glanced around at the scrolls on the walls and the glossy menus.

“No. When I was younger we did. Thorsten thinks they serve cat meat.” I flipped open the menu and thought about what delicious meal I wanted, unworried about my stepfather’s culinary prejudices.

“Thorsten?”

“My dad,” I said, not realizing I referred to Fa by his given name. That’s just how I thought of him.

“Is he your real dad?” Jake moved the silverware back and forth with his fingertips.

I was almost offended, but I reminded myself this was Jake asking me. There was no one who deserved to know more about me than he did. “No. I’ve never met my real dad. Mom and Thorsten got together when I was in elementary school. He’s awesome.” My words came out really clipped, even though I didn’t mean for them to. Jake poured his heart out to me two nights before; I could certainly fill him in on the basics without getting snippy.

“I bet he’s cool. I mean, he picked you and your mom, right? Obviously smart.” He studied the menu with serious eyes.

“You’ve never met my mom,” I pointed out.

“I saw her today.” He never took his eyes off of the menu.

“No.” I shook my head. “You weren’t there until after she dropped me off. You couldn’t have seen her.”

He looked up from the menu and right at me. “I was there.”

“But you didn’t come out to meet me.” I felt a little burr of nastiness. “I looked for you.”

“I was watching you.” His eyes were dark and serious.

“Why?”

“Because you’re pretty.” He stated it like it was simple fact. It made me feel a warm, tingly rash over my skin. “Because I love the way you walk and how your hair is.”

“How it is?” I teased.

“Like long and always moving around. Like a wave. Or grass. Long grass. It doesn’t sound flattering, not like I meant it to.” His face showed the frustration I imagined he felt.

“I’m pretty flattered.” I blushed at the difficulty of talking this honestly about things you don’t usually talk about. “I love when the wind blows the grass and it all ripples in a pattern. It’s beautiful.”

“I’m sorry you have to take my weird compliments and try to make them sound normal.” He cleared his throat and pointed to the menu. “Did you ever eat the spring rolls here?”

“I completely love your weird compliments.” I contemplated the menu, squinting a little as if I could make the tastiest thing pop out from the paper. “The spring rolls here are the best. Let’s get two combo platters.”

“Alright.”

“We’ll share. I want cream cheese wontons and sweet and sour chicken. What do you want?” I looked at Jake, and he looked uncomfortable, like he’d never ordered a plate of food from a restaurant. “Do you want me to recommend something?”

“Just order for me.” He leaned across the table and spoke low, his eyes pleading.

The waitress came over, and I nodded to Jake. “Hello,” I greeted her. “We’ll have two combo platters, please. I would like cream cheese wontons and sweet and sour chicken. The gentleman will have the spring rolls and beef and broccoli. And we’ll both have Cokes. Thank you.”

His body actually sagged with relief as she walked away from the table. “Thank you. I get so freaked out at restaurants.”

“Really?” I was completely shocked to hear this confession. “Don’t you race dirt bikes? How could that be less scary than ordering food?”

“I’ve hardly ever been out to a restaurant, but I got my first dirt bike when I was four.” He unrolled his napkin and balled up the paper napkin holder. “So I guess it’s just what I’m comfortable with.”

Mom and Thorsten took me out at least a few times a month, and I had eaten in some of the fanciest restaurants in the country, the ones that had extremely serious, trained waiters, professional runners for your food, and people whose only job was to refill your water.

“Well, next time we go out, you’ll have to practice ordering.” I folded my hands on the table like I just made an executive business decision.

“So are you asking me on a second date?” He crossed his arms and leaned back, a huge smile on his face.

“Oh yeah.” I narrowed my eyes and gave him an evil grin. “But just as a charity thing. You know, take a clueless guy out and teach him how to order food at a restaurant. You’re practically community service for me.”

He laughed, and when the waitress set our glasses down, he blew the straw wrapper at me.

It was nice to eat with him, scooping things off of his plate across the table and showing him how to hold the chopsticks I’d requested. I laughed every time they leapt out of his hands and flew across the table.

“I’d starve to death in China.” He picked up the thin pieces of wood for the thousandth time.

