Unlovable (39 page)

“
No longer an… A little out
of control?” he said incredulously as he lifted my arm. “I think
this is more than just a little out of control!” I backed away,
lowering my sleeves. “He almost—” A loud crack of thunder cut him
off in mid-sentence, the lights flickered and went out.

“
Great, I can’t see a
thing.” I moved forward, smacking my bruised knee into a barstool.
“Ouch.” Seth reached out and took my hand, wrapping his arms around
my waist once I was safely at his side.

“
Let me guess, your dad
taught you to see in the dark too.”

“
I don’t want to fight,” he
said, cinching me up against him.

“
Seth, let me say something
about the whole Zack thing. The reason I didn’t go into greater
detail about everything with you is because I didn’t want you to
hurt him.”

“
You’re worried about Zack?”
he said incredulously.

“
No.” I shuddered at the
idea. “I was worried you’d do something
to
him. I don’t want to spend the
rest of my life visiting you every other Wednesday in the state
prison. Conjugal visits are not my idea of a good time.”

“
You would visit me in
prison?”

“
I’d walk to the ends of the
earth for you. Being without you the past couple of weeks has been
horrible. I dreamt about you almost every night.”

“
Hmm, tell me about your
dreams,” he murmured against my skin.

“
I’d rather show
you.”

28

“
Thanks for taking me to see
my mom this morning, she looks awful.”

“
I’ve seen Cole work
miracles before, Maggie, don’t give up hope.”

“
I found some letters she’d
written to me, you can read them if you like. She wrote that she
loved me, she’s never actually told me that, not ever.”

“
I know it’s not the same
thing, but I love you, very much.”

“
It may not be the same, but
it is still wonderful to hear.” I squeezed his hand. “So, Principal
Nelson let you switch all your classes back? I hope you didn’t have
to use your gun.” He flashed a cunning grin at my question as we
walked into the cafeteria for lunch.

My eyes automatically gravitated to
Hillary’s usual table, she was sitting next to Zack, whose arm was
in a sling. “What did Booker do to Zack?” I had to laugh. “Can’t he
get in trouble for police brutality?”

“
Book didn’t touch him,” he
said, disappointed. “But he did talk to him after school yesterday,
telling him in no uncertain terms he was to never lay a hand, or
anything else, on you ever again. He was also kicked off the
baseball team. I don’t think it was a very good day for poor old
Zack.” There wasn’t an ounce of pity in his voice. Seth had tried
pressuring me into filing charges against Zack, but I’d refused,
fearing retaliation. He insisted I was worrying needlessly; he
obviously didn’t know Zack as well as I did.

“
There’s nothing wrong with
his arm either. He’s claiming he threw his elbow out during
practice. He’s been telling anyone who will listen that he quit the
team to preserve his arm for college ball.” Seth shook his head in
disgust. “Lying weasel. I overheard the coaches talking last week.
They were thinking of benching him anyway, his performance has
dropped off lately.

“
Of course Hillary was able
to talk her way out of any real trouble, claiming she had no idea
what Zack had planned to do to you, though she is suspended from
cheering for the next three games,” he said. “Here she comes, look
at the stupid smile on her face.”

I had never heard Seth speak with such
anger about anyone before and it surprised me. I wrapped my arm
around his and softly touched my lips to his cheek.

“
I’m sorry. They’ve hurt you
so deeply it’s been difficult for me to overlook everything,” he
said, caressing my jaw.

“
Kiss me,” I
whispered.

He looked at me surprised. “You do
realize if I kiss you everyone else will see us?” He didn’t care
for my hang up over public displays of affection, but he never
pressed the issue.

“
Do it before I change my
mind and leave you alone to deal with the evil
cheerleader.”

He encircled me in his arms, and while
cradling my head in his palm, covered my mouth with his in
undeniable passion. Catcalls and hoots rang out throughout the
cafeteria.

“
Where exactly have you been
hiding that kiss?” I blurted out when he pulled back. “When we get
home, you need to bring him out again, maybe even invite a few of
his friends over,” I said, jouncing my eyebrows at him.

“
Judging from your reaction,
it’s probably not a good idea.”

“
I’ll worry about that. In
fact, why don’t we skip the rest of school and go home right now.”
My fingers began toying with his hair.

“
I think you’ve skipped
enough school, don’t you?”

“
Spoil sport.” I had
completely forgotten about Hillary. I quickly glanced around, she
was nowhere to be seen.

After school, I reluctantly pulled out
my math book for some heavy duty Calculus tutoring. Seth and I
worked on it until I took the book and chucked it across the table
in tears.

“
I HATE MATH! I’m never
going to use this tripe ever again in my life. Why do I have to
know all this?” He wiped the tears from my eyes and pulled me onto
his lap.

“
I seem to remember a
promise you made to me once about math.” I nestled down into his
arms.

“
What promise?” He tucked
the stray piece of hair I’d been twisting behind my ear.

“
You said quote, 'You’ll
love Calculus by the time I’m done helping you, if not, I’ll kiss
you so long and hard, you won’t care about it anymore.'
”

“
I said that?” he
bantered.

“
Something like that, yes. I
want you to kiss me so long and hard I won’t care anymore. Kiss me
like you did at school today.”

“
I think we’ve had a long
day and we should go to bed.”

“
Seth!” I feigned horror at
his suggestion.

“
Aren’t you just hilarious,”
he said, taking my hand and leading me upstairs.

“
Does that mean you’re not
going to kiss me so long and hard I won’t care about Calculus
anymore?”

“
Not tonight.”

“
You should be a politician.
Long on promises, short on follow through.”

“
Good night,
Maggie.”

