TROUBLE, A New Adult Romance Novel (The Rebel Series) (4 page)

“A poke?
 
You actually
poke
your baby?”

I slap him lightly on the arm.
 
“Don’t say it like that.
 
It’s not like I’m torturing her.”

He shakes his head slowly. “I don’t think you should poke her.
 
That doesn’t sound good.”

“Would you shut up?” I turn away from him and look at the shelf in front of me. “I’m trying to buy tampons right now.”

He looks up at the shelves.
 
“Oh, shit.
 
I’m in the tampon aisle.”

I can’t help but laugh when I look at him and catch his horrified expression.
 
“Yes, you are.
 
Watch out, they’re going to
get
you!”
 
Without thinking, I grab a box off the shelf and throw it at him.

It bounces off his massive chest.

“Cut it out,” he says in a low whisper.
 
The box clatters to the floor.

“Uh-oh!
 
Here come some pads!” I say, tossing the next item at him.

The soft, plastic pack hits him in the forehead.

“What are those!” he yells, jumping out of the way as the pads bounce off to his right.
 
He’s high-stepping as he moves out of the way like he has big, scary football players coming to tackle his stupid butt.

In my deranged mind, I’m a football coach now and he’s on my team.
Time for some calisthenics!
 
“Move! Move! Move!” I yell, nailing him with box after box of tampons, pads and whatever else I can find nearby and grab from the shelves.
 
I’m possessed.
 
I cannot control myself for some reason and I don’t want to.
 
This is like getting high without drugs.

“Jesus Christ, Alissa, you’re losing it!
 
Stop!
 
You’re making a fucking mess!”
 
He’s running, jumping, and in between all his evasive maneuvers, picking up the boxes off the floor and holding them in his arms.
 
It’s almost like a contest now to see how many boxes and bags I can get him to pick up and hold at one time.
 
We should be on a game show.
 
We’d totally win.

Colin has about ten boxes stacking up in his arms and his face is bright red. My arm is poised over my shoulder as I’m about to launch a super-sized box of old-school sanitary pads, otherwise known in my house as mouse mattresses, at him.
 
I’m sure this will make all the other boxes fall out of his arms.
 
He’s like the duck in the county fair midway game and I’m about to nail him with my fake bullet and knock him over.
 
KA-BLAM!

“
What
in the sam hill is going on here?” A mostly bald man with a manager’s uniform and name-tag is standing at the end of the aisle, glaring at us and waiting for an answer to his question.
 
There are two really greasy clumps of hair trying to do the job of covering his shiny dome-like bald spot, and I’m suddenly possessed by the need to cut them off.
 
I search the aisle for a pair of scissors as I lower the box of pads down to my waist.

Colin interrupts my search when he points at me with a box of panty-liners.
 
“She’s pregnant.”

The manager puts his hands on his hips.
 
“I can see that.
 
What it doesn’t explain, however, is why suddenly all of these feminine products are on the floor.”

I start giggling.
 
It’s not pretty when my laughter turns quickly into snorts.
 
The potbelly pig is baaaack.

“What’s so funny?” the man asks me, his volume going up.

“You said feminine products.”
 
I don’t know why, but this is hysterical to me.
 
I hold my stomach, afraid I’m going to pull something or possibly pee my pants.

“See?
 
She’s pregnant,” Colin says.
 
“Explains everything.”
 
He starts shoving boxes anywhere on the shelf he can find an empty space.
 
“I’ll just clean this up real quick and then we’ll go.”

“You’re darn right you will.”
 
The manager shakes a ballpoint pen at us.
 
“You’re lucky I don’t call law enforcement.”

“Law enforcement.”
 
I’m giggling even harder now.
 
This guy is so serious.
 
Quin says I have a stick up my butt, but she needs to meet Mr. I’m-Going-To-Call-Law-Enforcement.
 
He makes me look as laid back as her and Teagan.

“I don’t see what’s so funny about getting arrested,” he continues. He gestures at my belly.
 
“I’m surprised you do, seeing as how you’re a mother.”

That douses my humor like nothing else could.
 
My smile turns upside down and I’m ready to kick him.
 
“I’m not a mother,” I say, deciding a kick isn’t quite enough for this butthead.
 
I really want to scratch him right now, but I’ve bitten off all my fingernails in the last few months, leaving me with just nubs.

“Sure looks to me like you are.
 
And what a fine mother you’ll make, too.”
 
He sneers. “Maybe by the time your kid is two years old he can be pick-pocketing tourists with you on the street corner.”

Colin has to hold me back from nubbing the guy’s face off.

“Okay, settle down, wild woman,” Colin says, pushing me backwards, towards the front of the aisle. He doesn’t sound mad or freaked out about being pelted with pads anymore.
 
He actually sounds happy.

“You haven’t finished cleaning this up!” the manager says, pointing at the last remaining boxes of pads on the floor.

“Pick it up yourself, comb-over,” Colin says over his shoulder.

“Yeah!
 
Pick it up yourself, comb-over!” I yell.
 
My voice echoes all over the store and I totally do not care.

I turn around and walk with Colin, moving as fast as my legs will take me without actually running.
 
It’s possible there’s serious waddling involved.
 
“You told him,” I say under my breath.

“Damn straight we did.”

I can’t stop grinning.
 
“You’re my hero.”

He lets out a huff of air.
 
“Trust me.
 
I ain’t nobody’s hero.”

I don’t argue, even though I know he’s wrong.

We get to the parking lot and into the car.
 
Once the doors are shut, we sit there, the silence folding in around us.
 
I’m starting to feel like we’re Bonnie and Clyde.
 
The worst part is, I don’t know whether to feel ashamed or proud.
 
I’m so confused right now.

“So,” Colin says finally, looking over at me.