“C’mon, you’re not so bad.” I watched him grab a piece of broccoli and open his mouth, only to have it slip out of the grasp of his sticks before he could get it in. I reached across the table and grabbed the piece tightly with my chopsticks, then lifted it helpfully to his mouth. He opened obligingly and ate.

“I might not starve if you were there to toss things in my mouth every once in a while.” He wiped some soy sauce off the side of his mouth with a napkin.

“I’d do it for you. That’s just how much I like you.” I pointed my chopsticks at him. “You’d better be willing to do something for me in return.”

I saw a gleam in his eyes that made me realize he was thinking something completely different than what I meant. “Oh, I think I’d be able to figure something out.”

“Maybe you can support us in China by being, like, a male geisha,” I suggested and raised my eyebrows.

“What’s a geisha?” His face was adorably suspicious.

“It’s like an entertaining woman, and they‘re actually Japanese. You know, the ones who wear the white face paint and kimonos. They hang out with important men and sing and joke and play instruments.”

“But they’re girls,” he said uncertainly.

“Yes,” I sighed. “But they’re supposed to be really attractive and people pay good money to have them around. That’s why you’d be a good one. Cause you’re a little bit of a man whore.”

He laughed. “Not anymore. Do geishas sleep with the guys?”

“No. I mean, they’re not nuns, but they aren’t expected to sleep with any clients unless they want to.” I placed the chopsticks neatly on the edge of my plate, empty except for a few grains of soy-sauce-soaked rice.

The waitress brought us the bill with two fortune cookies on top. I snapped it up, and knew I could afford it all with the tip because I had ordered everything. I put the twenty down and got up to leave.

“So what will you do while I’m a male geisha in China?” He helped me into my coat and wrapped my scarf around my neck.

“I’ll teach little Chinese kids to speak English.” I put my hat on my head and walked out the door Jake held for me.

“That doesn’t really sound fair.” He put his hand on the small of my back, keeping me from getting too close to the curb I was nowhere near too close to.

“Look, you have to shake what your mama gave you, in every sense. You’re the looks, so I’ll have to be the brains. Or the muscle.” I closed my fist and popped my tiny bicep. Jake squeezed it appreciatively.

“I guess you could take a few thugs out with those.” He wrapped his arms around me and his body blocked the cutting wind.

We were just about to kiss again when I heard Kelsie’s voice.

“Hey Brenna! Jake! What happened? Did you feel okay?” The Chinese food place was right down the street from the theater, and we must have timed our meal perfectly with the end of the movie.

“Brenna felt dizzy. I thought she might need a meal,” Jake covered for me.

“That was nice of you to watch out for Brenna,” Kelsie said, her voice overly sweet. I scowled at her. Her smile widened.

“No problem,” he mumbled.

“I know you guys ate, but we were going to head out and get something to eat at the diner. Do you guys want to come just to hang out?” I saw Chris and the other guy whose name I couldn’t remember. Kelsie noticed me looking right away. “Saxon and those two girls he dragged along left before the movie started. We thought they might have gone with you two, but I guess not.” She shrugged. “You two in?”

“I can stay longer.” Jake looked at me.

“I told Mom we might head out to eat after the movie.” I was still reeling a little from the news of Saxon’s exit. Did he see me and Jake leave? Did he have it planned from the start? Had I made a decision to outsmart Saxon only to get outsmarted?

I was more than a little disgusted. My point had been to not think of him at all and then gloat about it to his face.

We walked along the sidewalk, towards the diner. The guys discussed the upcoming Folly show.

“I listened to your album the other day,” I said to Chris. “I thought it was really good.”

“Awesome.” He pointed at me. “I hear you’re a crazy artist.”

“Maybe. I heard you need some designs.” I felt a swell of pride when I thought about myself as an artist. I liked it.

“Yeah, people have been asking for shirts at our shows. If you’ve even got a sketch or a digital image, we can get them screen printed, and we’d give you a cut of anything we make. Like royalties.” Chris pushed his glasses up onto the bridge of his nose, and I saw what attracted Kelsie to him. He was handsome in that lean, serious-faced, artistic way.