The next morning, the air was alive
with the unmistakable smell of waffles and burnt bacon, two of my
favorites… minus the burnt part. I quickly brushed my teeth and got
dressed. Peering over the staircase railing, I could see Seth in
the kitchen in his gray basketball shorts and a blue DEA tee shirt
removing a hot waffle from the waffle iron.

“
Hot! Hot!” He tossed the
waffle onto a plate, licking his singed fingers. I suppressed a
giggle as he rushed over to the stove and fruitlessly tried to save
the burnt bacon. He soon gave up, dumped it into the garbage
disposal, and starting over again with a few fresh
slices.

I had never seen Seth so distracted
before. He was all thumbs, I sat down to watch. I noticed his
Calculus book was sitting open on the counter. He was working on a
math problem as he cooked, and if I wasn’t mistaken, he was
struggling with it.

The bacon began spitting wildly on the
stove and a splash of grease jumped from the pan, landing on his
tee shirt. He jerked the shirt way from his skin and unplugged the
waffle iron, setting it aside as he began mumbling, I strained to
hear.

“
You have a degree in this,
come on!” He held up a slip of paper, and wrote a mathematical
formula of some kind in the air with his finger. Still frustrated,
he paused to set out a can of whipped cream and some fresh
strawberries.

I fell in love with him all over again
as he stood in the kitchen burning the bacon for a second time
while complaining to his stupid Calculus book that it had to be
wrong. I climbed down the stairs as he dumped the second round of
charred bacon into the sink.

“
Now you know how I feel.”
He jumped at my words.

“
Hey, you’re not supposed to
be up yet. I wanted to make you breakfast in bed for your
birthday.”

“
That’s sweet, but my
birthday is not until the 27
^th
.”

“
Maggie, it is the
27
^th
.” I
was shocked. I couldn’t believe I’d lost track of that much time.
“I have something to give you, though it’s not a birthday present.
I was going to give it to you a couple of weeks ago, except
…”

“
I was too busy freaking
out, maybe?” I suggested with a grimace.

He took my hand, leading me back up to
the bedroom and pulled out a dark blue velvet box from the dresser.
“I had this made for you.”

Nestled inside the box was a
silver heart shaped necklace with two gemstones lying side-by-side
that made up the heart. “This side is a diamond, your birthstone,
and the other is a
sapphire, my
birthstone. It comes apart.” He pressed firmly on the center of the
heart, and the necklace split in two, each gemstone was now half a
heart. He snapped it back together. “It’s us, apart we’re
incomplete, together we’re whole.” He took it out of the box and
put the necklace around my neck. The gemstones fell to the center
of my chest and lay over my heart perfectly.

“
It’s
beautiful. Thank you.” I pressed my mouth to his. When
h
e pulled away, I ran my tongue over
my lips to catch the last of his kiss.

“
It drives me crazy when you
do that,” he groaned, crushing his mouth back over mine. I liked
how this birthday was going so far!

“
I made waffles with
strawberries and whipped cream for your birthday breakfast, they’re
your favorite right?” he said, leading me back
downstairs.

Everything was delicious, well, except
for the burnt bacon. He showed me the math problem he couldn’t
figure out, insisting again that the book was wrong. When I pointed
out that he had copied the problem down wrong onto the paper, he
was so happy you’d think he’d won the lottery.

“
Now that I’ve had my
private tutor lesson for the day, I’m going to take a shower.” I
cleaned up the kitchen while he was getting ready, staring down at
my necklace often. The lights in the kitchen made it sparkle even
more.

“
I promise it won’t
disappear.” He descended the stairs looking delicious in a pair of
worn jeans and a blue button down shirt.

“
I love it. It’s so
beautiful.”

“
I’m glad you like it. Come
here, let me show you the security system Booker designed. It’s
pretty amazing.”

The system was complicated, with its
three backup alarms and two separate codes. I had no idea how I was
going to memorize all the numbers. He showed me how to program it,
and how to bypass the windows so I could open them without
triggering the alarm, which he then did so the burnt bacon smell
could escape. “No one has ever broken the code on one of his
alarms,” he bragged of his friend as he opened the last
window.

“
Which brings me to my
proposal,” he said, fidgeting nervously with the buttons on his
sleeve. “Ah, until they catch the Dresers, Booker and I… both of
us… think it would be safer, if, um, for you to move in here. I
know you probably feel uncomfortable with the idea, but Mags, your
trailer’s not safe.”

He cleared his throat and
continued, pacing while he spoke. “As you know, my dad was a
Chaplin in the military, and he instilled in me some core
principles I value deeply. I’ve always planned on waiting until I
was married to have sex, so if you’re worried I will try and
pressure you into sleeping with me, I promise, I won’t.” His
beautiful face was now bright pink.

When he had first told me about his
dad being a Chaplin, I’d suspected that was why he never pushed our
relationship physically, but it was good to know for sure.
“Okay.”

He looked at me carefully. “Okay?
That’s it?”

“
I trust you.” Completely.
He’d more than proven he was trustworthy, and it was about time I
showed him that.

He exhaled loudly. “Thank you. I guess
we should go and pick up your things and bring them over here
then.”

I smiled.
“
I guess we’d
better.
” It was nice to know even he got
nervous sometimes.

It took all of five minutes to round
up my clothes from the trailer. They fit nicely into two plastic
grocery bags. I also gathered my mother’s letters and stuffed them
into my jacket pocket.

“
This is it?” He looked with
disbelief as he took the bags of clothes from me. “Now I know what
I’m getting you for your birthday.”

“
You already gave me this
beautiful necklace. It’s more than enough.”