Reclaim - Aly Martinez Page 0,16

been saving each and every one of those syllables for me since seven a.m. “So, last night, I was thinking if we always turn in exactly a hundred worms, Mr. Leonard might get suspicious. So, each day, we need to take him a few less and sometimes a few extras. Mix it up. It will equal the same each week but not the same every day. But we gotta have somewhere to keep them on the days we give him less or we’ll be out the money.” He stopped beside an old oak tree and swung his arms out to the side. “Tada!”

Twisting my lips, I glanced around, trying to figure out what was so amazing about this particular tree. It wasn’t even one of the big ones, and if I was being honest, it was kind of crooked too. “It’s a tree. I don’t get it.”

“Oh, right.” He jumped into action. Bending over, he sank his fingers into the dirt and came up with the lid of a plastic container about the size of a shoe box. “Worm storage.” Full of excitement, he bounced his gaze from me to the container he’d buried in the ground. “Pretty cool, huh? I talked to my dad on the phone last night and he said worms can live for weeks as long as you keep them somewhere dark and cool. So I tossed in some dirt, poked holes in the lid, and boom—Stewart and Cole Worm Farm is in business.”

I openly gaped at him.

Holy smokes, this kid had thought of everything. I probably would have just tossed out a few worms every day. No, wait, I wouldn’t even have thought about turning in the same number every day and would have gotten myself fired by the end of the week.

I’d been wrong. Camden Cole wasn’t a genius.

He was the genius who taught the other geniuses.

He was next-level genius, and at the moment, he was my business partner. And it had not escaped me how he’d put my last name first in our company.

But most of all, I was starting to feel like he might be my friend.

Cue the lump in my throat again.

And the something-good-or-something-bad pain in my chest.

And this time, add all the flutters in my stomach.

I had no idea how to react to any of those things. For as little experience as I had in the feelings department, I had infinitely less in the boy department. With Camden’s blue eyes and bright smile homed in on me, waiting for all the praise he rightly deserved, there was only one thing left to do.

I gave him a titty twister and took off like a Gold medalist, straight for the creek.

“Last one in!” I yelled, stripping my clothes off to reveal my purple tankini as I ran.

“Hey, that hurt, you cheater!” He laughed, hot on my heels, rubbing his pec.

As I was toeing my shoes off, he did a cannonball, beating me into the water once again.

But it was okay.

While he was underwater, I took a second to compartmentalize all the feelings screaming inside my mind. It was a trick I’d learned shortly after my mother left. Everything had a nice, neat drawer in my head, hidden out of my thoughts so I didn’t have to deal with any them until I was ready. Sometimes, late at night, I’d plunder through those drawers—considering and contemplating. But for the most part, I’d sealed them shut, never to be visited again.

If the last two days were any indication, I was going to need a lot more drawers for Camden Cole.

We played in the water for several hours. Made bets on who could hold their breath the longest—him. And who could do the most flips underwater—me. We even played Slapjack, and surprisingly enough, he beat me twice. By the time we returned to our little slice of peace on the creek bank, our fingers and toes were prunes and the sun hung high in the midday sky.

“I’m starved. You hungry?” he asked, collapsing onto his towel.

I shook my head despite the emptiness of my stomach.

“Oh, come on.” He started zipping and unzipping various compartments on his bag. “No use in us sitting out here wasting away.” When he found what he’d been searching for, he lifted two plastic baggies in my direction. “I brought one peanut butter and jelly and one turkey and potato chip. Made ’em myself. Your pick.”

Oh. My. God. This was worse than the bug spray.

So, so, so much worse.

Because it was