Wreckless (16 page)

“I ruined your night. You were supposed to meet up with your friends.”

“We did meet up with my friends. We were just there.”

I could feel the tears pushing at the back of my eyes again. “But you had to leave because of me, and Mish is really angry.”

“Bridget, darlin’, never, ever, ever drink again.” He sat next to me, his back resting against the other side of the tire. “I don't care how mad Mish is. Maybe she'll get the idea I'm not interested.”

“Yeah. Whatever.” I sniffed, trying not to cry again. Only, this time it was the idea of Mish that had me forcing back tears.

“Well, sometimes a person has to try something on for a second to see if it fits.”

“I don't even know what that means.” I wiped the tears from my eyes.

“I've got stuff going on. A girl like you… Oh, hell, a girl like you is just going to look at me and see a mess. Someone like Mish sees a challenge. She sees a reputation. I thought...”

“What?”

“Maybe I considered seeing if I wanted to earn that reputation.”

I thought I was sobering up, but he wasn't making any sense.

Every time I thought I was getting him, he was something else. Never what I expected. Shifting.

“What's this reputation?”

I was suddenly not sure I wanted to know. If there was one, was it earned?

“I don't think you really have one,” I said, when he didn't answer.

I grinned at him, trying to lighten up the way his lips tipped down. Now, after that kiss, I didn't seem to be able to focus on much more than those lips.

“Oh, trust me. I do.” He turned, crooked one leg in front of him, and leaned back against the wheel. “I've been away for two years and everyone here is just waiting to judge me. Waiting to say they were right about me.”

The way he announced that, the being away bit, made it clear there was obviously something bigger than
we moved away and moved back
going on.

“Are you going to tell me anything more than that?”

He looked at me, really looked at me as if he could judge me just by looking.

“You're trusting me tonight,” is what he finally said.

It wasn't what I'd expected. I'd expected him to either say no¸ or tease me to change the subject. I figured I had about a ten percent chance of him actually telling me what was going on…and that was being optimistic.

But trust—that wasn't something I had expected him to bring up. I’d forgotten tonight had started out so hard. That my trust had been shattered. Again. When I finally answered, I’m not sure who I surprised more.

“More than you know.” And wasn't that the truth.

My answer seemed to throw him, to bother him. I wasn't sure why, but I was guessing I'd said the one thing that slowed his thought process. As if the trust I’d handed him wasn’t the normal everyday trust he saw at home or school. As if right there between the two of us it was something more.

After a moment, he nodded. “Fair enough.”

I waited, wondering what that meant when he didn't start talking.

“Let’s get off the ground.” Jake stood and pulled me to my feet.

He let go of my hands and I teetered, not sure which way to reach to steady myself as he swiped at the dirt I’d manage to get all over my dress. Before I could end up on my butt again, Jake wrapped an arm around my shoulder and walked me to the rear of the truck before hoisting me into the bed. We settled among everything with our backs to the cab, my head sliding until it landed—admittedly comfortably—on his shoulder.

“Do you have any brothers or sisters?” he asked.

This conversation was
not
going the way I'd expected. It was always the simple questions that walked a person right up to the gray line of truth and lies. How many questions—and how close to the line—was he going to push me?

“No.” I held my breath, waiting to see what he’d throw at me next that might lead us closer to the gray area.

“I'm the youngest of five.” He rested his head back against the hub. “Three brothers and a sister.”

I wasn't sure where this was going, but if there was one thing I knew how to do, it was sit quietly.

“My parents went through a rough patch. Nothing serious. Just bickering. Probably about money and college bills, and we had that drought—everyone was arguing about the damn rain not coming. One brother moved out. The other two were big deals at school. Both of them going on to play ball at college. Both of them quarterbacks.”

I could totally believe that after seeing the build of one of the brothers. If they all had that same tall, lean cut, they'd pretty much blend in anywhere a quarterback conference happened. You know, if there were quarterback conferences.

