Playing Hooky with the Hottie - Maggie Dallen Page 0,21

rung, and everyone was scurrying to their classrooms.

Hazel was fidgeting, her features tense, and her expression anything but happy.

That was fine. I hadn’t expected her to be loving this plan.

But the challenge was part of the fun.

“You ready?” I asked.

She exhaled loudly. “Do we really have to do this?”

I didn’t stop until I was close enough to see the terror hiding there in her eyes. “I’m afraid it’s necessary.”

I snagged her bag from her and led the way to where I’d parked. “Let’s do this, Hazey May.”

“It’s really not necessary, though,” she said. She’d hate it if she knew I could hear her fear, so I didn’t call it out. “I could pretend to be having fun anywhere...and after school lets out.”

“Yes, but you see, that’s not the point.”

She had to scramble to keep up with me because I was moving fast. Give this girl any chance to back out, and she’d take it. I had to get her away from this school before she could change her mind.

“What do you mean, that’s not the point?”

I stopped next to my car, and she bumped into me. “The point is not to pretend to have fun. The point is...to have fun.”

She stared at me blankly.

“I know,” I said. “Shocking suggestion, right?” I pretended to be confused. “Actually having fun? Who would even think it?”

“You think playing hooky is fun?”

“Not necessarily,” I said, opening the passenger side for her when it became clear she wasn’t making a move to get in the car on her own. “But a day at the lake sounds pretty nice.”

“Lake? What lake?”

I was grinning as I came around to the driver’s side, and I ignored her questions and protests. “Look around you, Hazel,” I said instead.

“What?” She was still staring at me even as I pulled out of the lot and into traffic.

“Look around you. We have unseasonably warm weather going on, considering it’s the fall. We might as well take advantage, right?”

She blinked at me, and I knew she couldn’t argue. It felt like summer outside, and it wouldn’t last for long.

“But...a lake?” she asked. “Where is there a lake?”

I pointed ahead of us. “Mountains. Lakes. Have you never left this town before? I should tell you that if you keep heading that way—” I pointed east. “You’re gonna hit this big body of water kids these days call the ocean.”

Her look said she was unamused.

Her twitching lips said otherwise.

I grinned at her and then turned back to the road.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked.

I’d expected this question, of course. The problem was, I still had no idea how to answer it. How could I explain it to her when I couldn’t even answer that for myself?

I’d told myself after I saw her and Justin that I’d let it go. I didn’t care that much. I mean, sure, I found the girl fascinating, and yeah, maybe I was attracted to her, but it wasn’t like this was love at first sight or something.

It wasn’t like I couldn’t live without her.

I’d told myself I wouldn’t try that hard, I mean a guy had his pride—and then I’d found myself packing a picnic and….

My pride was nowhere to be found.

A picnic? Who packed a picnic?

She was still waiting, and I should have known better if I thought she might drop it. “You already helped me out, and you’re not getting anything in return so I don’t understand why you’re doing this.”

“I liked how the photos came out,” I said, fidgeting under her watchful stare.

It was the closest I could come to admitting the truth. Besides, it wasn’t a lie. Those pictures were amazing. Maybe my best work yet.

“So you’re just...you’re doing this for the photos?” she asked, shifting in her seat to watch me better.

“And for you,” I said.

She was quiet for a while, and I focused on the traffic ahead of me as I headed toward the lake my family liked to go to in the summer.

“You really want me to get my crush’s attention, huh?”

I couldn’t exactly read her tone, so I finally risked a glance in her direction. She still looked nervous, though I suspected the further away from school we got the more she’d relax.

“Is it working? Has this blind moron figured out how great you are?”

She blinked in surprise.

This was one of the things I liked about her. She always took a beat before responding. I wouldn't say she was chill—she wasn’t. She was too focused to be chill. I had a