way so it won’t rattle around once we’re on the road. “It’s a board that you ride on the snow with.”
I punch him in the gut. “Yeah, dummy, I know what a snowboard is. I’m just wondering why you’re bringing it.”
“Because there will be snow.” His eyes are so blue, and even when he smiles and they’re just slivers on his face, their intensity is still shocking.
“Yeah, I know there will be snow. I just don’t plan to actually go out in it.”
Ran yanks the keys from my hand and holds open the passenger side door to my truck so I can slide in. I shove my suitcase over with my feet to make room for them. “So you would choose sitting in a house with all those people you supposedly hate all weekend over riding down the slopes with me?”
I straighten my mouth and crease my brow. “Is it an option to do neither?”
Ran joins me in the cab of the truck and drapes his arm across the seat as he looks over his shoulder to back out of the driveway. “No, it’s not an option. Either you spend an incredible afternoon with me, learning how to navigate the slopes dusted in amazing, fresh powder, or you spend it with your lying mother, her annoying husband, and their perfect children—in your words, of course.”
“It really isn’t fair the way you phrased that, Ran.”
“Getting a taste of your own medicine, Little Miss Word Manipulator?” He squeezes just above my knee and smirks that unfair grin of his.
“Oh,” I say, mockingly, “I forgot to tell you. I took your suggestion and switched to linguistics for my major.”
“Very funny,” Ran says, his eyes focused on the road. The sky is overcast; threatening clouds hang over the city like a thin blanket of gray. I’m sure the higher up the hill we go, the more likely the chance for snow. I’m glad I decided to throw the chains in the back at the last minute. “What is your major anyway?”
“Undecided.”
Ran’s mouth opens slightly and he nods. “Why am I’m not surprised?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I shoot him a glare even though he can’t see it since his eyes are fixed on the road ahead. I’m pretty sure my tone indicates there is one attached to my words.
“You seem undecided about a lot of things.”
“Well, I’m definitely not undecided about the fact that you are incredibly—”
“Handsome,” Ran interjects, coasting the truck onto the freeway. He glances over his shoulder as he changes lanes and dares to give me a coy smile when his eyes meet mine on their way back to look out the front windshield.
“No, incredibly—”
“Irresistible.”
I huff loudly. “No. Incredibly—”
“Sexy. Geez, Maggie, will you just spit it out already?”
I try to muster a good comeback to throw at him, but he’s gotten me all disoriented with his assertions that he’s handsome, irresistible, and sexy, because he’s all of those things.
“And you think you’re not?” He turns his head my direction. “I have to try to focus on the road for the next two hours and you go and wear your hair like that? Do you want us to get in an accident?”
“My hair?” I laugh, curling the end of my ponytail around my finger. There’s nothing at all special about my hair today. “This ponytail distracts you?”
“Your neck distracts me, Maggie.”
“Well, that’s just crazy.” I intentionally wrap a strand of hair around my finger slowly so he can see it this time. His lips purse into a disapproving line. “Honestly, I wore a ponytail because I didn’t take a shower this morning.”
“I thought we discussed your dirty neck situation already.”
“Shut it, Ran.”
He gives up the fight and drops his eyes back onto the stretch of highway ahead, keeping the steering wheel balanced between his hands and his knee. We’re in gridlocked traffic, everyone else in town heading to the snow for the holiday break, too. We’ll probably spend the better half of the day making a drive that should normally take us under two hours. The idea of being trapped with Ran in the truck for so long has never been such a welcome thought.
We soon discover that a working radio was not on the list of car buying criteria for Mikey when he selected the Ranger, because for over an hour we have nothing to choose from but two stations that seem to only play music from mariachi bands. Ran belts loudly in Spanish, repeating the words