“I’ll have something to you by the end of the week.” A job! I had an actual job that I was excited about.

“Cool.” He looked at me like he had confidence in my promise to deliver. “I’ll introduce you to the band when we see each other at school.”

He responded to something Kelsie said, and I noticed Jake hanging back.

“You okay?” I took his hand in mine.

“Yeah.” He squeezed my hand. “You’re going to be famous soon, huh?”

“My design might be,” I said breezily. “Are you already buckling under the pressure of being part of a celebrity couple?”

Whoops. The words were out of my mouth before I thought much about them. Honestly, it was just a funny thing to say. I looked at Jake, wondering what I should say now. We were at the diner, and I motioned for Kelsie to go in without us.

“Are you asking me to be your boyfriend, Brenna?” Jake’s face was way too delighted for his own good.

“Nope.” I turned my nose up at him. “I never ask guys out.”

“Really? Because I think you just asked me out.”

“No I did not. You misinterpreted. That happens a lot. My jokes are very high brow.”

“Or just not that funny.”

I jabbed him with my elbow and he laughed.

And that’s when I knew for sure we should be dating.

“I did not ask you out. But I would seriously think about not shooting you down if you asked me. Nicely.” I had to keep my pride.

He took both of my hands in his. “Brenna Blixen will you be my girlfriend, please.” He held up one of my hands and kissed my knuckles smoothly. “Pretty please. With sugar on top.”

“That was really nice.” I tried to keep my voice light and calm, but there was a knot in my throat. “I’ll do it.”

“Let’s celebrate,” he suggested, his voice low and perfect. He pulled me close and kissed me, and his mouth felt extra warm and soft in the bitter autumn wind outside of the diner. We kept it relatively quick. We were on the sidewalk outside of a diner for God’s sake!

“I like a celebration kiss, but some celebration pie would be even better. But I’m broke.” I remembered too late that I was tapped.

“Good thing your new boyfriend is a high roller.” Jake’s smile so big and happy I was starting to forget what his expression looked like when he wasn’t smiling that big, goofy grin. We sat at the table with the others, and a young waitress in extremely tight pants hurried over as soon as she saw Jake sit.

“Can I help you?” She leaned over to better expose her already overexposed cleavage.

He looked right at me and winked. Then he took a deep breath and smiled at the waitress. “The lady and I will each have a slice of apple pie a la mode. And two Cokes please.” He handed her the menus with that goofy grin still overwhelming his entire face.

Kelsie gave me a curious glance, but all I could do was mouth ‘later’ across the table. Under the glossy, black-speckled laminate booth top, Jake grabbed my hand and squeezed it in his hard. We ate our celebratory pie and joked with the others, and soon it was time to leave. I had to call Mom, even though I just wanted to stay with Jake all day. And all night, too, if I was honest about it.

But that wasn’t possible, and I knew Mom would have already been home most of today by herself. It was horrible to think about her eating all alone. So I told Jake I had to call her, and I did.

She sounded glad to hear from me, and she said she’d be happy to pick me up at the diner. She would be there in fifteen minutes. Everyone else was slowly starting to trickle out and go home, too.

Jake sat in the diner lobby with me, facing the windows so I could see Mom’s car when she pulled up. He put his arm around my shoulders.

“Awesome day.” He took a deep breath and looked very self-satisfied.

“It was pretty good.” I grabbed him and squeezed him hard. “I’ll see you tomorrow at school.”

“You’re not calling me tonight?” He looked surprised.

“I’ll call, but we can’t talk too long. And I have to call after Mom goes to bed. We watch shows on TV together and talk, and I can’t miss out on that.” I wanted to, and felt ridden with guilt for even thinking that way. My mother had raised me for fifteen years; I had known Jake for less than a week. It wasn’t a question of loyalty, because Mom would win hands down. It was just who I had a craving to be with. Guilty as it made me feel, that was definitely Jake.

“I wouldn’t want you to.” Suddenly he moved away from me. “Mom’s here.” He kissed my cheek quickly. “Get going.”

