The Boy Who Sneaks in My Bedroom Window (34 page)

I tore my
eyes away from my father and looked at the little baby;
he was cute, chubby, blond hair, brown eyes and
a big smile. I looked at the lady in the picture; she had brown
hair and grey eyes just like my mom and me. She looked nice. “Is
this your mom?” I asked, pointing at her.

He smiled and
nodded
. “Yeah. Her name’s Ruby,” he said,
taking his wallet back when I was done.

I couldn’t
get
the image out of my brain of my
father smiling. Had he changed? I looked Johnny over, he looked
happy, no bruises or cuts, no telltale limp or wincing or anything.
“So, do you get on with him then?” I asked curiously, watching his
face for his reaction.

“
Matt? Yeah
he’s OK. It’ll be better when he’s older and he can do more stuff,”
he answered, shrugging.

I gulped.
“No, I meant my father,” I clarified, trying not to flinch at the
thought of him. Johnny shrugged and nodded, but didn’t say
anything. “It must be hard having a guy come along though after
years of it just being you and your mom,” I stated, trying to push
for an answer. Was my father hurting him too, or maybe the baby, or
his mom? I was immediately thankful that he didn't have another
girl living with him. The physical abuse was bad; Jake got the
brunt of it, but the sexual abuse, that left mental scars that I
knew I still wasn't over. Memories of those Sunday's flashed
through my mind and I bit the inside of my cheek to stop from
crying.

He
nodded and looked at the floor. “It was a little
hard, but they’ve been together for over two years now, so…” he
trailed off, shrugging. I opened my mouth to push the issue further
but he cut me off. “So how long have you and Liam been together?”
he asked, pulling out some more grass and rolling it in his hand to
make a ball.

I smiled at
the thought of Liam. “A week and a half.”

“
He’s your
brother
’s friend, right?” he
asked.

“
Yeah. I’ve
known him since I was four,” I confirmed, loving talking about
Liam. I was actually really missing him, I gotten used to seeing
him all day over the weekend so it was hard going back to only
seeing him at lunchtime. “So, tell me some more about you,” I
suggested, laying down on my belly and propping my head on my
hands, watching him.

He laid down
too and chatted about h
is life, his likes
and dislikes. He was a keen skateboarder and entered competitions
and stuff at the weekends and did stunts and tricks. He missed his
friends. He’d never had a girlfriend. His favourite food was
chicken curry. I’d just started to tell him mine when I spotted
Liam jogging towards me across the parking lot, looking so handsome
that he was almost painful to look at. I jumped up and grinned as
he wrapped his arms around me, lifting me off of my feet and
crashed his lips to mine. I kissed him back hungrily.

He
pulled back after a few seconds. “I need to have
some alone time with you,” he whispered as he kissed me again,
gentler this time.

I
smiled
. “What, right now? Can’t you wait
until we get home?” I joked.

He shook his
head
. “No, but I can wait until the
parking lot at the back of the gym after we’ve dropped Jake off,”
he suggested, grinning wickedly.

“
In your
dreams
, Liam,” I said, laughing and
rolling my eyes.

“
Probably
,” he agreed as he put me
down, holding me close to his side, laughing at my horrified
expression. Johnny pushed himself up and was standing there
awkwardly. “Thanks for looking after my girl for me,” Liam said,
smiling a friendly smile.

“
Yeah
, no problem,” Johnny
muttered nervously, kicking his shoes in the grass. Jake walked
over, looking between me and Johnny with a confused expression.
“Well I guess I’ll see you guys tomorrow. Thanks for letting me
hang with you, Amber,” Johnny said, smiling.

“
Yeah, it was
fun. Hey, let’s see this car of yours before you go,” I suggested,
nodding back towards the parking lot. He grinned
proudly.

