Aftershocks (24 page)

“You have a date?” Luke asked, upon hearing our conversation. I thought he was zoned out reading a book in the corner, but apparently he’d heard me.

“Yup,” I said, taking a bite of a taco and trying not to get sauce on my jeans. I tried not to gloat, but I knew this conversation would get back to Connor, so I was a little smug. Not that I thought he’d care that I was dating, but I knew he would be upset that I’d withheld information when we had a habit of not keeping secrets from each other.

“With who?”

“Jack West,” I said, and watched the surprise glance over Luke’s face.

Luke nodded in approval. “Wow, when you date, you realy date.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Nicky asked.

Luke shook his head. “Nothing. Jack’s a good guy,” was al he said, but I knew he was itching to make a comment about the fact that I’d gone after the most sought-after guy in our class. “Way to go, Abbs.”

“Thanks,” I said, feeling satisfied that he approved. I wasn’t quite sure why. “Any progress with Sophia?”

I hadn’t heard much about her lately, but I assumed Luke was stil interested. I’d caught him looking at her wistfuly in the hal the other day after school. She’d smiled at him and he’d blushed. Nicky had then socked him in the arm and proceeded to give him a lecture on how he shouldn’t waste his time on someone like her.

“I told him he needs to just ask her out,” Laurie said, and I looked up to see her entering the stockroom. She was watching the store for us while we ate. “But he won’t listen to me.”

“Agreed,” I said, as she searched for a box of snowboarding boots on the shelf. “You need to just ask her out. I’m sure she’l say yes.”

“Ugh,” Nicky said, as she roled her eyes. “Just let it go, Luke. She’s not good enough for you. She cheated!”

See cheating was bad. Everyone knew that.

“Okay,” Luke said. “Enough advice. It’s not happening.”

We al just laughed.

“Anyway,” Luke said. “Since you’re al here, I talked to Gabe earlier tonight. He’s quitting. He said he wasn’t earning enough money, so he had to look for something else. Now we need to find someone who can work a few days a week since, Laurie, I know you’l want at least two of his shifts, right.”

“Absolutely,” Laurie said. She was a colege student who didn’t get much financial support from her parents, so she’d happily work forty hours a week if they were available.

“Alright, so Laurie, you can take the day shift on Friday and Saturday. I need you both to keep your ears open if you hear of anyone who wants to work the day shift on Mondays and Wednesdays while Laurie is in class and Sundays from twelve to six. That can be the same person, or it can be two. To drive more people in, I’m going to put a sign in the window, but we should let customers know that we’re hiring.”

Luke seemed so official, like an army general preparing his troops for battle.

“Yes, boss,” I said, saluting him.

“Right away, sir,” Nicky said, playing along.

“I’m on it, chief,” Laurie said, as she winked at me. She was quick on the up-take and fit right in with me and Nicky.

“Ha, ha. Loving the sense of humor. You guys are hilarious,” Luke said before he headed back to floor.

On Tuesday night Jack took me out to dinner. We went to a local diner and had burgers, fries and milkshakes. He held my hand, told me I looked beautiful and kissed me often, and I wished I would fal in love with him. Things would be so much easier.

When he dropped me off, he left his car on as he leaned over to kiss me. For close to five minutes we didn’t move from the front seat of his Explorer. Suspended over the gear shift, our lips met over and over again, hungrier with each kiss. I knew he wanted more – wanted me to invite him inside, but my parents were home, so that wasn’t going to happen. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I wanted more too. Jack was incredibly sexy.

Instead I gave him one last kiss, told him I’d see him at school and hopped out of the car.

“Sweet dreams, good girl,” he caled after me, the passenger side window roled down, the icy air mixing with the warm air inside the car and fogging the windows more than they already were. “I hope they’re about me.”

I just shook my head and smiled at him. He realy was charming, and I didn’t even think he had to try. I just came naturaly to him.

I watched him drive away, and as soon as his car was out of sight, I noticed someone on a bike staring at me from the sidewalk in front of my house. I squinted a little into the dark night trying to ascertain who it was.

“Jordan?” I asked, realizing who it was. I started to walk toward him wondering what on earth he was doing out at eleven-thirty at night.

