Kiss and Break Up - Ella Fields Page 0,5

the bikes that cost him a small fortune instead of playing video games. I didn’t take suggestions or reminders too well. So I guess you could say I didn’t take them at all. I rode when I wanted to and never when he pointed out that I should.

“Shit.” Lars spat on the ground, then stubbed out his cigarette.

I frowned, adjusting my gloves as he smashed down his helmet and threw his leg over the seat. A second later, he was tearing off into the orange smeared sunset.

Jackson shook his head, his eyes laughing before he did the same.

Halting some feet away, Mila watched them go, then looked at me with clear dismay. I shrugged, slapped my goggles on, then sprayed her with dirt as I raced off after them.

We thundered over the jumps, clefts, and ditches we’d created after hours of patting, shoveling, and using the bulldozer Dad had bought me last Christmas.

Twenty minutes later, near the edge of our property, we stopped by the small stream hidden behind a smattering of rocks and weeds.

Lars pulled off his helmet, swiping back his sweat-soaked hair. “Do you think she’s gone?”

“She’s probably still hobbling back to her car.” I set my helmet on my lap, then plucked out my pack of cigarettes from my pants. They were squashed, as expected, but they’d do.

Jackson leaned over his handle bars, his cheeks mottled as he pushed a loud burst of air past his lips. “What was she doing here?”

We were in as good a shape as we could be for a bunch of idiots who drank, smoked, and took the odd drug here and there. But I didn’t care. I’d quit racing when I was fifteen and found more interesting things to do with my time. Things which, of course, involved my dick.

Jackson still raced from time to time. Lars never did. Too costly to upkeep.

Lars looked a little chagrined. “I might have said I was riding here today when she called me.”

“You actually answered?” I scoffed. “Dipshit.”

“I was half asleep when my phone rang.” He looked through the trees. “I thought she’d given up.”

Jackson tutted. “You thought wrong. How long has it been since you dipped in that anyway?”

“Right before school let out. At that huge bay party.”

I laughed.

Lars’s worn boots kicked at a sharp looking rock. “She wanted to meet up, and I said I’d be too busy riding to hang. Guess she didn’t take the hint.”

I’d be concerned that she knew where I lived, but everyone knew where most people lived in this hellish town.

Jackson pushed his hair back, sliding his helmet on. “The word no doesn’t exist in Mila Groove’s vocabulary.”

“You’d know, you savage.” I drew in a deep inhale, coughing laughter as he flipped me off.

“I never fucked her. That was Rave.”

I pondered that, then decided I didn’t give a fuck.

“Enough vag talk,” Lars said. “Wade’s having another party Friday. We in?”

I felt my body pull taut as I remembered Peggy mentioning that Byron Woods had asked her to go. Though the guy had some nerve, I wasn’t worried. Peggy probably wouldn’t even go.

I’d texted her this morning, telling her she should come over for a ride. It wasn’t something she did very often, but she usually made a point to during the summer. We were a few weeks shy of returning to school, and she’d yet to take me up on the offer. She couldn’t ride well, but she liked riding with me. At least, I thought she did.

I wasn’t privy to what she was doing instead, and I didn’t really care to be. Probably scrapbooking, Instagramming, or thrift shopping. Maybe staring at her metal-free teeth in the mirror for hours on end.

“Get up.”

Peggy moaned and rolled over, peeling an eye open.

“Freckles. You promised me.”

“Promised what?” she said, but it came out slightly mumbled.

“That you’d come riding with me.” My brows cinched. “What’s wrong with you?”

Her tongue snuck out to glide between her lips, and she winced, then grabbed a pillow and shoved it over her face. “It kind of hurts, Dash.”

Shit. I’d forgotten today was the day she was fixing some of the gaps between her teeth. I wasn’t even sure why she was bothering; her teeth were pretty much perfect as they were. But she’d been wanting them since sophomore year after seeing Daphne’s teeth slowly change into perfect pearls. Her words, not mine.

I hadn’t needed them. Thank fuck. But even if I had, fuck that. No metal was getting near my mouth unless it was