magical. I didn’t want it to end.
Taggish took hold of my hips. I wasn’t the only one feeling that way.
“Now what?” he asked, surprising me with the straightforward question. But then, after everything we’d talked about, maybe not. He understood about taking risks.
I shrugged. I still had a few things to learn.
He moved one hand to my back, pulling me closer until our faces, our mouths, and eyes were only inches apart. “Don’t do that, Mara,” he murmured.
I knew exactly what he meant.
I chewed my lip. It was excruciating, this insecurity. But that was stupid. Here we stood, in the middle of the school parking lot no less, with our arms around each other. Anyone could see us. Taggish didn’t seem to care.
It was my turn to take that leap. Before I could talk myself out of it, I closed the distance between us. We’d been kissing each other all day, enough that it felt familiar and new at the same time.
Taggish pulled me closer and inhaled deeply through his nose as his mouth stayed on mine. It felt as though he pulled me inside himself with the air.
I felt changed.
The day had changed things. But how much? Was it what I wanted? I had so many other things to think about—
“I can feel you worrying,” Taggish murmured against my lips.
“I wasn’t planning on this.”
He pulled his face back but kept his arms around my waist. “It’s a surprise to me, too.”
“Good surprise or bad surprise?”
“I want it to be good,” he admitted.
I felt a little thrill at his words. “So do I.”
Taggish kissed me again, a quick, hard kiss, before letting me go. He opened my door and shut it back again once I sat behind the wheel.
As I drove away from him, I wondered if I'd been dropped into an alternate universe, one where Taggish Morton and I were not only friends, but maybe something more.
He wasn't what I thought. He’d shown a side of himself to me I knew he hid from the rest of the world. He’d been sweet, sensitive, and more insightful than I ever could have imagined. He’d been through terrible things, experienced deep pain. He wasn’t the shallow charmer he appeared to be, the one I’d believed him to be.
All of this made him impossible to dislike when I’d been perfectly happy to do so just a few weeks ago.
I’d have to think more about that later. First, I had to face my parents. Dad would still be at work, but I knew Mom would be home. I wasn’t necessarily late getting home from school, but it was later than usual. She would wonder about it, especially after the detention debacle. I was just glad Matt and Marie weren’t at the house to tease me. Dealing with Mom would be difficult enough.
Sitting in the driveway, working up the nerve to go inside, I experienced the sickeningly dreadful anticipation I so desperately hated. This was the emotion, the feeling I’d worked so hard to avoid all my life. Did that make me a coward? Weak? Or was I smart to avoid it? I hated the idea of disappointing my parents, or anyone for that matter. What had Taggish asked me earlier? Would the consequence of skipping school be worth it?
I thought back over the day with him. We’d gone hiking and swimming. Those activities in and of themselves wouldn’t have been enough to make this moment worth it. But he had been worth it. Which only proved there were some things, some people, in this life worth breaking the rules for.
Who would have known Taggish would be one of them for me?
After swallowing back a bitter mouthful of anxiety, I went inside the house. Mom was in the kitchen stirring something in the crock-pot.
“Something smells good.” I inhaled appreciatively and opened the refrigerator, looking for something cold to drink.
“I made stew earlier,” she remarked and set the lid back on the crock-pot. Mom worked part-time at the library. She loved reading and the fact that working at the library ensured she never missed a good book.
“Anything exciting happen at the library today?” The public library had a computer lab, free for anyone to use. Sometimes, there were shady characters who dropped in and made a ruckus—or at least an interesting story.
“Not unless you count a new shipment of books that needed cataloging.”
“Ugh. I don’t.” I sat on a stool at the island and watched as she filled her stand mixer with ingredients for dinner