“
What car
have you got?” Jake asked curiously as we all started walking. I
knew that would catch Jakes interest. I smiled and pulled Liam a
little bit behind, letting Jake and Johnny go ahead, giving them a
little time. Jake needed to see for himself that Johnny was OK
before he would stop scowling at him. By the time we caught up with
them, Jake was sitting behind the wheel of a midnight blue BMW Z4,
rubbing his hands on the dashboard lovingly.

“
Oh
shit
, this is a nice car,” Liam purred,
tracing his hand over the roof with wide eyes. He grabbed my hand
and pulled me close to him. “When I’m a millionaire hockey player,
I’ll buy you one of these,” he stated, tangling his hand in my
hair, looking into my eyes making me feel slightly
weightless.

I pressed
myself to him and bit his chin gently
.
“I’d rather have a Ferrari,” I joked.

He
sighed
dramatically. “Wow, OK, I hope I
get signed to a good team if you’re going to be this demanding,” he
replied, as he kissed me, making me yearn for him to run his hands
down my body. After another ten minutes of drooling over Johnny’s
car we finally left and went to drop Jake at work. I jumped into
the front seat and held Liam’s hand all the way home, excited for
some private time. Not that it would be easy with my mom home for
the week, but I’m pretty sure we’d manage. Even just a cuddle on
the sofa sounded like heaven right about now.

Chapter 18

The next morning, after Liam had snuck out of my
window, I went to the kitchen to see Jake sitting there chatting to
my mom. “Good morning,” I chirped happily.

My
m
om looked at me a little shocked. “What
are you so happy about this morning?” she asked,
smiling.

I grinned and
suppressed a giggle; I couldn’t very well tell her that my
hot
tie of a boyfriend had just given me a
very good reason to be smiling before he climbed back out of my
window. So instead, I just shrugged. “Why not?” I countered,
looking anywhere but Jake. He probably knew the exact reason for my
happy, satisfied face. “So, Jake, anything you want to tell me?” I
teased, sitting down next to him.

He shook his
head
, looking confused. “No. Should there
be?” he asked, raising an eyebrow suspiciously.

“
You
, crushing on my best friend
perhaps?” I suggested, nudging him with my shoulder
gently.

He gasped and
spilt a spoonful of cereal onto the kitchen counter; he composed
himself quickly and smirked at me. “I’m not crushing on your best
friend. That’s your job, remember?” he said sarcastically. I
couldn’t help but laugh, him being all defensive wasn’t helping his
case, if he felt nothing for her then he would have just gone along
with it or made some slutty comment.

“
Yeah OK.
Whatever you say, Jake. I’ve got my eye on you. Just don’t hurt
her,” I stated, grabbing a bowl and making some cereal.

Liam walked
through the door
, and I would imagine
that if my face looked like his, then that’s probably why my mom
was asking what I was so happy about. He was grinning from ear to
ear. “Morning,” he greeted, giving Jake one of those cheesy fist
punches on the way past.

“
Good
morning
, Liam. Breakfast?” my mom
offered, holding up some bread.

He nodded,
smiling gratefully. “Sure, Margaret, that’d be great.” He wrapped
his arms around me from behind. “Hey, Angel. I missed you last
night,” he purred.

I heard my
mom ‘aww’ quietly and I tried not to laugh. “Oh you did, huh?” I
said, slapping his hand as he moved it down between my legs under
the counter.

He laughed
and moved to stan
d next to me.
“Absolutely I did. I liked sleeping in with you the other night.
Maybe your mom will let me sleep in with you from now on,” he said,
looking at my mom hopefully.

“
Don’t push
it
, Liam,” she replied, rolling her
eyes.

He
laughed
. “Hey, it was worth a shot!” he
stated, brushing my hair behind my ears and looking at her a little
sheepishly.

“
You always
were cheeky
,” my mom muttered, smiling as
she put three slices of toast in front of him.

“
I was just
asking Jake about him crushing on Kate
,”
I told Liam, wanting to change the subject from my sex life and him
sleeping in my bed. I’d spoken to Liam about Jake and Kate last
night. He said that he hadn’t noticed anything, but he was going to
watch him today for me.