“I don't know what got into me. I think I just felt like I didn't fit anywhere between the Dean's List genius and the two captains of everything. I got tired of hearing,
your brothers, your brothers, your brothers
all the time.”

I had a feeling this wasn't going anywhere good.

“It's my own fault. I just gave up trying to live up to anything. And with all of them in college, it was like the bar moved. It wasn't just trying to live up to them in high school, but Dave became the quarterback at State and then one weekend freshman year they had him start in a home game. Seriously, how do you live up to that?”

No idea.

“I know what you mean.” It was the stupidest thing to say. I had no idea how it crossed my lips.

“Really?” He drawled out the word. “You know what I mean?”

“We all have things we're trying to live up to—or not. I mean…”

I just stopped talking. There was nothing I could say that was going to make it better. I had personal knowledge of how annoying it was when people who couldn’t have a clue said,
I know exactly how you feel.

“Sorry.” I settled back, trying to signal I'd be quiet from there on in.

Jake just looked at me as if I were a puzzle he thought he'd solved. Then he grinned that grin, humoring me like a child again. I knew what that was like, too. To be humored. I was done being that girl.

“I gave up. I mean, I didn't quit the team or drop out or anything. I just quit trying as hard. Stopped doing everything right. And next thing you know, I’m in Tommy Markson's truck and we're getting pulled over. We hadn't even been speeding.”

My overactive imagination got the best of me. I had no idea where this story was going, but in my head nothing good was coming.

“And?”

“And Tommy Markson's truck turned out not to be Tommy Markson's truck. He'd lifted it on his way to get me and another guy. Told me it was his dad's.”

Oh. Wow.

“We'd been driving around, just going nowhere when we were pulled over. The cop hauled us all in. My parents came to get me, my mom in tears. My dad thought it was the beginning of a long slow descent into hoodlumdom.”

I didn't want to admit I could see that path set out too from what he was saying.

“Tommy finally admitted that me and the other guy didn't know he'd stolen the truck. Luckily, the judge believed him and we were let go. But my parents weren't so forgiving.”

He looked past me, down the road. This certainly made the sign-stealing incident make more sense.

“My parents shipped me off to this school for at-risk guys.”

“Oh.” I mean, really, that kind of stunk.

“Yeah. I hated it at first. I was really ticked off. But it was hard to stay mad.”

“Why?”

“Well, first off because it was a ranch. I spent five hours in the morning working, then five in school, then chores after dinner. I was too tired to be mad.” I knew the story was going to have a better ending than expected when he chuckled. “And because my counselor got it. Even called my parents and told them I wasn't
at risk
, I was just going through a stupid phase. But by then, I was on their scholarship roll and didn't want to go back home. I did my whole two years.”

“So you were like roping cattle and stuff?”

“Not so much. At first you dig a lot of holes. You have to work your way up to handling the animals.” He grinned. “I can plant a fence post quicker than you could change your outfit.”

Which was saying something, since clothes and I had a very casual relationship when it came to picking and choosing.

“You just got home from working a ranch for two years.”

“Right, but you'd think I'd been to some juvie up north, the way people talked about me when I first got home. I’d come back thinking I didn’t have anything to prove to anyone, and I was so wrong.”

I knew exactly what that was like, even if I couldn't own up to it. I knew the way people watched you as if you couldn't see them and the looks they’d give you. I knew what it was like with everyone thinking you were something you weren't. I knew about expectations that had nothing to do with you and everything to do with your circumstances.

“And?”

“And I thought why not take advantage of it? When Sarah started hinting at wanting to go out, I took her up on everything she was offering.”

I thought that would hurt to hear. But it didn’t—not the way I expected. It hurt a little to hear how raw talking about her made his voice.

“What happened to Sarah?”

Jake snorted and rested his head back against the side of the truck bed.

“Sarah found out that dating a normal guy with a reputation was the same as dating a normal guy. She thought my ideas of wild might run a little outside the lines. She was too wild to hold onto, I guess.”

Even with the rawness, I still wanted to know if he'd loved her, if she'd broken his heart. I wanted to know if he was over her.

