Love at 11 - By Mari Mancusi Page 0,53
had filled up since I’d first arrived and several biker boys were staring at me with frank interest. Jodi stood up and grabbed me by the hand.
“Let’s go. We can talk in the car.”
We walked to her vehicle, a Ford Expedition, big enough to hold her four dogs. And sure enough, she’d brought the pooches with her. When I climbed in, they all clambered to the front seat of the SUV to try to greet me, as if I were their favorite person in the whole world and they’d missed me dreadfully since I’d been gone. Their enthusiastic welcome and sloppy kisses made me laugh, and suddenly I felt much better.
“Guys! Guys! Cut it out!” I giggled as the Italian greyhound took advantage of her small size to crawl under the Great Danes and hop into my lap. I cuddled her in my arms and she licked my hand.
Jodi popped in the other side. “In the back,” she scolded. “Bad! Bad dogs! In the BACK!” With great effort she managed to shove them all backward, then closed the cage that separated the front seats from the rest of the SUV. The dogs whimpered behind the bars, as if having been sent to solitary confinement.
“They’re so spoiled,” Jodi complained as she turned the key in the ignition. “Sorry about that.”
“No problem. They’re cute.” I stroked the Italian greyhound who had somehow managed to escape the prison sentence.
“So tell me again, why are you out here in the middle of nowhere?” Jodi asked as she pulled out onto the main road.
“I was doing undercover work for that drug cartel story Miguel told us about.”
She looked over at me before turning back to the road. “And where’s Jamie?”
“Hell if I care where he is. I hope he rots in this backwater town.”
Jodi slammed on the brakes, causing me to lurch forward and bang my head on the dashboard. The dogs yelped their annoyance from the back.
“Ow!” I protested.
“Madeline Madison, you weren’t planning on leaving him here, were you?” she scolded.
“What are you, my mother?” I growled, rubbing my head. Though of course, if she were my mother, she’d be too busy shopping in gay Paris to give me a lift.
Jodi steered the SUV to the side of the road. “What’s going on, Maddy?” she asked. “Why are you mad at Jamie? I thought you guys were becoming friends.”
I shook my head. “What can I say? He’s a jerk.” I really, really didn’t want to tell her how stupid I’d been. How I’d had an affair with a nearly married man who, this afternoon, had informed me that he would never be leaving the wife-to-be. It was way too clichéd.
But Jodi was hearing none of it. “If you won’t tell me what happened, I’m getting out of this car and searching for Jamie myself.”
“You can’t. The dogs and I will suffer from hot-car syndrome and die.”
“I’ll leave the air conditioner on.”
“You’ll run out of gas.”
“There’s a gas station a block up.”
“But think how expensive gas prices are right now—”
“What happened, Maddy?” Jodi demanded. “I drove two hours to find you. And I’m driving another two hours back. That means today I’ve given you four hours of my life. You’d think for four hours you could come clean.”
I stared at the Italian greyhound in my lap. “Fine,” I muttered. “We had a thing.”
“A thing?” Jodi cried angrily. “How do you define ‘a thing’? Isn’t the guy getting married in three months?”
“See? This is why I didn’t want to tell you. I knew you’d be all judgmental and stuff.” Jodi swallowed. “Sorry. Go on.”
So I told her. Everything. How we’d slept together the night I’d found out my parents were getting divorced. How he’d found me abandoned, after my date left me, and asked me to dinner with him and Jennifer. How we’d accidentally taken Ecstasy in the desert and how he’d confessed his feelings, only to take it all back the next day.
By the end of the tale, Jodi was seething with indignation. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, Maddy?”
“What am I doing? I’m just the innocent bystander here. He’s the one with the fiancée.”
“Please, Maddy. Grow up. Take some responsibility for your actions. Sure, I’m not saying Jamie’s been acting like Mother Theresa here, but you haven’t exactly been discouraging his behavior either.”
“Oh fine. So it’s all my fault.”
“I’m not saying that. I’m just suggesting you gain a little perspective before you leave the guy stranded in the desert. I mean, what