“
You’re not
crushing on a sixteen year old, are you Jake? What the hell kind of
eighteen year old would even look at a sixteen year old that way?”
Liam asked with fake shock, using Jakes words from a couple of
weeks ago.

Jake glared
at him warningly. “Ha ha. You two are hilarious,” he grumbled,
shaking his head as he walked off to get dressed.

When we pulled into the parking lot at school, there
was a crowd of people hovering around Johnny’s car. He was standing
there awkwardly, looking really uncomfortable while the boys talked
to him about his car and the girls flirted shamelessly, trying to
get him into the back of it by the looks of it. Jessica, as usual,
was at the front.

“
Wow
, we really have some sluts at
this school!” I whispered to Liam.

He
nodded
, looking unimpressed.
“Yep.”

“
M
aybe you should go and help him.
He looks really uncomfortable,” I suggested, looking at Liam
pleadingly.

He
s
ighed and rolled his eyes at me. “Why
must you be so damn nice all the time?” he asked, kissing me gently
before walking off in the direction of Johnny’s car. I watched him
wave his hand in a buzz off gesture, making half of the boys walk
off immediately. He threw his arm around Johnny’s shoulder,
grinning as he guided him away from the crowd towards the school,
while Johnny looked at him gratefully. I smiled to myself; I really
did have the most adorable boyfriend in the world.

Kate skipped
over to me. “Where’s your hot ass of a brother?” she asked. Jake
cleared his throat behind her. She turned and grinned at him.
“Sorry, I should have said, hot ass of a
stepbrother
,” she corrected,
winking at him.

His face
dropped slightly but he quickly put on a smirk. “Finally realised
I’m not interested but you
’re still
trying to get in with the family, huh?” he teased.

She
laughed
. “Something like that. Maybe I’ve
just gone off of blonds, or maybe you’ve lost your mojo,” she
countered, smirking back at him. I almost choked on my laughter.
Jake loved the chase I could tell, he’d never wanted anyone he
couldn’t have before and I honestly think he wanted Kate now just
because she wasn’t interested. I dragged her in through the doors
and spotted Liam and Johnny chatting against his locker.

“
Hey
,” I greeted, smiling as I
wrapped my arm around Liam’s waist.

“
Hey
, Amber. How are you today?”
Johnny asked politely.

“
I’m
excellent. You?” I asked trying not to laugh as Liam’s hand slipped
down the back of my jeans, rubbing his hand over my ass
softly.

“
I’m
good
.” He nodded in agreement. Kate was
smiling at him seductively next to me.

“
I was just
telling Johnny about Ice Hockey
,” Liam
interjected, squeezing my ass gently. I smiled sweetly at him as I
elbowed him in the ribs. Damn pervert boy! He pulled his hand out
of my jeans chuckling to himself.

“
Yeah
, I’m going to come to the
game on Friday. You think I could sit with you?” Johnny asked,
looking at me hopefully.

“
You can sit
with me if you want to
,” Kate offered,
licking her lips slowly as she looked him over.

He blushed
and
smiled at her timidly. “Thanks. I’d
like that,” he agreed quietly.

“
Come on
then
, let’s get to class,” I suggested,
rolling my eyes. Those two were
so
going to get it on, because by
the look on Kate’s face she wasn’t stopping until he was hers, and
he seemed to like her too. I turned to walk off but stopped as I
spotted Jessica walking up to me with a hateful expression on her
face. She practically threw a brown envelope into my hands as she
glared at me.

“
I still
think you cheated, but people say that it’s only fair that you get
the money
, so there it is, Emo bitch,”
she growled angrily.

Holy crap!
Did she just give me over four thousand doll
ars? I actually won the money?

Kate stepped
closer to me. “Jessica, you better back the hell off before I make
you,” she spat angrily.