Kate looks between the two of us, shaking her head. “That’s unnecessary. I’m sure you have better…”
“I’m going there anyway.”
“See? No need to go alone.” Becky smiles brightly. “I’ll see you guys later, then.”
Everybody waves their goodbyes as they go to their next class.
Shifting my weight from one leg to another, I hoist the strap of my backpack higher. “Is it me, or are you usually this stubborn?” I ask, the question nagging at me from earlier.
“I’m pretty sure I’m capable of finding my own way to the classroom. It has nothing to do with you.”
To prove her point, she starts walking. In the wrong direction, no less. My lips twitch, but I school my features as I hurry after her.
“Are you telling me if it were Becky who shared the next class with you, you’d have tried to get rid of her too?”
She turns over her shoulder and glares at me. “Of course not!”
“Then it is me,” I point out, unsure if I’m happy or disappointed with the confirmation of my suspicion.
“Ugh.” Kate stops in her tracks for a moment. “Are you usually this infuriating, or is it me?”
This time I can’t help the grin that spreads over my lips. “What can I say? You bring out the best in people.”
Kate narrows her eyes at me. “Does everybody usually fall at your feet?”
“Umm… Usually, yeah.”
Just not her, apparently, literal falling not included.
“I’m not one of your groupies.”
My brows shoot up. “Never said you were. Besides, how do you even know I have groupies?”
“Don’t all football players have groupies?” She waves her hand. “Doesn’t matter. Either way, you can ease up on the charm; it’s not going to work on me.”
I look around. “What charm?”
“That charm.” She points at my face. “Right there.”
“My face? What’s wrong with it?”
“Not just your face, but the whole package. Those eyes and that smug grin, ugh.”
I chuckle. The grip that was clenching around my gut easing a bit as the meaning of her words set in. “What you wanna say is, you like me, but you don’t want to like me?”
Kate huffs, crossing her arms over her chest defensively. “I don’t like you.”
“Say that again.” My grin grows wider. “Try being convincing this time around, Kitty.”
She presses her lips in a tight line. “I’m serious.”
“Mm-hmm…”
The warning bell rings.
“We should go. I don’t want to be late on the first day.”
She turns around and continues walking.
I shake my head at her retreating back, laughing quietly. That girl is something else.
“Kitty?” I call after her.
“I’m serious, Emmett, I can’t…” She turns around and finds me standing in the spot where she left me.
“What are you doing? We’re going to be la—”
“Late if you keep going in the wrong direction,” I finish for her. “I know.”
Kate blinks, looks in the direction she was going, and then back at me. “You’ve gotta be shitting me.”
“Afraid not.” I laugh. “C’mon. As you keep pointing out, you don’t want to be late.”
She turns on her feet and sashays toward me. Her footsteps are long, hips swaying from side to side as she crosses the distance between us. For a while, I think she’ll power through me, but she stops when we’re toe to toe, jabbing her finger in my chest. “You did this on purpose.”
“Who? Me?” I give her my most innocent smile. “I thought you said you know where you’re going.”
“I. Hate. You,” she says, and to accentuate the statement, she pokes me in the chest with each word.
Laughing, I wrap my fingers around her wrist, stopping her from making a hole in my chest.
“Keep trying, Kitty. Keep trying.” With her hand safely in mine, I pull her in the right direction. “Let’s go. Time’s a wastin’.”
Chapter Four
KATHERINE
“Morning,” I say as I enter the kitchen and go straight for the coffee maker.
“Good morning.” Aunt Mabel turns around and leans against the sink. “Did you sleep well?”
“‘S okay,” I mumble, grabbing the biggest cup out of the cabinet and pouring the black gold. I drop two sugars into it, then a dash of creamer, stirring the contents before taking a sip.
Heaven.
“Your light was on until late.”
I look up at her, surprised by her comment. There is nothing in the way she says it that demands attention. She isn’t reprimanding me or nagging, but it still makes me feel unsettled. I’m not used to people actually… caring. Even using the word feels weird in my mind.
Don’t get me wrong; I know Mom loves me. That was never the issue. But she’s always been too stuck in her own world to ask questions. Random, boring mom questions that I so often hear my classmates complain about. With her, there’s always something, her new boyfriend, her asshole boss, or a role she was preparing for and was certain she’d get when she never did.
Mabel is her complete opposite. There are some physical similarities, like our dark blue, almost purple eyes. Bluebonnet eyes, Mom always said. One trait that all Adams girls share. Aunt Mabel also has the same brown hair like Mom and me, only hers is cut in a short, practical bob and is streaked with a few grays, something Mom wouldn’t ever let happen. Hell, she’s been coloring it platinum for the last decade, insisting blondes are more popular in Hollywood. But Mabel isn’t Mom. She’s older, dependable, practical. Everything I wish Mom was, but know she never will be.
“Yeah.” I run my free hand through my messy hair. “I was working on some homework.”
And then I couldn’t fall asleep because my thoughts were filled with a boy. And not just any boy.
Emmett.
The way he smiled at me, his eyes crinkling in the corners. The warmth of his hand as it enveloped mine when he pulled me to the classroom. Just thinking about it makes my heart race faster.
“That’s good.” Mabel nods, taking a sip of her coffee. “How’s school going?”
“It’s okay.” I shrug, not really knowing what to say. School’s school. “Different.”
Mabel smiles softly, almost regretfully. “Not really used to small-town life, huh?”
“No.” I shake my head. “I guess not.”
Mom left Bluebonnet Creek the day she turned eighteen, and she never looked back; at least that’s the story she always tells.
We’ve never come here, not even for a short visit. There was always something. Either Mom was too busy with her work, too stuck on her flavor of the month, we were at school, or we didn’t have enough cash to fly here, and the bus ride just takes too damn long. There was always something.
I didn’t question it—after all, you can’t miss something you never knew existed. Until things with Penny, my younger sister, went south this past spring, and this small town seemed like the perfect place to escape to.