Echoes Between Us - McGarry, Katie Page 0,59

for her job, even on Saturdays, but Lucy and I will come.”

That smile she unleashes is close to lethal. “Great! This is going to be so much fun! We play games and we have a question at the dinner table that everyone has to answer and there’s going to be pie! So much pie you’ll think you died and went to heaven.”

I pull up in front of her house, and there’s a strange combination of sadness and nerves. Something I’m unfamiliar with. I’m not ready for this night to be over. But it’s late, I have a curfew, and even though Veronica wears the most beautiful smile, there are dark circles under her eyes and her skin is a bit too pale—as if she needs to sleep for a week.

I turn off the engine, and there’s silence as we both stay seated in the car. I wonder what it means that she hasn’t jumped out yet. Maybe it doesn’t mean anything, but there’s a part of me that wants it to mean something because as weird as it is to admit—I like her. “I had fun.”

“Jumping off a cliff was fun?”

I smile to take the sting out of the truth. “That’s my every Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. I try to fit jumping in during the week when I can, but school often gets in the way.”

“School ruins everything,” she says.

“Yeah.” A pause on my end. “I meant what I said earlier. I like hanging out with you.”

There’s something in how her blue eyes soften that causes me to feel lost and then found. “I like hanging out with you, too.”

My head tilts, as I almost forgot. I dig into my jeans pocket and pull out her flower barrette. “When you were trying for EVPs that last time, I went over to check out where you fell and I found this.”

Her gorgeous mouth pops open into an adorable O. “Where did you find it? I looked everywhere on the ground for it.”

I shrug one shoulder like it wasn’t a big thing as she sweeps locks of her hair up to fasten the barrette into place. “It had fallen down the cliff. Not as far as we fell, but down a bit.”

“And you went for it?” Her voice rises in pitch as if she thinks I’m crazy. I am, but that would be news for her.

“It wasn’t a big deal. As I said, it wasn’t nearly as far down as we went and—”

I don’t get a chance to finish my sentence as Veronica launches herself across the console at me. Her arms around my neck, her soft body pressed to mine, the sweet scent of her hair and perfume filling my nose.

“Thank you,” she says against my neck. Her hot breath causes me to become warm, and the air surrounding us grows rich with electricity. “You have no idea how much this means to me. It’s like you’ve given me the world.”

I’m hesitant, so slow in moving because I don’t want to do anything that she doesn’t want, but I’ve been going crazy with the need to touch her nearly all evening. And with her arms still wrapped around me, with her head nuzzled intimately on my shoulder, her breath against my neck, I weave my arms around her and allow my hands on her back.

She sighs then, as if she’s happy, and she relaxes further into me. I close my eyes and hold on tighter. I never knew a hug could feel like this. Every cell in my body buzzes, and I’d give anything to turn my head and kiss her.

Veronica slowly edges back, but she doesn’t pull completely away. She keeps her hands on my shoulders as her eyes bore into mine. “You shouldn’t have done that. The ground could have given way again and you could have fallen into the river and it was pitch black and what if you had hit a rock on the way down and passed out and drowned and—”

“But I didn’t,” I cut her off. I glance down as I tell her more than I’ve ever told anyone else. “Sometimes a good adrenaline rush makes me feel alive.”

The humor in her eyes tells me she thinks I’m joking. “That’s insane.”

“That’s me.”

A renegade curl breaks loose from the barrette and bounces near her eye. I hold my breath as I capture the lock of hair and tuck it behind her ear. The air around us pops and sizzles as my fingers barely brush the