“Hey Abby,” Jordan said when I reached him. The light from the streetlight overhead bounced off his braces as he gave me a tentative smile. “Is that your new boyfriend?”

“What are you doing here?” I asked, ignoring his question. “It’s realy late. Does your dad know you’re out of the house?”

Jordan shook his head. “He’s out of town, and Connor’s watching me. He fel asleep on the couch, so I snuck out. I wanted to see you.”

I appraised the boy, his curly hair so much like Connor’s but a little longer and faling into his eyes – it seemed he was in need of a haircut. Unlike Connor, though, he stil had that boyish innocence, and I could see why Connor protected him so much. Connor had been through a lot with his parents, and I knew he tried to shield Jordan from what he’d dealt with.

“You wanted to see me?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest and smiling at him. I was just a little flattered.

“Yeah,” he said, grinning sheepishly. “I missed you. How come you haven’t come over lately? Did you and Connor get in a fight?”

I knew then that as much as I didn’t want to lie to Jordan, I had to. It was what Connor would want me to do. Jordan didn’t need to know that I didn’t come around anymore because I was embarrassed about my feelings for his brother and that it was hard for me to not feel hurt that he’d rejected me. Jordan was too young to understand why Connor and I couldn’t be friends, so I figured it would be better if I just lied.

“No, J. We didn’t get in a fight. I’ve just been busy with school and stuff, but I miss you too. Have you been practicing playing
Call of
Duty
?”

“Yeah, a lot. I could even beat you now,” he said, as if chalenging me to come over and see how good he’d gotten.

“Oh yeah?”

He nodded. “Yeah, you wanna come over tomorrow?”

Man, the way he said it made my heart squeeze just a little. I felt bad that I couldn’t hang out with him. He was a cool kid.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t. I have to work tomorrow.” I watched Jordan’s face fal as I said it, so I changed tactics. “Maybe we can play next weekend, unless you’re going to your mom’s house?”

I knew Jordan spent some weekends with their mother even though Connor never did. He’d divulged little pieces of information about her, so I knew they didn’t realy get along. I also knew there was much more to the story, but he’d never shared it with me.

Jordan’s face lit up. “That would be great. I’m not going to my mom’s. She’s going to Las Vegas with her new boyfriend.”

“Why don’t you come over on Saturday then?”

“Awesome,” Jordan said, his smile a mile wide. “Can Connor come too or wil your boyfriend not like that?”

The kid didn’t miss a thing.

“J, I don’t know if Connor wil want to come over. He might have plans with Alexis.”

Jordan made a face and roled his eyes. “Yeah, probably. She’s always hanging out at our house. She’s so annoying. ‘Connor, can you get me a soda? Don’t you have anything diet? Your music sucks, put on something else. Can’t we watch something that wasn’t produced by Judd Apatow?’ I don’t know why he likes her.”

I had to stifle a laugh. Jordan’s imitation of Alexis was realy good.

“Jordan, it’s not nice to make fun of her,” I said, trying to set a good example.

“Whatever,” he said. “She’s not nice to me, so why should I be nice to her.”

I shrugged. He had a point.

“Okay, so I’l see you Saturday?” I asked, thinking he should probably get home. It was a school night.

“I’l be here.” He moved back onto his bike then and started to turn into the street to ride home.

“Bye J.”

Chapter
22

That Friday, much to Nicky’s excitement, I agreed to go to Amanda Peterson’s party with her. Amanda was a friend of Nicky’s from the voleybal team, and she wasn’t super popular, so I figured there’s be a good chance I wouldn’t run into Alexis or Connor. It was pretty much the only reason I agreed to go.

I picked Nic up outside of work after she and Laurie closed up the store. She’d gotten her car back at the end of September, but then got it taken away when she got a ticket for running a stop sign the week before, so she was back to bumming rides.

She got into my car in a flourish, a wave of her candy-scented perfume folowing her. She quickly stripped off the hoodie she was wearing to reveal a low-cut tank top.

“Nicky!” I chastised as we puled away. “It’s freezing outside.”

“I’m fine,” she said, as she produced a cropped cardigan from her tote bag. “See.”

“Yeah, no hypothermia for you,” I said, sarcasticaly.

