Rebel at Spruce High (Spruce Texas Romance #5) - Daryl Banner Page 0,44

… it’s not … it’s not backwards at all.” Did he just say that? It’s no big deal to him? Two guys kissing? He and I kissing? I literally can’t think of anything else now. “Spruce is …” Am I still talking? Are we still walking? What is life? “Spruce is a pretty open and … what was I saying? … open and, um, accepting place. For a small town.”

He shrugs. “Good.” He kicks another pebble, sending it into a nearby gutter to kerplunk in the unknowable water below.

We walk in silence for a while. My brain is on fire. I am very clearly dwelling on that same fact, over and over, spiraling around in my brain like a rollercoaster in the shape of an infinity sign. “So you—” I swallow, cutting myself off. “—you really don’t mind?”

He still directs all his words to the pavement. “Mind what?”

“Kissing me?”

“Didn’t I say I don’t care already? It’s acting, isn’t it? You play a role. If I’m playing a gay dude with a cat allergy, fine, I’ll do it.”

“Well, yeah, it’s acting, but—Wait, it’s Danny with the allergy. Not Kingsley.”

He frowns at the side of my face. “Huh?”

“My character has the allergy,” I remind him. With a glance at Vann’s gorgeous face, I realize looking at him and his frowning, pouty lips is a mistake, especially with all the kissy-kissy going on in my head, so I look away at once. “I, uh, claim to have an allergy, kinda. But it’s probably just to antagonize you. You are the cat.”

“Hm. Right.” His tone softens, and I hear a hint of amusement when he adds, “Just a dirty stray, huh?”

I smile in the dark. “A dirty stray.”

Before I know it, we’re turning onto my street, and my house looms ahead. I stop at the corner with Vann as Winona zips ahead of us, likely heading for the gate toward my shed. I’d put money down that it’s the gate that got left open with her in the backyard.

I turn to Vann. “Well, I’m home now. So, uh … thanks for—”

“We never got your apron,” Vann points out.

“Oh. I literally … completely forgot about it,” I admit. “Guess I was too wrapped up in …” Chatting with you. Walking alongside you. Shivering with disbelief that we ran into each other. Wondering what it would be like to kiss you. Then realizing I will know that reality soon whether I’m ready for it or not. In front of people. “So anyway,” I cut off my looping thoughts, “thank you for walking me home. I’m pretty sure you had more fun things you could’ve done tonight, but—”

“Nah, this was fine.” His hands go into his pockets again as he gazes off toward where Winona ran. “Sorry your dog wrestled you into the mud and won.”

Suddenly, I realize it’s Friday night, he’s clearly got nowhere else to be, and my house is a stone’s throw across the street. Is this when I invite him over to hang out? Is it too late? Would I appear desperate? Or is he expecting me to? Is that why he said this was fine? Am I just going to continue standing here while he—?

“Wanna hang out with me for a bit?” I blurt, then freeze.

A silence as long as a lifetime stretches between us. Vann is back to staring at the ground, like he has an obsession with his big feet and those military-style boots he wears. I wonder if he even heard me. Did I ask the question at all, or did I imagine it?

Then he gazes at me. I wasn’t prepared for his gaze, his eyes lit by the streetlamp nearby, and even in the semidarkness, he is beautiful in his mystery. Tortured. Curious. Hiding in his shell, yet reaching out to me somehow.

And then he shrugs. “Sure.”

My heart stops at once and falls in love with that one, tiny, lovely, stupid word. Sure.

07 | VANN

Sure?

Really, Vann? Sure? That’s all you’re gonna say to him? After he invites you—still a total stranger—into his house at midnight? After you just happened to encounter him on the streets of this small spiderweb of a town?

“Uh, alright, yeah, cool!” Toby exclaims cheerily, then leads the way. I follow a few steps behind, my eyes dropping to his cute butt in those slacks he’s got on from the restaurant.

Yes, I know where he came from. I heard Ms. Joy say it during auditions, asking him about his job at Biggie’s Bites. It wasn’t