Heart Waves (6 page)

“I’ll go, as long as you’re coming with me,” he laughed foolishly as his arms swung around my waist pulling me to him.

Still holding my phone, I planted my hands between us to act as a barrier and pushed him back as hard as I could. He didn’t budge but somehow managed to pull me closer.

“Get the hell off me!” I said as firmly as I could.

“Or what?
You’ll spank me?” he guffawed.

“No, I will,” Reece’s voice rang out.

My head snapped around in disbelief. There he was, my hero, standing tall behind me. Just in time to rescue me. Shocked, I looked at him in awe.

“Go find your own girl,” the drunk growled.

“She is my girl.” Reece’s eyes were sharp and piercing, his voice menacing. My heart thrummed wildly hearing his words. I only wished they were true. 

“Now she’s my girl.” The drunk narrowed his eyes and glared at Reece. “So get lost!”

I continued to struggle against the possessive jerk, knowing what was going to come next. I had to take action before either of these testosterone-filled-jocks did. Now that Reece had so much of his attention I saw my chance to break away.

I boldly brought my right hand back and thrust it forward quickly, giving him a palm strike to the nose, rendering my new found friend harmless.

“AHHH!” he let go and brought his hands up to his nose. “You little . . .”

Immediately I realized what I’d done, and recognized that I probably only exacerbated the situation, and perhaps put both Reece and myself right in harm’s way. After all, prior to my impetuous act, the stranger, although inebriated, had no reason to harm either of us.

As he shouted profanities at me, I grabbed Reece’s hand, and ran toward the rides, thinking we might be able to lose ourselves in the crowd since more people still lingered there. We ran about fifty feet when Reece glanced back to find no one behind us.

“Real mature, Jenna,” he teased, “hitting your date
like
that.”

I smiled, coyly, “What do you want? I couldn’t think of anything else to do.”

“Remind me never to get you angry.” He said shrieking away in a playful manner, pretending to be afraid.

“What are you doing here anyway?” I challenged, the thrill of adrenaline rushing through me. “I thought you left.”

“I came back to make sure your date didn’t ditch you.”

Ouch! Talk about a kick in the teeth. “Ditch me?  You think I’m
ditchable
?” I couldn’t believe how his words sliced at my heart.

Reece squeezed my hand. He tilted his head down slightly and looked up fluttering his long, dark eye lashes as he spoke, “Not if I were your date. Nothing could keep me away from you.” He paused and smiled, hoping that would get him off the hook, but he could quickly see it wasn’t. “I knew you were alone and I wanted to make sure you got home safely.”

I yanked my hand away from him, my feelings still hurt, “Because I’m so horrible to hang around, a guy would have to ditch me, leaving me stranded?”

“Sorry, it was a bad joke.”

“Darn right.”

“But it
was
a good thing I came back.”

“I had it under control,” I lied, not wanting to give him an iota of satisfaction.

“Yeah, it looked like it,” he teased. “Call Grace, let her know I’m taking you home.”

“I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”

“Uh huh.”

“I am.” I insisted. “And, in case you hadn’t noticed, it was me that sent that creep running.”

He chuckled, “No, Jenna. Actually, it was us you sent running.”

No matter how hard I tried not to, I couldn’t help but smile.

His face changed, “Aren’t you even a little glad I came back?” he asked much more serious than before.

I didn’t want to answer. I didn’t want to admit how crushed I felt to see him with another girl, how the thought of him leaving with Lisa caused me bodily pain with every breath. And I certainly didn’t want to admit how terrified I felt believing I was all alone against that degenerate, until I heard him stake a claim on me.

“Why did you come back?” I asked hoping to get a direct answer.

He looked away, and then met my eyes, “To be with you.”

“What about Lisa?” I asked.

“What about her?”

“Seemed like you wanted to be with her.”

“Nah,” he looked uninterested, “we were just hanging out.”

“She looked like she was interested in a lot more than hanging out.” I bit my lip and hoped I didn’t sound as jealous as I felt.

“Exactly.
But I wanted to be with you. So I ditched her.
Because unlike you, she is
ditchable
.”

“Totally
ditchable
!”
I said with more confidence than I had.

“C’mon. Let me take you home.” He gave a crooked smile.

Since I had no better options and had no idea where Grace was or when she would be back, I accepted. Thinking about driving home with him alone in his car made my teeth chatter.

“I’m in the lot across the street.” Reece slipped his arm around my shoulder and pulled me to his side. “Let me warm you up.”

He did. I felt warmer almost immediately. Whether it came from him or from the sudden self-consciousness I felt being so intimately close to him, I couldn’t tell. We continued walking, without speaking, until we reached his black Prius. Reece held the door open for me until I got settled, and then he slid into the seat next to me.

The sudden ringing of my phone broke the stiffening silence. I ignored it, letting it go straight to voicemail.

“Bet
it’s
Grace,” Reece looked over curiously, “Aren’t you going to let her know you’re okay?”

I shook my head. “Let her sweat it out!  A little worry won’t kill her. But it might teach her a lesson.”

He smiled. “I never want to get on your bad side.” 

The eight-minute drive from the boardwalk to my house passed in fast forward. I hoped the drawbridge would be up to buy me extra time in the car with him, especially since the conversation went in a most uncomfortable direction.

No such luck.