“How are you getting home?” I asked as I put my scarf and hat on.

“I’m getting a ride,” he said vaguely. “Take care, Brenna. I’ll talk to you later.”

I didn’t like his answer, but that was nothing new. Jake was always giving me answers I didn’t like, or I was always coming to conclusions about him that were probably right, but that made me sad.

“Take care.” I cupped his face and kissed him quickly on the lips before I hurried out to Mom’s car. When I glanced back at the windows of the diner, they were so reflective I couldn’t see anything but my own face staring back at me. That was good because it meant Mom hadn’t seen Jake or his kiss, but it also meant I couldn’t see Jake as we pulled away.

“Was it fun?” Mom asked after I slid in and buckled my seatbelt securely.

“Yeah. It was really cool to see the movies on the big screen.”

“Who went?” Mom asked.

“Kelsie and a bunch of kids from school she knows. We didn’t get to talk too much because we were in a theatre.” It was easier to lie to my mom if some of what I lied about was true.

“I’m glad you’re hanging out with friends already.” Mom paused. “Bren, I’ve been thinking about something and I wanted to run it by you.”

“Okay.” I could tell she was nervous from the way she held tight to the steering wheel.

“I think I might like to take a job at the community college.” Mom glanced in the rearview mirror, then over at me.

“Mom that’s great!” Mom had gotten her Masters in Art History before we left for Denmark, and she had been working towards her PhD for a long time. “Maybe you can work on finishing your thesis.”

“I thought that. The thing is, I would have to pick up a night class or two, and I hate for you to be alone until after nine on a school night.” Her perfect eyebrows pulled together on her forehead.

“Mom, it’s fine,” I assured her. “I’ll have homework most nights anyway. And I’ve been thinking about joining track. I might not be around all that much.”

“But you still need me,” Mom said, and I felt a lump in my throat, because I knew she loved that aspect of our relationship.

“You’re my mom.” I wanted to reassure her how much I loved her. “I’ll need you forever. But I don’t need you every minute. And you and I have cell phones. The community college is only twenty minutes away from our house. And I know all of the neighbors. You have to do this, Mom. You’re such a good teacher, and the community college kids especially need really good professors.”

Her forehead smoothed and her eyebrows returned to their rightful place like twin birds’ wings over her blue-gray eyes. “You’re the best, Bren. How’d I get such an excellent kid?”

“Good genes?”

She reached across the center console and patted me on the knee. “You got that right.”

We got home and I did some reading in my Kingsolver, since I hadn’t had a chance before. My room looked amazing. I was so impressed with how it had turned out, and having a really beautiful room made it much easier to hole up in there. Not that I needed any excuse. I’d loved being alone in my room since long before I’d had a boy to moon over. I popped open my laptop and transferred the picture of Jake from my phone to the computer, then ran it through my photoshop program. I cleaned it up and made it black and white since the color was terrible. I hooked my laptop to my photo printer and printed it out.

Just looking at it made me feel light and bubbly. I put it in my book as a bookmark, not wanting to leave it out in case Mom or Thorsten came in for something. There were a lot of reasons I didn’t want to talk to them about Jake, but a really major one was I simply didn’t know how they’d feel about me having a boyfriend at all. So I took the path of least resistance and didn’t mention him.

Mom and I ate a small dinner in the living room, our plates on the coffee table. We watched some detective show Mom had gotten addicted to, but I could never follow. Then she stretched and yawned and told me she had a good book and was heading to bed.

“Love you.” She kissed me. I told her I loved her too, and waited a minute before I switched off the TV and put the plates in the dishwasher. Then I went to my room, trying not to hurry too much because I wanted to savor this time before I called him. It was almost torturous. I washed up and got my pajamas on, and sat on my bed, staring at my phone until I couldn’t wait one more second.

“Brenna.” His voice sounded sleepy already.

“Hey Jake.” I snuggled down in my bed. “How are you?”

“Pretty great. I got this amazing girl to agree to date me today.”

“Really? Was she super desperate?” I teased.

