Risking It All (Kingston Brothers #4) - Isabel Lucero Page 0,24
when I notice a couple girls approach him.
He’s been recognized.
As I get closer, he poses with them for a selfie, smiles that adorable fucking smile, and says something that makes them laugh.
“Still charming as ever, huh?”
His eyes find mine. “You tell me.”
I shake my head and playfully smack him on the shoulder. “Come on, rock star. Those girls are about to post those photos to social media, and everyone’s gonna come swarming.”
After we’re in the SUV, he just sits behind the wheel, not making a move to start it up.
“What’s up?”
Merrick shifts in his seat and faces me. “I don’t want to take you home yet.”
I glance at my watch. “It’s only nine o’clock, and it’s not like I have curfew anymore. What do you wanna do?”
That was the wrong question to ask, because when Merrick looks at me, his eyes are hooded, and nothing but lust-filled thoughts rest behind them. When he looks at my mouth, I unconsciously lick my lips.
“I don’t know. I don’t care, really. Nothing too public would be nice, though.”
“Well, I don’t know. We could just drive.”
I think briefly about saying we could go to my place, but that would definitely send a message that I’m not trying to send. I can tell Merrick’s got a lot of things on his mind, and I can try to be his friend again, but I’m not willing to put my heart on the line anymore.
“That’s fine,” he says, turning the key to crank the engine.
Merrick drives through our small town, and we reminisce about our childhood.
“Remember when we were parked in that little lot,” he says, pointing out a small spot near another park. “And we got so fucking high in the car, and then a cop pulled up?”
I laugh. “Oh, yeah! Shit, I was scared out of my mind.”
“I remember,” he says with a laugh. “I was so paranoid. I didn’t know if leaving would bring attention to us, but didn’t really want to stay there either. The car was smoked out!”
“Good thing that other car got his attention first.”
“Yeah, ’cause the windows were steamed up and the car was rockin’.”
“Teenagers are so stupid, man.”
“Aw, man. They closed down Box O Tacos?” he says, noticing the boarded up windows. “They had the best fucking Strawberry Mountain Dew and cheese sticks.”
“Wrong. They had the best Strawberry Sierra Mist, and you would always pull the cheese sticks open and only eat the cheese, like a fuckin’ weirdo.”
“Hey, man. Don’t judge me.”
After driving for another ten minutes or so, he pulls up to our old high school and puts the vehicle in park.
“So many memories here.”
“Yeah,” I agree. “There’s that table we used to sit on at lunch.”
He chews on his lip, fighting off a laugh. “That fucking table.” Before I can ask what he means, he goes on. “You see the alcove to the music building?”
“I see it.”
“That’s where we met.”
“What? Really?” I ask.
“You don’t remember?”
“I thought we met in English.”
“No. I was coming out of choir, but it was raining its ass off. I mean, you’d think we were in the middle of a hurricane or something, so I stayed in the alcove, looking at my schedule and map of the campus, trying to figure out where I needed to go. Right before I was about to make a run for it, you came darting around the building and into the alcove with me. You were drenched, looking like a drowned rat.” He laughs, shaking his head. “You looked up at me and gave me a lopsided grin and said, ‘The weatherman said there’s a slight chance of rain today.’ and I started cracking up. I don’t even know why I thought it was so funny, but I kept thinking about it the rest of the day.”
“You were so bundled up,” I say, remembering. “You had a hood on and it hung low over your forehead. That’s probably why I didn’t recognize you when I saw you in English.”
“And that picnic table,” he says, staring at it with a small grin on his face. “It was on that table that I realized I wanted to be more than your friend.”
He cuts his eyes at me nervously, gauging my reaction.
“Tell me.”
“We were both sitting on the tabletop with our feet on the bench. You were talking to someone else but I was staring at you the whole time. I watched that dimple appear when you laughed, and noticed every time you’d lick your lips. I remember thinking how