Left Behind: Left Behind Series #1 (6 page)

About
two years ago, a friend introduced me to street racing. At first, I wanted
nothing to do with it. Getting caught up in illegal shit wasn’t for me. I’d
done enough of that in New York. I was only twenty-four at the time and not
looking for a criminal record. However, once I saw firsthand the kind of dough
it brought in, I couldn’t resist. Besides, when there are cops involved, it
can’t be all that bad, right? The dude who runs the show has a friend or two on
the force, and those guys brought in other guys. They get extra cash and we
don’t get arrested. Works out for everyone. 
      

“Definitely,”
I assure him. Their waitress is bringing another round of drinks to the table.
“Put this round on me,” I tell her as I stand up to go.

“Hang
around and have a few with us,” Danny offers. “It’s still early.”

“Wish
I could, but I have some shit to take care of before I can leave tonight.”

“I
thought you had this awesome job where you get paid to drink and hook up with
any girl you want. This is actually disappointing to hear,” he jokes.

“Most
of the time, that’s pretty much all I do,” I confess. “Let me know as soon as
my car’s done. Make sure my paint doesn’t get scratched.”

“Who
the fuck picked that color?” Mike wants to know. Mike is Danny’s right-hand man
and cousin. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one without the other. That’s exactly
how my brother and I used to be.

“What’s
the matter? You don’t like green?” I laugh at him.

“Green?
That shit’s glow-in-the-dark,” he says, shaking his head.

“Those
bastards won’t miss it when I cross the finish line so far ahead of them then.
Danny, always a pleasure. Looking forward to hearing from you.”

“Later.
Thanks for the round.” He holds up his beer.

***

Just
as I’m finishing up in the office, Meg knocks on the door and sticks her head
in. “Wasn’t sure if you’d be alone or not. What happened to the cute girl you
were talking to at the bar earlier?”

“She
left with a friend.” Damn her for reminding me about Kacie.

 “Wow.
A girl was immune to Evan Pierce’s charms? That’s unheard of,” she says. “She
looked awfully young. Did you even card her?” I realize I didn’t even consider
it. Damn. I could have gotten an address. “Party’s over and the room’s cleaned
up. I’m leaving.” My cousin turns to walk away.

“Hold
on, Meg,” I call out to her. She comes into the office and falls into the chair
across from me. She looks exhausted. “I’m sorry I had to call you in to work on
your night off, but I really appreciate you helping me out. Couldn’t have done
it without you.”

She
sighs. “I’m sorry I gave you so much shit. You always help me out. We’re
supposed to be there for each other. I had no right to act the way I did. It
won’t happen again.”

“Want
to talk about it?”

“Not
really. Having problems with Connor,” she says.

“Again?
Meg, you deserve so much better than him.” This guy has treated her like shit too
many times to count. I have no idea why the hell she keeps going back to him.
My cousin is a pretty girl. Guys that come in here are always asking for her.
She doesn’t need this.

“Maybe.
He promised this time would be different but, once again, he never showed up
last night,” Meg tells me.

“Let
him go.” I really wish I could make her.

“Easier
said than done,” she replies.

“You
may think I’m a piece of shit for the way I am, but at least I’m honest. Girls
know what they’re getting from me. I even warn them not to bother trying to
change me because it won’t happen.”

“I
don’t think you’re a piece of shit. I just think you’re a little broken,” she
says, standing up.

“No,
I’m not.”

“We’re
all broken in one way or another, Evan. Sometimes it takes finding the one
person meant to hold us together in order to realize it,” she whispers, sadly.
“I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You
going to be alright?” I ask.

“Yeah.
I’ll be fine. Good night.”

“Good
night, Meg,” I say as she walks out of the office.

When
I finally climb in bed around four in the morning, Kacie Foster seems to be all
I can think about. The sad look on her face is tormenting me. Then again, so is
the way that dress looked on her. It was short, but not too short. It was very
flattering to her thin frame and was enough to make me want to see more. Part
of me is wishing I just walked away from the bar before she even got there. I
should have known the moment I saw her expression to get as far away as I
could. Another very stubborn part of me is wishing I took her back to the
office instead of getting her a seat. At least if I did that, I’d be able to
sleep right now. After tossing and turning, trying to clear her out of my head,
I remember who she’s friends with. Tomorrow, before I go back to the club, I
think I’ll pay Jade Quinn a visit.