“Oh, yeah. She couldn’t keep her hands off of me during the whole date. Poor thing. I think she’s obsessed.”

I liked the fact that we could joke about being together. I was dreading the idea that it might get too serious or too sappy. I really didn’t know anything about dating or having a boyfriend. Every single thing was new for me. “You sound tired, Jake.”

“Not too tired to talk to you,” he said and yawned.

“I think you’re too tired to be awake at all.” I flipped open my book and traced the picture of him smiling at me in black and white.

“You took too long to call me,” he accused, his voice sweet.

“I wanted to savor it,” I said quietly, now embarrassed.

“You’re pretty seriously adorable.” The need for sleep made him suddenly punchy.

“You’re quite deliciously irresistible yourself,” I whispered. “Bedtime, Jake.”

“Tell me you can’t live without me,” he insisted.

“I’m having trouble pulling in a breath unless I’m looking at your picture,” I lied, but it wasn‘t a huge lie.

“You have a picture of me?” he asked, surprised.

“The one from today. From the movie theater lobby.”

“The one with my big ol’ chipped tooth?” His voice was slurred with drowsiness.

“That’s the one.”

“You like that picture?” He sounded astonished.

“You look good.”

“Brenna.” My name was a sigh on his lips. “How do you see good when you see me?”

“Because you’re good,” I said simply. “And that’s it. Good night Jake.”

“If I’m good, you’re a thousand times better than the best,” he said sleepily.

“Good night, Jake,” I repeated, thinking about his head on a pillow, the phone loose in his hand.

“Good night, Brenna. I’ll be there tomorrow.”

“Okay. Me too. Sleep.” I clicked my phone off.

Chapter 8

And just like that, my world started to spin slowly around Jake Kelly. He was my boyfriend, but more than I’d ever thought a boyfriend could be. Because it wasn’t all about being physical, even though I loved that aspect, and Jake was always respectful of my lack of experience and my wariness to go farther, to the places he’d been so many times without really thinking about it much at all. School centered around looking forward to Jake and avoiding Saxon.

After the weekend at the movies, Saxon was completely quiet and cold to me in school. We didn’t walk to class together anymore, and the only reason I still sat at his lunch table was that it was too awkward to try to find other friends to sit with. I didn’t know that many people in the school, and since most of the kids had already clumped together in their strangely unbreakable clans as soon as the year began, they weren’t very willing to change.

The best part of my day was just after lunch when I got on my bike and headed to Tech, even though the weather was increasingly colder and the wind bit angrily through all of my layers. I pushed my feet against the pedals, willing my body closer to Jake. Unlike Saxon, Jake was someone I could work with easily. I loved when the two of us sat across from each other in companionable silence, grinning whenever our eyes met across the rough shop tables. Sometimes he would catch my leg under the table with the top of his boot and rub the rounded top of the boot along the bottom of my calf, up and down. He never looked at me when he did it, which made it even more adorable. I liked the feel of his slightly hard boot sliding up and down the soft curve of my leg.

He walked me out to my bike on a freezing Thursday afternoon. “It’s cold.” His teeth chattered a little.

“It’s not bad once you get going.” I tied my scarf firmly around my mouth and nose and pulled my hat down over my ears.

“You look like a snowman.” He reached out to tuck loose hairs back under my hat.

I knew he was worried about me, but that seemed so ridiculous. He was the one with the threadbare coat and holey hat. His boots were scuffed and the laces were fraying, and the denim of his pants was so soft it felt silky. I had no idea how he got to work or home, and I had no idea what his house was like once he got home. I didn’t know where he slept or if he even had his own room. Or bed. For all I knew he might be camped on his couch. Or worse.

I blinked those thoughts away, forcing a laugh at his joke. I was glad he couldn’t see much of my face with my entire anti-cold outfit on. “This snowman had better get going before Mama Snowman brings out the icy fury.”

“I can’t believe your mom is still cool with you riding to school,” Jake stalled.

I sighed. “C’mon, not you, too. I like it. It makes me feel very independent.”