Nicky just roled her eyes and turned up the stereo. I let her fiddle with my iPod until she found a song she liked. She danced in the passenger seat and sang along to the music. I wished I could get as excited as her about the party, but I was nervous about running into Connor. I’d been cordial to him when I’d seen him but continued to keep him at arms-length.

“Ugh, there had better be some cute guys at this party,” Nicky said over the music. “I’m so sick of the losers from our school. Amanda said she’d hook me up with one of her friends from Clayton, but we’l see. I don’t know how I feel about private school guys.”

Amanda had gone to Clayton Prep for her first two years of high school but had transferred to our school the year before. Lucky for Nicky, she’d kept in touch with a lot of her old classmates. I hated to think it, but I was pretty sure Nicky had worn out her welcome with most of the guys in our class.

When we arrived at the party, it was in ful swing. Nicky got us beers and we started to make a lap around the party to see who was there. An hour, a few beers and a few conversations later, we found Luke having a heated conversation with Sophia and watched for a few minutes before she ran off in tears. Luke turned around, his face red with anger, his eyes flashing as he appraised us.

“Oh, thank God you’re here,” he said, taking my nearly ful beer out of my hand.

“Hey,” I said, reaching for it, but he was already guzzling half of it down.

When he finaly stopped drinking, he said, “You drove, didn’t you?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I did. Why, do you need a ride?”

Luke just laughed. “Yeah, and because I love you, I’m cutting you off. Sober up, and then you can drive me home. I’m planning to get realy wasted, so my car wil be spending the night here. You’re my DD.”

I opened my mouth to protest and ask what happened, but before I could say anything, someone walked up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around, half-expecting to see Connor and was surprised when it was Jack.

“Hey good girl,” he said, shooting me a lopsided grin. I could tel he’d been drinking just a bit that night. He had a relaxed look on his face, and his eyes were slightly hooded.

“Hey Jack,” I said, my mind flashing back to our make-out session earlier in the week. I hadn’t seen him outside of school since then.

“What’s up?”

“I just wanted to say helo,” he said coyly. “I can’t stop thinking about you and wanted to tel you that those boots are off-the-charts sexy.

I looked down at my tal heeled black scrunch boots that I’d worn over black leggings and paired with a gray sweater dress.

“Oh Jack,” I said, stepping closer to him. “I think you’re just drunk and a little horny.”

“It’s your fault,” he said, “but don’t worry. I won’t try anything.”

I laughed. “I’m pretty sure you’d be game if I asked you to go into Amanda’s bedroom with me and see what happened,” I said, maintaining eye contact with him as I stepped closer, my hip touching his.

“Who’s Amanda?” he asked, as he pressed his body against mine.

I roled my eyes in a playful way. “This is her party,” I said, looking up at him. “Did you not know where you were going tonight?”

He shrugged. “It’s Friday night, I knew I’d be going to a party, so it didn’t much matter where it was. Besides, Connor drove, so I didn’t have to care.”

I froze for a second. “Connor’s here?”

Jack nodded. “Yeah, he and Alexis got in some fight, so he caled me. He’s al pissed off at her or something, but I guess that’s pretty much their thing these days. It could work to your benefit.”

Oh yeah, since that worked so wel the last time. I would be steering clear of Connor Richmond that night.

I swalowed hard and realized that as hard as I was trying not to be interested in that subject, I was dying for more information. Connor and Alexis were fighting, and I suddenly wanted to know why. What was the happy, dysfunctional couple disagreeing on now?

“Do you care that he’s here?” Jack asked in a way that told me he realy wanted me to say no.

“Not realy,” I said, cocking my head slightly. “I’m just stil pissed off at him right now, so I’m thinking it would be better if I didn’t see him. I don’t want to start a fight or anything.

“I’d pay to see that. I’l bet you’re pretty sexy when you’re mad,” Jack said, his head leaning closer to me as if he was planning on kissing me. I realy wished he would.

Screw that. I was taking matters into my own hands. I let my eyes focus on his lips for a beat, took his face in my hands, and brought his lips down to mine. He responded immediately, puling me close to him and within a few seconds, we were the couple openly making out in the living room of a party. We kissed until someone yeled, ‘get a room’ �� I’m pretty sure it was Nicky – and Jack puled back.

“Maybe we should listen to her,” he said, smirking at me.