Evan

It
feels as though the moment the sun comes up, my eyes pry themselves open and
refuse to close again. Didn’t I just fall asleep? A quick glance at my phone
tells me it’s only nine o’clock. Why the hell am I awake already? I grab the
pillow next to me and hold it over my face. Hopefully, it will make it dark
enough to trick my eyes into falling back to sleep. After a few minutes of this
bullshit, I realize it’s doing me no good. Damn, it’s going to be a long day.
It’s Saturday so no one will be looking for me to show up at Skyline until late
in the afternoon or early evening. Is there something I need to do today that’s
slipping my mind? Suddenly, an image of these gorgeous hazel eyes pops into my
head and it hits me. I need to go see Jade.

The
first week I moved to Tampa, I met Jake at a bar Meg had taken me to.
Apparently, those two went to school together for years. A few weeks later, he
invited me to a party at his house. That’s when he introduced me to his sister.
Even at seventeen, Jade was no pushover. One time, I watched as she put a grown
man in his place without batting an eye. It wasn’t pretty. Jade Quinn also
happens to be drop dead gorgeous. The only reason I’ve never tried to sleep
with her is because her brother is one of the closest friends I have here.
Okay, that and she would never tolerate my “whoring around”, as she calls it.
She’d probably kick my ass before her brother even got the chance.

There’s
no way Jade is awake yet. Since I am, there’s no reason to just lie around when
I could be getting ready. If I show up at her door before she gets up, she’ll
kill me. Climbing out of bed this early on a Saturday is painful, even without
a hangover. After dropping my boxers to the floor, to go along with the rest of
this week’s dirty laundry, I go across the hallway to the bathroom. My
reflection reveals an overtired, overworked version of myself. When did this
happen? A cold shower should help me feel a little better. It doesn’t, of
course. Why didn’t I just pick up another girl from the club last night? Maybe
if I had, I would have forgotten all about Kacie and I could still be sleeping.
Why the fuck am I still thinking about some random girl who just so happened to
sit down at my bar?

An
hour later, my Dodge Ram pulls into the Quinn’s driveway. I have no idea what
to say to Jade. “Hey, who’s the girl you were dragging out of the club last
night?” That’ll go over really well. Both of their cars are here, so at least
they’re home. The second after ringing the doorbell, I consider the fact that
Kacie may be here. What if she crashed here after leaving the club last night?
Girls do that kind of shit, right? I should have checked with Jake before
coming all the way over here. Before I can turn to walk away, the door swings
open. Jade glares at me as if I had done something wrong.

“The
answer is no,” is all she says as she walks away. She’s already dressed in her
bathing suit, so I know I didn’t wake her up. Thank goodness for that. Since
she left the door open, I take it as an invitation to go inside. This house
isn’t nearly as big as most of the places in the neighborhood, but it’s still
awesome and a whole lot better than my condo. I enter through the oak door,
closing it behind me. The foyer is pretty big. It leads to the stairs on my
left, the kitchen next to that, the living room directly in front of me, or the
garage on my right. I can hear voices coming from the kitchen, so that’s where
I go.

Silence
falls over the room as I enter it. Jake is sitting at the table eating a bowl
of cereal, looking at something on his phone. Jade is standing next to the
island in the huge modern kitchen. She has her hand on her hip looking hot, as
usual.

“What’s
up?” Jake greets me.

“Good
morning, beautiful,” I say to Jade. She doesn’t say anything back. “What’s up,
Jake? You working today?” Does everyone except for me normally wake up this
early on a Saturday morning?

“Hell,
no. I don’t do weekends,” he tells me. “I need to work on my car. They should
be calling about the next race soon, don’t you think?” It took a little while
for Jake to tell me about the races. Guess he needed to make sure I wasn’t a
snitch or anything.