“We could’ve doubled you know,” Reece broke the silence. He took his eyes off the road for the briefest of moments to glance in my direction.

“Huh?” He lost me, was he talking about Lisa and the drunk?

“With Grace and Mike.”
He explained as if he knew what I was thinking.

That made much more sense. “I didn’t know Grace planned to meet Mike until it was too late.”

“But when she told you he was there, did you even consider asking about me?”

“No.” I looked out the window, away from him. I didn’t want to explain my desperation in keeping any interest I had in Reece far from Mike’s knowledge. Bad enough Reece asked him about me.

“That’s what I thought.” 

“Just think of all the fun you would have missed with Lisa,” I
said,
jealousy heavy in my voice.

Reece smiled, enjoying my reaction. “My friend Brandon is a great guy, but sometimes he drinks too much and gets rowdy. Tonight he started drinking before we left the house.”

I thought back to the night we met, when Reece’s friend came to get him. Brandon was drunk and out of control. Seemed like a pattern to me.

“So why do you hang out with him?”

“It doesn’t happen often, but when it does, he tends to get mean. He was especially nasty tonight when Lisa was trying to get my attention.”

An image of Lisa in slut mode flashed through my mind, “And by getting your attention you mean throwing herself at you?”

“Careful Jenna, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were jealous.” He grinned looking over at my reaction.  Getting none he continued. “Brandon said something similar to her, only he was much nastier and added on a string of insults. She ran off with tears in her eyes.”

“So you had to make her feel better.”
Of course.
Isn’t that what superheroes do? I couldn’t believe how much it bothered me to hear him talk about it.

He nodded. “Unfortunately when I apologized for Brandon,” he paused, “she got the wrong idea.” 

“Which you didn’t bother to correct.”

He continued as if I hadn’t said a word. “I offered to walk her to her
car,
I hoped to clear it up in private. That’s when I ran into you.” He paused, and then smiled, playfully, “Waiting for your date.” He emphasized the last word.

I wished he didn’t bring that back up. “Why are we rehashing this?”

“No reason to get upset. I’d just like to know the real reason you didn’t want to go out with me tonight.” He was looking at the road, his fingers wrapped tight around the steering wheel.

“The real reason?”
I reiterated stalling for time. We were close to home, and I hoped to drag out my response so I wouldn’t have to answer him. “I told you, Grace and I had plans, I just didn’t realize she made Mike part of those plans.”  

Reece turned onto my street and slowed the car to little more than a crawl. “Do you have to go home, or can you hang out and talk for a while?”

There went the fluttering butterflies in my belly, flying with fervor. “Let me poke my head in and tell my parents I’m home. Then we can sit out back, by the pool.”

He nodded.
             

Reece parked the car between Mike’s house and mine. “Don’t move,” he instructed. I stayed put, and watched him get out and come around to open the door for me.

“Should I wait here for you?”

I nodded. “I’ll put the light on out back so you know when I’m there.” I felt awkward just walking away from him. I wanted to do something more, give his hand a
squeeze,
give him a quick kiss on the cheek, but those actions held too much insinuation.

I walked straight into my house without looking back, knowing if I did, I’d be lost, hypnotized by his eyes.

“I’m home,” I yelled up to my parents.

My mother came out of her bedroom.

“I thought you were with Grace,” she said sounding concerned.

“I was.”

“She called three times in the last twenty minutes, to make sure you made it home safe. You had me worried sick.”

“I’m fine, Mom.” I tried to reassure her. “Grace and I sort of got separated. We were at the boardwalk and ran into Mike and some of his friends. She went on some rides with Mike and one of his friends offered to drive me home.”

“Jenna,” she had that
motherish
tone about her. “I don’t like you getting in cars with strange boys. We’ve discussed this.”

My mind flitted back to Reece and the fact he was waiting for me outside. I was taking much longer than I should have. I worried by the time I made it out Reece would be gone. “I know. I’m fine. We’ll talk about it tomorrow. I promise.”

She huffed. “Alright, go get ready for bed.”

I thought for a moment of going through the motions of putting on my pajamas to placate her and then sneaking out like I did last night. I knew if I did, Reece would give up on me for sure.

“Actually Mom, I’d like to go sit by the pool for a while.”

“It’s late, Jenna.”

“I know.” I pleaded with my eyes, “But I’ll just be out back, and it’s not like I have anywhere to be tomorrow.”

“Will you be alone?”

“No.” I said in a very small voice. “But he’s really nice Mom, and we’ll be here, only out back. I mean you can watch us through a window if you like.”

After a long sigh.
“I just might do that.”

“Thank you, thank you,
thank
you!” I gave her a quick hug and kiss on the cheek.

I sprang to the sliding door that lead out to the backyard, feeling giddy and bubbly. I turned the lights on and went to wait by the side of the pool.

Before settling myself on a lounge, I pulled another one right up next to it. This did two things. First, it kept him close without making me so nervous I couldn’t think clearly. Second, it gave a better appearance if Mom did spy on us through her window than if we were huddled together on one lounge.

No sign of him. I closed my eyes and began counting to one hundred, trying to convince myself it was for the best if he left.

He opened the gate at forty-three.

“I thought you changed your mind,” he said. For the first time, Reece didn’t seem one hundred percent self-assured and unflappable.
That made my heart throb
, fast and hard.