Trouble in Sudden Falls: A Sudden Falls Romance (16 page)

Fortunately, Eli didn’t stop, but unfortunately, the memory halted Maddie in her tracks. She let her forehead fall against the front door as she put her key in the lock. “What have we done?” She rested her eyes for a moment, as if she could make the evening before cease to exist if she refused to face it.

Maddie locked the door and moved more slowly to her car. She tried to look at the situation objectively. At least she hadn’t slept with him, though God knew, she’d been more than willing.

Eli had stopped things.
Again.

Eli Redmond—who’d pretty much sleep with
anyone
. She shrugged as she climbed into the car. Okay, so he claimed that wasn’t true, and she had to admit she hadn’t seen his usual procession of women since she’d moved home. Eli had evidently become more discriminating. It was more than possible his social life had calmed down some.

Possible. Not
likely
, of course.

But maybe he wasn’t that bad anymore. He had kept them out of a potentially tricky situation. And that was more than she could say for herself, because there had been a point last night when she’d been all for throwing caution to the wind.

Maddie sighed as she turned from Oakwood Avenue onto Main Street. Of course, his prudence did get him one step closer to full access of Andy’s car for two years. ‘Cause now she was seriously contemplating jumping him. To hell with the consequences.

Fortunately or unfortunately—she couldn’t quite decide which—it was the consequences that had kept her up the night before. How could she know for certain that Eli wouldn’t get bored and move on to someone else?

That would be more than she could take. The idea of finding Eli with the first chubby tart that came along hurt so much more than the reality of having discovered Darren. How could she trust that Eli wouldn’t get sidetracked?

Trust being the operative word, and a conviction she really didn’t feel. The only way she could trust him would be if she were somehow assured that he wouldn’t get relationship A.D.D. Maybe a test of some sort?

She could fix him up with someone. If he took the bait, then she’d know. And if he didn’t…? It would be a step closer at least.

Maddie mentally catalogued the women in town with whom she still kept in touch. The list was pretty sparse. Heck, the list of women—single or otherwise—who were actually willing to speak to her was pretty small. Ellie Stevenson was still single. And if she wasn’t, there was probably a sister, friend or cousin, or sister of a friend’s cousin who was.

It’s not like she’d have to work very hard to find someone who was interested.

Except that she didn’t like the idea of Eli dating someone else. Not that he was dating
her
for certain… no matter how many times he’d propositioned her lately.

As she parked her car behind the store, she let her imagination get away from her for a moment. What would it be like to really date Eli? They had the chemistry, to be sure. Last night proved that without a doubt. Who knew that seventeen-plus years of unrequited hormones could go off so explosively? That man knew how to kiss, there was no doubt about it.

She shook her head abruptly. The less she thought about that the better. Eli was right. Until she knew she could trust him with her heart in addition to her friendship, then she shouldn’t even consider it.

But what if she set him up with someone to prove a point and he ended up marrying that woman? How stupid would she feel then?

“Hey, Freak. Why are you sitting at our table?” Rogan looked up and saw Sudden Falls High’s version of the school bully. Which happened to be slightly preppier than the playground thug from the last school he went to. Same chopped meat brain power with the physique to match, though. He wore the Friday uniform of the hockey team: jersey and jeans. Rogan raised an eyebrow and continued eating his lunch off his tray, missing the food of Mrs. Peachy—the actual name of the head cafeteria lady from two schools ago.

Meathead evidently wasn’t done. “Hey punk, I’m talkin’ to you.”

Rogan looked up again and shrugged. If he were Eli, he’d undoubtedly quote DeNiro. But he wasn’t. “But I am not talking to you,” he enunciated carefully.

Meathead’s face turned red as he lunged towards Rogan’s tray. He moved it in enough time to save the rest of his cardboard pizza—though why he bothered, he couldn’t say.

He gave Meathead his fiercest look, which stalled the guy in his tracks. “Look. I don’t want trouble. Go away.” When he got angry, people usually noticed. Rogan had been told on a number of occasions that the look in his eyes, the set of his jaw and the tone of his voice were enough to scare the devil himself. He wasn’t above using that to his advantage.

“Whatever, dude.” Meathead’s response and retreat made up in haste what it lacked in wit.

Rogan continued to pick at the pizza in front of him, not at all interested in it, but refusing to look as if he were running away. He opened the computer manual on the table beside the tray and perused the index searching for the answer to a problem he was having with his new network.

A moment later, two members of the perpetually cute-and-sweet crowd—juniors, he was certain—made their way to his table. “Can we sit here?” asked one. They looked remarkably alike and they were both in his English Lit class. One was Anna or Abby or Amy. She was fairly quiet and wore muted shades of peach and green always with a white cardigan sweater which didn’t do much to hide a pretty impressive… well, not much could have hidden them, really. And her near twin and best friend—or so he was told—Darla or Darlene or something, outshone her friend with bright colored clothes and a bubbly personality, but a less impressive set of headlights. He wasn’t good with names, particularly when he wasn’t
trying
to make a good impression.

Each girl sat across from him and set her salad on the table in front of her. He suspected something was up. Girls like them weren’t interested in guys like him. And besides, he’d seen them across the room, pointing and giggling to each other. They definitely had something up their collective sleeves.

“You’re in our English Lit class, aren’t you?” said the less quiet one—Darlene, he thought.