“I’m
pretty sure it’ll be this week or next. They aren’t going to want all the
holiday traffic around,” I agree. “With any luck, it won’t be until after
Wednesday, though. The Scirocco should be ready by then.” One good thing about
my uncle going to Europe was that he made the arrangements for my car to be
shipped over as soon as he got there.

“Your
uncle is going to kill you if something happens to that car.”

“Why
would he kill me? I paid for everything. He just had to set it up for me.”

“I
still can’t believe you are entering it in a street race.”

“That’s
the reason I bought it,” I remind him.

“I
don’t want to be around when someone scratches it.”

“I’m
serious, Evan. The answer is no,” Jade interrupts. She’s been so quiet, I
almost forgot she was there.

“I
don’t remember asking you a question,” I admit.

“Kacie
Foster is your question and my answer is no. You can’t sleep with her,” Jade
blurts out.

Unintentionally,
I start to laugh. Jake is shaking his head. He probably knows what I’m about to
say. “I don’t ask anyone’s permission to sleep with a girl, except for the girl.”

“This
isn’t a joke. She’s not just any girl. I saw the way you were looking at her
last night,” Jade says.

“And
how was that?” I ask, sarcastically.

“Like
you were ready to rip her clothes off and throw her ass over the bar.”

I
flash Jade the smile I know has been wetting panties for years. “Are you
jealous?”

“Screw
you!” she barks and it makes me laugh again. “Jake, help me out here.” She
looks desperately to her brother for assistance.

He
sighs. “Kacie’s family, Evan,” is all he says to me, but he’s implying a lot
more. You don’t fuck around with a friend’s family. “She’s not your type,
anyway.”

That
strikes a nerve. “What’s my type?” I ask, slightly irritated and a little
offended.

“Easy,”
Jake confidently says, taking his dishes over to the sink.

“Look,
Evan.” Jade is much calmer now that she knows Jake is on her side. “Kacie has
had a really rough life, which got worse over the last few months. I just got
her to come home. The second something happens, she’s going to bolt and I may
never get her back again! She’s my best friend and I don’t want to lose her.”

“What
do you mean, ‘just got her back’? She’s from
here
? How come I’ve never
seen her before?”

“I’ve
been friends with her since we were in the fourth grade,” she starts telling me,
grabbing two Cokes from the refrigerator and potato chips from the cabinet.
“The day after high school graduation, she packed her shit and moved over a
thousand miles away to go to college. She didn’t even hang around for the
summer. Her parents have treated her like crap since the day she was born.
Other than us,” she glances over to Jake, “she’s only had her grandparents to
love her. Her grandfather passed away years ago and her grandmother, who she
was closest to, passed away about four months ago. She’s broken and scarred
deeper than any of us.” Kacie Foster and I have more things in common than I
would have ever guessed. Well, all except for the broken part.

“Why
did she come back?” I ask, sympathetically. There’s no way in hell I’d ever go
home.

Jade
shrugs her shoulders. “She says there are some things she needs to take care of
here.”

“What
does any of this have to do with me being interested in her?” I try to play off
being unaffected by the information she’s just given me.

“Damn
it, Evan!” Jade yells. “Kacie isn’t the kind of girl to sleep around the way
you do. Stay the fuck away from her!”

“And
if I don’t?” It slips out before I can stop it. This isn’t helping my cause.

“Evan,
knock it off.” Jake stops what he is doing. “Jade, chill.” He’s shaking his
head again. “Stop acting like an old married couple. You,” he looks at his
sister, “can’t tell people what to do. You,” he looks at me, “should respect
your friend’s feelings. I’ll be in the garage. Don’t make me come back in
here.”

Jade
gives me a nasty look and starts to head toward the back door. I don’t want her
to be mad at me. “Alright, I get it. You don’t want your friend hurt and I can
respect that.” She stops walking. “I promise not to sleep with her.” Jade
smiles. “Unless she begs. I don’t have the willpower to deny a beautiful girl
who begs.”