“So,” I say back, meeting his stare without flinching.

“I guess we still need to go shopping.”

“Better not go back to Teagan without tampons,” I warn.

He’s biting the inside of his cheek, I think to keep from smiling.
 
“Can I trust you to behave yourself in the next store?” he asks.

“Probably not,” I say, turning to look out the front window.
 
My chin goes up just the slightest bit.
 
I feel completely reckless and wild, and I love it.
 
For the first time in months, I feel alive.

“Good,” he says, starting up the car and reversing out of the space.
 
“Behaving is boring.”

CHAPTER THREE

ALL THE EXCITEMENT GENERATED BY my tampon attack has left me exhausted.
 
By the time we get to the second grocery store, I’m too tired to even shop.
 
I give Colin the best description I can of the type of tampons he should get for Teagan and nap in the car, and surprisingly, he gives me no argument about having to make the purchase alone.
 
When I wake up, we’re at Rebel Wheels again.
 
My elated mood has completely deflated into nothing. I’m back to being a gray-girl, living in a numb state.

I climb out of the car with regret in my heart.
 
I really don’t want to go back inside this place.
 
Now that I’ve had a taste of the real world again and uprooted myself from the couch, I’m almost regretting my hibernation plan.
 
Too bad my energy levels are more suited to
that
plan than any other.
 
My feet feel like lead weights.

Colin drops the plastic bag from the store on the armchair when we get into the apartment and then wanders into the kitchen.
 
I hear the refrigerator door opening and the clank of beer bottles.

I’m dismayed to find Quin and Mick there, hanging out in front of the television.
 
My plan to take a nap and sleep off this lethargy, or at least wile away a few more hours of my boring life in unconscious mode, is now on hold.
 
With all these people in the room where I sleep, it’s not going to be possible.
 
I sit in the corner of the couch and grab my e-reader from the coffee table, trying not to let my grouchiness show.

“You’re not going to bury your nose in another book, are you?” asks Quin, getting up from the nearby armchair.

“Yes,” I say simply.
 
I don’t even look up at her.

“What are you reading?” Mick asks.

I shrug.
 
I’m actually not reading anything right now. I’ve been staring at the same page of this book for days.
 
I just look at the black words swimming around on the screen and let my mind wander into happier times, both past and imagined.
 
It’s easier than trying to fall into someone else’s life on the pages.

“You’re not even reading a book, are you?” Quin asks, falling down into a spot on the couch right next to me.
 
She’s too close, but I can’t move away since I’m stuck in the corner.
 
I try not to let it irritate me, but it’s pretty much impossible.

She leans in closer.
 
“
Pride and Prejudice.
 
Oh, God, are you reading that voluntarily?
 
I mean, not for an English Lit assignment?”

“Some people do that, you know,” I say, flipping my tablet over so she’ll quit looking at it.

“You should read the sexy stuff.
 
Erotic romance.
 
The hotsy totsy hoochie cootchie stuff.”

I sniff a little.
 
“Pride and Prejudice is sexy.”

She snorts.
 
“My ass.”

“How would you know?
 
You’ve never read it.”

“Like hell, I haven’t.
 
That Darcy guy was a total pushover and I have no idea why he was okay with sloppy seconds.
 
He deserved better.”

I cannot believe her. “Sloppy seconds?
 
Are you serious?” Quin is so obtuse sometimes.

“Yes. Dead serious.
 
Sloppy seconds all the way.”

“There are no sloppy seconds in Pride and Prejudice.”
 
Now she’s just making me mad.

“What do you call Mr. Wickham?
 
He was her first choice. He got the prime beef.
 
Darcy?
 
Sloppy seconds, like I said.”

 
I put my nose in the air.
 
Quin has no idea what she’s talking about.
 
“Wickham was a scoundrel and a cheat and not fit to be her husband.”

Quin starts laughing.
 
“You sound like Elizabeth Bennet herself.”

I push myself up off the couch with effort, dropping my tablet to the table with a clatter.
 
“Oh, shut up, Quin.”

I grab my purse that was hiding behind a plant and storm out of the apartment.
 
It’s only after getting out into the hallway that I realize what a bad idea that was.
 
Now I have nowhere to go, and I can’t very well walk back into the apartment after that kind of exit; I’ll look ten times more foolish than I already do.

I walk to the end of the hallway and take the stairs down into the main garage.
 
I’ve always just cruised through this space without stopping, but since I’ve been warned about ten times not to touch anything in Teagan’s office, this is the only place left to me unless I want to wander around outside, which I don’t.
 
It’s way too hot outside for a pregnant person.

I sigh as I wander over to a table covered in tools, putting my purse over my head and across my chest so I can be hands-free. There’s a car nearby with its hood open and a rag lying over the radiator part.
 
A piece of the engine is resting on the cloth.
 
The car is painted an ugly orange.

Who’d paint a car orange? Not me.
 
I’d go with white or cream.
 
Something clean-looking and elegant.
 
I sigh as I picture it.
 
I had already picked out the perfect car for myself, freshman year, just like I’d picked out everything else I was eventually going to have in my life once I graduated.
 
I even made a vision board with cut-out magazine pictures of the car, the house, the husband, the children, the dog and cat.
 
Everything.
 
I had the perfect plan.

I smile with extreme bitterness as the memories fade.
 
All of those dreams are now gone, like car exhaust in my rearview mirror.
 
I don’t even have my beater Toyota anymore.
Ugh
.

I run my fingers over one of the tools.
 
It looks so blunt and masculine.
 
It’s cold and hard and …
ew
, covered in black grease.
 
Crud.
 
Now I’m dirty
.
 
I try to wipe the goop off my fingers on a blue rag nearby, but there’s grease on that too.
 
I’m standing there staring at my black-smeared hand when I hear footsteps behind me.