“This winter is one of the coldest we’ve had in years, Brenna. You should hear the Zinga brothers bitching about the crops that got frosted. I can’t wait until I can drive you home.” He squinted at the sky. “It looks like snow. It smells like it too.” He gave me a worried look.

“Mom forbids biking in the snow. If it snows tomorrow, I take the bus,” I promised.

“It’s going to snow now,” he said, his legs spread over the front wheel of my bike, his hands gripping the handlebars. “Go home now.” He pulled the scarf down and kissed me, lightly, then with a little more hunger.

I leaned into him, trying to find the balance between quietly savoring the kiss and pressing in, tapping into the rush of feelings I had to keep bound inside. If I let go, went where my body begged me to, it was like a switch tripped in Jake’s head, and he backed off entirely. I had to play it just right, leading him in and making him forget what we were doing.

We were tangled around the cold metal frame of my bike, our arms and chests pressed together, our mouths and lips licking and sucking urgently. Then I shivered.

Just the tiniest imaginable shiver.

“Get going,” Jake barked. He pulled away and left me panting for more of him. Even as I sulked and snapped back that he wasn’t my keeper, I checked him out from under my eyelashes.

I knew why every girl we ever came within ten feet of pressed her breasts into his face and batted her eyelashes like she was having a facial spasm. He was the perfect mixture of pure angelic good boy and hot dangerous bad boy. He was sweet and mannered and romantic, but there was an edge to him that made me bristle and swoon at the same time. Swoon, just like Scarlett O’Hara. It was like I could imagine him carrying an old lady’s groceries to her car, but I could also picture him in a fist fight. And I wasn’t sure which image intrigued me more.

Sick, sick, sick. But I couldn’t lie about him. I felt my chest get hot and tight every time I thought of him. I was falling head over heels in love with Jake Kelly, and the feeling was better than anything I’d ever felt before.

“Bye,” I snapped, narrowed my eyes at him, and then I pretended I was going to pedal away even as I waited for the pull of his hand on my bike.

“Can’t let you go mad.” He pulled my bike back, just like I knew he would. Then he kissed my lips again gently. He fixed my scarf over my mouth and nose. “Brenna, you know you’re crazy, right?” His smile was so wide it crinkled his eyes, eyes as gray as this sky before the snow.

“I thought that was part of what drove you to me.” I was unable to resist him for even a minute. When Jake turned on his charm, I was defenseless.

“I want you to be safe.” He rubbed his red, chapped hand over my mittened one. “Look where you’re going and don’t make any stops.”

“I’m not an idiot, Jake,” I said through my scarf.

“I never said that,” Jake returned calmly. “Even pretty, smart girls can get caught in storms. Go.”

I dropped my hands from the bike and let it balance between my legs, threw him a hard hug, and darted away. I didn’t like to look back, because I knew exactly where Jake would be standing, watching me race away from him as he stood there, shivering until I was out of sight. Just because it happened every afternoon didn’t mean I wanted to see it.

Jake was right about the weather. As soon as I crested the hill beyond the school, snowflakes started to flurry and swirl. I felt a prickle of irritation. It wasn’t even winter yet. New Jersey was always cold, but this was just crazy. It was like even the weather was conspiring to keep me from riding to school.

I rode as hard I could and kept my eyes on the road without exception. I was just past Frankford when a car rambled too close to my side. I didn’t even have to look to know who it was.

I waved a hand to my side, flagging him away, but he crept dangerously close, refusing to back off. Finally I had to stop or risk being run into a deep, leaf-filled ditch on the side of the road.

I smacked my hand hard on the warm hood of his car in frustration, and Saxon gave me an amused grin from the interior. The smoke from his cigarette mixed with the swirling snowflakes and struck me as a weird combination of something so clean and cold and fresh with something so smoldering and dirty and choking.

“I’ll give you a ride.” It wasn’t a suggestion. As usual. Typical Saxon.

“No thanks. It’s getting worse, so why don’t you stop trying to drive me off of the road and let me go home?”

He took a long drag then flicked the finished cigarette out the window, the cherry bright orange and still smoldering. I made a face. There was nothing I hated more than seeing the ground littered with the dull brown filters of cigarettes.