He let out a snort. “As if that could ever happen.”
“Zack assumed I’d jump into his arms for comfort.”
“Comfort? Nothing else?” He arched a brow.
“Okay, he was hoping for a little more. He grabbed my face and forced me to kiss him. That’s what these bruises are from.”
“And then?”
“He followed me out to the parking lot where we began arguing again. I was able to convince him to leave, and that’s pretty much the whole story.”
“How about your knees?” He slid the legs of my jeans up over my knees so fast I didn’t have time to pull them away. He gasped when he saw the cuts and bruises. They looked worse today than the day it had happened.
“Dwayne,” I hissed under my breath. I yanked my legs away and stomped over to the kitchen.
Seth followed. “Can I see your arms?” I thought of hiding them behind me except why bother. “I thought we weren’t going to keep important things from each other, Maggie? I’d call this important.”
“No, I told you what happened, he was a little out of control, but I handled it, and I’m planning on talking to Mrs. Volkel about it, so this is no longer an issue.”
“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.
r /> 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 27th.”
“Maggie, it is the 27th.” 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 he 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.”
“I didn’t give you that for your birthday, so technically I haven’t gotten you anything yet.” I rolled my eyes. “Let’s go, you can complain on the way to the mall.”
We picked out several pairs of pants with coordinating tops. I was surprised to see how well he mixed and matched things. “Are you sure you’re not gay?” I asked as he tried to find a shirt in just the right shade of green.
“That’s stereotyping,” he said, kissing me until I was completely lost. “Tell me, would a gay man kiss you like that?”
“Definitely not!” I leaned against a clothes rack for balance.
He also picked out a beautiful pink dress with black piping along the bottom and neckline, and a pair of black strappy pumps. The shoes looked almost identical to the ones I’d admired when he brought me to the mall last time, except these were better quality. “I wanted to buy you something special to wear,” he said, putting his credit card back into his wallet.
I looked at the many packages in both our arms and felt a rush of guilt. “I need a job, Seth. I can’t keep leeching off you.”
“You’re not leeching, Maggie.” He shook his head.
“Can you understand how I feel, just a little? It doesn’t matter anyway, I can’t leave my mom alone for that long,” I said, frustrated.
“If you’re serious about getting a job, I think I have the perfect solution. We will be needing some help with paper work at the Lunch Swap starting in June, and there’s an extra laptop at the office. You can take it home and do the work there. You’ll be with your mother, and you can earn some money.”
“That’d be perfect.” A little too perfect. “You’re not making this whole job up just for me are you?” I eyed him suspiciously.
“No, our secretary is leaving to have a baby. You’d be doing me a big favor, although I do have an ulterior motive,” he smiled sinisterly. “Since you’ll be using a laptop, you’ll be able to work at my house occasionally. And I promise to be a good boss and distract you from your work every chance I get.”
“Hmm, sounds like sexual harassment.”
“Darn straight! Maybe we should go back to my place, and I’ll show you how I plan on distracting you,” he said.
His cell phone interrupted a perfectly good kiss. I readjusted the packages in my arms while Seth took the call.
“Change of plans,” he said, stuffing the phone into his pocket. The expression on his face could only be described as elation. “Booker invited us to have lunch with him and his grandfather, Sam. You’ll love Sam. He’s sarcastic too.”
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***
We turned right on Country Cottage Lane and pulled up to number 69. It was a beautiful old colonial home, gray with black shutters and stately white pillars. Booker, and I presumed his grandfather Sam, were standing out front to greet us. Time for all my cat jokes.
“Play nice, Maggie.”
“I will.” Maybe.
“Happy birthday, Jailbait.” Booker walked over and gave me a hug.
“Seth, you let the cat out of the bag and told Booker about my birthday?” I said, scratching Booker behind his ears. Seth mumbled something about me not waiting even two seconds. I ignored him. This was going to be fun.
“You told her? You’ve betrayed your best friend to a girl?”
“You’re still my best friend, but she’s the love of my life. She would have found out sooner or later anyway.”
“I would have preferred later.”
“Don’t be angry, Booker. I’ll take you out for some catnip later if you promise not to be a sourpuss all afternoon.” That was a good one, even Seth had to laugh.
“I’d like you to meet my grandfather, Sam,” he said, ignoring me. I stretched out my hand to the frail looking old man who took it in both of his.
“My, my. Booker wasn’t kidding, you are a hottie.”
“Grandfather!” Booker immediately turned to Seth. “I swear I never said that. I did say she’s a beautiful girl.”
Sam squeezed my hand. “Alright, maybe I’m embellishing a little, it still doesn’t change the fact.”
He guided me into a large dining room where there was an elaborate lunch of sliced meats and cheeses set out on glass platters. There were several small bowls filled with condiments, and a black basket lined in red linen held oversized rolls. It was all spread out on an ornate Rosewood table.