“I
hate you,” she informs me.

“Wait
a second.” It occurs to me that she’s holding two sodas. “Is she here?”

“Uh,
no,” she says, glancing over her shoulder at the door. “Not exactly.”

“Not
exactly?” I’m not going to let her slide on this. “What does that mean?”

“After
last night with her parents ganging up on her, she’s ready to run. Promise me
you won’t be the one who sends her out of town,” Jade pleads. Kacie must really
mean a lot for her to be acting the way she is.

“I
promise.” Hopefully, I don’t screw that up. 

The
internal debate going on in her head right now is quite obvious. Eventually,
she makes a decision. “She’s not here. She lives next door.”

Earlier,
when the thought of Kacie being here occurred to me as I knocked on the door, I
wanted to run far away. Now, knowing she’s only a few yards away, I have a
whole different feeling. For the last twelve hours, I’ve done nothing but think
about this girl and now I finally get to see her again. Happiness runs through
me as I bounce over and open the door for Jade.

 “You
better be on your best behavior, Evan Pierce,” Jade warns, walking past me. I
follow her through her backyard over to where the hedge separates this yard
from the next one. The hedge is interrupted in one spot by a white archway
covered in a flowered vine.

“Why
aren’t you hanging out by your pool?” I ask, looking back at the Quinn’s yard.
Before Jade can explain, the view I walk into speaks for itself. The
landscaping is amazing. Palm trees, tropical flowers, the pool, the view of the
bay are all spectacular themselves, but the house is what stands out the most.
Huge windows on both the lower and upper levels provide a picturesque view from
almost every room in the place. There’s a balcony off one of the rooms
upstairs, and there’s another room on the ground level which opens up onto a
patio semi-separated from the rest of the yard by a row of tall plants. Who the
hell can afford a place like this?

Jade
doesn’t wait for me to keep up with her. She heads over and makes herself at
home on a lounge chair next to her friend. As I slowly approach, my eyes roam
over Kacie’s entire body, of which her blue strapless bikini gives me the
perfect view. She’s just as beautiful as I imagined she would be. Unlike last
night, she has her hair pulled up. Her eyes are hidden behind black sunglasses
and a book has her complete attention. Jade hands her one of the bottles of
soda and puts the bag of potato chips on the glass table between them. Kacie
never looks away from the page she’s reading, although she mumbles her
gratitude.

When
I finally make my way to where they are sitting, words have escaped me. This
must be what it feels like to be intimidated by a girl. To be afraid of
rejection. I have to pull my shit together. This is ridiculous. I talk to
females all the damn time. Why hasn’t she looked at me? She
has
to know
I’m here. I clear my throat in hopes of drawing her eyes up. Maybe she’ll speak
first and make this easier.

Jade
sighs and says, “Kacie, that’s Evan Pierce, who you may or may not remember
from the club last night.” Jade immediately goes back to looking at the
magazine she has just picked up. I sit down on the edge of the chair on the
other side of Kacie.

Kacie
looks up for a second. “Oh, hey,” she says, then she’s back into the book. What
the fuck?

“Hey.
What’s going on over here?” I try to strike up a conversation.

She
holds the book up even higher as if I didn’t see it before and mumbles,
“Reading.” It sounds like Jade may be chuckling behind her magazine. This isn’t
going as well as I hoped.

“Anything
good?”

“Yup.”
Her one word answers suck.

“What’s
with the Coke and potato chips so early in the morning?”

“Hangover.”

“Seriously,
you should try it, Ev,” Jade says. “Works every time.” Thanks for throwing me a
bone there, Jade.

“Are
you doing any better since the last time I saw you?” I ignore Jade and attempt
to talk to Kacie again. This time, I nudge her leg with the back of my hand.
Man, her leg is smooth.

Finally,
I found something to grab her attention. Kacie stops reading, but doesn’t put
the book down. She flips her sunglasses to the top of her head. “I am. Thank
you for asking, and thank you for the drinks last night. I really appreciate
what you did. Jade and I are planning on going out later. I was going to stop
by the club to pay for them.”