“I think so. Cannifarm, first period?”

“That’s it.” She picked through her salad, pulling out the bacon bits and placing them in a dainty little pile at the edge of her tray. “What did you do to piss her off?”

“I breathe.”

She giggled and it was such a nice sound, he raised his eyes. Actually, Darlene didn’t giggle,
Amy
did. A smile brightened up her face quickly turning her into the downright prettier friend. Darlene elbowed Amy and gave her a significant look. Significant of what, Rogan couldn’t say.

“She’s not so bad once you get to know her,” Amy said quietly, almost challenging him.

“Right.”

“She’s on the town council with my uncle. I’ve known her since I was little.”

“Maybe you could put in a good word.” He didn’t think for an instant that she would.

“Sure.”

He needed all the help he could get if he hoped to pull off the grades that Eli and the college required to let him participate in the college program. He wanted it so bad he could taste it.

“Funny T-shirt,” she said.

He looked down at his chest. His T-shirt read, “Roses are #FF0000, Violets are #0000FF, All our base are belong to you.”

“I don’t get it,” Darlene said.

He doubted Amy did either until she looked over at her friend then explained it. “F-F-0-0-0-0 is the hex code for red, 0-0-0-0-F-F is the hex code for blue and the base thing is a reference to a really old computer game from Japan that had a horrible translation.”

“Nice,” he said, definitely intrigued. She spoke hardcore geek. Not many girls around here like that.

“We’ve got choir,” Darlene said, slowly getting to her feet, and tossing her trash onto her tray.

“See you,” he returned absently, his thoughts returning pretty quickly to the anticipation and possibility of college.

Anything would have to be better than high school—one extremely cute and well-rounded geek-girl aside. It felt like everyone was out to get him. School sucked, he had no friends to speak of, and the ones he did have pretty much resided inside his computer. Even though Eli was being pretty cool by giving him the old network equipment, everything else at the house seemed strained and he would have to give it up as soon as he moved the next time. And yesterday, he got a letter from Becca. That wasn’t entirely unusual, but it rarely boded well.

He fingered the letter he’d stuck in between the pages of the manual on the table beside him. He still hadn’t gotten up the guts to open it. Either she was on her way back—which meant that she would be taking him away—
Again
. And that would mean no college, no early graduation from high school and no relief from more of this torture. Or conversely, she could say she wasn’t coming back—at least not any time soon, which meant that he’d been abandoned yet again. Philosophically, he thought he preferred the latter, but it would have been nice if his own mother would occasionally
pretend
she liked him in some way.

“Mr. Lafayette.” Rogan straightened as Mrs. Cannifarm barreled down on him. “What are you reading?” she asked in her typically superior tone. Rogan took a deep breath to calm the instant need to go on the defensive.

He lifted the book enough that she could see the cover.

“If you put half the effort into my classroom that you’re putting into that computer manual,” her nostrils flared as she said it, “you’d actually be able to get a decent grade.”

That bitch had nerve. He ground his teeth together. “I’ve read every assignment. I’ve done all the required homework. You haven’t passed back the last test scores, but I knew the material and understood the questions you asked so I can’t imagine it’ll be that bad.”

Her eyes narrowed on him. “You can’t, can you?” she asked walking off, her nose firmly planted in the air.

Damn. Rogan ground his teeth. He totally shouldn’t have antagonized her. She held his future in the palm of her hand.

Amy couldn’t believe she’d talked to Rogan Lafayette! She put a hand over her racing heart. They’d had a
real
conversation. Nothing like when she bumped into him in the hallway and he mumbled “‘Scuse me,” before dropping his gaze back to his phone and heading off to his next class.

This time he’d actually looked her in the eye.

And held her gaze.

It was cosmic. It was amazing. It had been
waaaayyy
too short.

“Was it everything you hoped?” Darlene asked as they dumped their trays near the doorway.

“He has
gorgeous
eyes.” Amy’s voice held dreamier quality than she’d intended and she realized she sounded like a total loser.

“Good grief.” Darlene rolled her eyes.

“How do you think it went? Do you think he likes me?”

Darlene bit the corner of her mouth like she was fighting a grin. “I think he was more absorbed in Mrs. Cannifarm’s abuse.” Darlene could occasionally be too honest.

Amy felt her spirits sag.

“But he
did
talk to you. And he actually listened. It didn’t seem like he was humoring you.”

“Yeah, he did.” Amy couldn’t help but smile.

“Ready for choir?”

“I forgot my purse in my locker. I need to check my blood sugar. As much fun as it would be to pass out in the middle of practice for the Spring Chorale, I don’t think Mrs. Bayliss would take it very well.”

Darlene stopped to contemplate that. “No. But it might be fun to watch.”

Amy play-slapped her. “Hey…”

“Okay, so it wouldn’t be fun enough to risk your life,” Darlene conceded. “Go check how sweet you are. I’ll wait.”

Chapter Nine

It was early the next morning in the privacy of his room, before Rogan found the guts to break the seal on the letter from Becca. It was written on wrinkled and ratty-looking notebook paper, complete with torn fringe from the wire binding at the left margin.

Becca’s handwriting on a good day was barely legible and any other time, required the decoding skills of the NSA. Fortunately, she’d written her letter on a good day, and Rogan could more or less make out her message.