I wanted to know if there was something so wrong with me that a few hours after catching Tanner and Leah together, my biggest concern wasn't that I no longer had a best friend. The heartache I thought would kill me had numbed. The most I felt now was anger and embarrassment. But Jake…he made me feel more things than I knew existed.

“So...”

“So when the summer was almost over, she dumped me and that was that.”

I looked at him, trying to see the truth and then let the words slip out.

“Was it?”

I suddenly felt sick again, but not from the booze. I felt sick because I realized that it
mattered
. It mattered if he was over her. It mattered if he was interested in Mish. It mattered that he didn't look at me with anything more than amusement.

If I'd been that girl, that daring girl, the one who was a little wild myself when I'd met him, would he be looking at me differently?

But there was no going back.

I couldn't be that all-the-way girl no matter what I crossed off that list, but that didn't stop me from wanting to hold on to the part of myself he'd kissed.

“Jake?” I was still stuck looking at the hollow of his throat, which had at some point become my favorite part of him…next to his hands…and his smile…and his rear end…and…oh, I was hopeless.

He looked down at me and must have read it on my face.

“Now Bridget, don't be thinking that. No more kisses. That was our kiss.”

“I don't think another kiss would hurt anything.”

“Kindergarten teachers and wild boys don't date, darlin’.”

“You said it was all a reputation.” I raised my head to meet his gaze. “You said you weren't really wild.”

“Nah. I said I wasn't wild enough for her.” He stood and offered me a hand. “That girl was certifiably crazy.”

Chapter Twelve

“This one?” Jake rolled by Tanner's driveway. “You didn't say he lived right on the road.”

“I said he lived in town.”

“Fine. But—and I'm serious—no fire.”

I rolled my eyes. In retrospect the fire was obviously a bad idea. Don't get me wrong. I wished it weren't. But arson, as Jake put it, was not on the list.

He coasted us to the end of the street and parked about fifty yards beyond the last house.

Between my hair and my pale skin and the red dress, I wasn't going to be sneaking the whole way without someone seeing me.

“Here.” Jake handed me a black hoodie and the dark cap he'd been wearing before we'd gone swimming.

I smiled as I tucked my hair up into it. I glanced over at his now-bare head, checking out his hair and it’s slightly mussed
style.
I liked it. It was dark and thick with a little bit of wave. I could see wanting to just run my hands through it all night.

That was on my secret list. The one that started with kissing him again. The one I was going to have to keep to myself, tucked away inside, since he wasn't interested.

We ran down the road, Jake shushing me every time a giggle slipped out. Before we got to Tanner's house, he handed me a roll of toilet paper.

“Do you know how to do this?”

I rolled my eyes. “Just throw it at the tree.”

Jake laughed. “Pretty much. Make sure it has a good tail so it catches, and try not to get it stuck too quickly.”

When we got to the yard, a light out back was still on. Hopefully no one was up, but it was almost two and Tanner’s curfew was midnight.

Of course, that might just have been what he was telling me. But who knows.

I was getting tired of questioning everything. I stood there, staring at that light, wondering if he'd just dropped her off. If my showing up had even slowed down their night. If they'd tried to call or wanted to talk to me. I wondered if either felt bad. I wondered why, if he was with her, he dating me.

I felt the gut punch all over again. The idea that everyone had to have known and no one had said anything was…mind-boggling. I couldn't believe that people wouldn't tell me.

Had they all thought I was that fragile? My family? Tanner? The entire school?

It was the lies and betrayal that hurt. Not the fact that I’d lost Tanner. And, to be honest, even the pain of losing Leah was fading. Oh, it hurt, and I knew life was going to be completely different being alone without a best friend compared to being alone with a best friend, but you can’t unlearn a betrayal. There were things in life that once you knew them, the entire world was tainted with that experience.

I should know.

“Bridget?”

Jake crossed back to me and tilted my chin up so he could meet my gaze under the bill of the snug black hat he’d stuck on my head. The only person who thought I had a little devil in me somewhere and he was already doubting me.