“If she really meant that, she wouldn’t have snuck us into a bar.”
That was Emma-logic, all right. The longer you thought about it, the less sense it made.
Emma glanced from me to Nash. Then she smiled and headed down the alley toward the car lot across the street, to give us some privacy. I dug my keys from my pocket and stared at them, trying to avoid Nash’s gaze until I knew what I was going to say.
He’d seen me at my worst, and rather than flipping out or making fun, he’d helped me regain control. We’d connected in a way I wouldn’t have thought possible an hour earlier, especially with someone like Nash, whose one-track mind was a thing of legends. Still, I couldn’t fight the certainty that this evening’s dream would end in tomorrow’s nightmare. That daylight would bring him to his senses, and he’d wonder what he was doing with me in the first place.
I opened my mouth, but no sound came out. My keys jangled, the ring dangling from my index finger, and he frowned when his gaze settled on them.
“You okay to drive?” He grinned, and my pulse jumped in response. “I could take you home and walk from there. You live in the Parkview complex, right? That’s just a couple of minutes from me.”
He knew where I lived? I must have looked suspicious, because he rushed to explain. “I gave your sister a ride once. Last month.”
My jaw tightened, and I felt my expression darken. “She’s my cousin.” Nash had given Sophie a ride? Please don’t let that be a euphemism …
He frowned and shook his head in answer to my unspoken question. “Scott Carter asked me to give her a lift.”
Oh. Good. I nodded, and he shrugged. “So you want me to take you guys home?” He held his hand out for my keys.
“That’s okay, I’m good to drive.” And I wasn’t in the habit of letting people I barely knew behind the wheel of my car. Especially really hot guys who—rumor had it—had gotten two speeding tickets in his ex’s Firebird.
Nash flashed a deep set of stubbly dimples and shrugged. “Then can I have a lift? I rode with Carter, and he won’t be ready to go for hours.”
My pulse jumped into my throat. Was he leaving early just so he could ride with me? Or had I ruined his evening with my freak-tastic hysterics?
“Um … yeah.” My car was a mess, but it was too late to worry about that. “But you’ll have to flip Emma for shotgun.”
Fortunately, that turned out to be unnecessary. Em took the back, shooting me a meaningful glance and pointing at Nash as she slid across the seat, swiping a corn-chip bag onto the floor. I dropped her off first, a full hour and a half before her curfew, which had to be some kind of record.
As I pulled out of Emma’s driveway, Nash twisted in the passenger seat to face me, his expression somber, and my heart beat so hard it almost hurt. It was time for the easy letdown. He was too cool to say it in front of Emma, and even with her gone, he’d probably be really nice about it. But the bottom line was the same; he wasn’t interested in me. At least, not after my public meltdown.
“So you’ve had these panic attacks before?”
What? My hands clenched the wheel in surprise as I took a left at the end of the street.
“A couple of times.” Half a dozen, at least. I couldn’t purge suspicion from my voice. My “issues” should have driven him screaming into the night, and instead he wanted details? Why?
“Do your parents know?”
I shifted in my seat, as if a new position might make me more comfortable with the question. But it would take much more than that. “My mom died when I was little, and my dad couldn’t handle me on his own. He moved to Ireland, and I’ve been with my aunt and uncle ever since.”
Nash blinked and nodded for me to go on. He gave me none of the awkward sympathy or compulsive, I’m-not-sure-what-to-say throat-clearing I usually got when people found out I’d been half-orphaned, then wholly abandoned. I liked him for that, even if I didn’t like where his questions were heading.
“So your aunt and uncle know?”
Yeah. They think I’m one egg shy of a dozen. But the truth hurt too much to say out loud.
I turned to see him watching me closely, and my suspicion flared again, settling to burn deep in my gut. Why did he care what my family knew about my not-so-private misery? Unless he was planning to laugh with his friends later about what a freak I was.
But his interest didn’t seem malicious. Especially considering what he’d done for me at Taboo. So maybe his curiosity was feigned, and he was after something else to tell his friends about. Something girls rarely denied him, if the rumors were true.
If he didn’t get it, would he tell the entire school my darkest, most painful secret?
No. My stomach pitched at the thought, and I hit the brake too hard as we came to a stop sign.
My foot still wedged against the brake, I glanced in the rearview mirror at the empty street behind me, then shifted into Park and turned to face Nash, steeling my nerve for the question to come. “What do you want from me?” I spat it out before I could change my mind.
Nash’s eyes widened in surprise, and he sat back hard against the passenger’s side door, as if I’d shoved him. “I just. Nothing.”
“You want nothing?” I wanted to see the deep greens and browns of his irises, but the beam from the nearest streetlight didn’t reach my car, so only the dim light from my dashboard shone on him, and it wasn’t enough to illuminate his face. To let me truly read his expression. “I can count the number of times we’ve really spoken before tonight on one hand.” I held that hand up for emphasis. “Then you come out of nowhere and play white knight to my distressed damsel, and I’m supposed to believe you want nothing in return? Nothing to tell your friends about on Monday?”
He tried to laugh, but the sound was stilted, and he shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I wouldn’t—”
“Save it. Rumor has it you’ve conquered more territory than Genghis Khan.”
A single dark brow rose in the shadows, challenging me. “You believe everything you hear?”
My eyebrow shot up to mirror his. “You denyin’ it?”
Instead of answering, he laughed for real and propped one elbow on the door handle. “Are you always this mean to guys who sing to you in dark alleys?”
My next retort died on my lips, so surprised was I by the reminder. He had sung to me, and somehow talked me down from a brutal panic attack. He’d saved me from public humiliation. But there had to be a reason, and I wasn’t that great of a conquest.
“I don’t trust you,” I said finally, my hands limp and worthless on my lap.
“Right now I don’t trust you either.” He grinned in the dark, flashing pale teeth and a single shadowed dimple, and his open-armed gesture took in the stopped car. “Are you kicking me out, or do I get door-to-door service?”
That’s
