Crushed (13 page)

Reece grinned when he
noted
tiny little
Emma “accidentally” knock into Natalie, causing her to bounce off the hallway wall.

By the time
he
reached Cleo, a few of the papers had been kicked across the room.
He
swiped up the few that were
scattered out of her immediate reach
.
He
hoped they weren’t too important
.
A
few had dirty footprints stamped across them now.

“Thanks,” she said as
he
handed them to her.

He
scanned the area for any stragglers but didn’t see any. “Got ’em all?”
he
asked.

She shrugged as she searched the room. “I guess.”

“So,”
he began as they
started walking down the hall together, “you want the elementary school slot?”

She smiled and nodded. “Yes. And I don’t mean to be bossy
but if you don’t hurry up, it’ll probably be gone.” She motioned to the hordes of
people in front of
them
.
He
realized she was probab
ly right. “But we don’t have to
try for that one
,
” she said. “I know kids aren’t really your thing.”

Now
he grinned because he was sure she was joking. He’d
never understood how she could want to be a teache
r, specifically kindergarten. His oldest niece wa
s four and
he thought
she was great. And he knew he
even love
d
her. B
ut he
would hate to be in a room with twenty or thirty of her
.
Just the thought of it reminded him
of a torture chamber.
He wasn’t so sure he was
convinced that extra
year would make a difference. He
used to tease Cleo about it all the time. She used
to tease him back, asking what he had against little kids. His answer was…Nothing,
a
s long as
there wasn’t
more than one or two of them at a time.
But a
class full
of them for
a
couple of hours out of the week? For Cleo?
He
could handle that.

“I’m on it,”
he
said
. H
e
took off at more of a jog than was probably allowed.

It didn’t do much good. By the time
he got outside, he
was still toward the end of the line.

By the time it was
his
turn, only the least desirable slots were left. Cl
assroom volunteer: Full.
Damn
, he thought.
Yard work: Full. Repairing and shelving books at the public library: Full. 

He
kept skimming.
Everything
was full except…Clean-up in the ki
tchen at the nursing home:
No
, he thought.
Cleaning out cages at the animal shelter:
Uh,
hell
no
, was his mental response to that.

He
glanced back up at the classroom volunteer
slot. He wondered
if he
could con someone into trading.
Natalie and
Eli
? A spike of annoyance shot
through
him. He was
pretty damn sure Natalie only wanted the slot so Cl
eo couldn’t have it. No way was he
groveling to Natalie, begging h
er for it. He
let out a defeated sigh
. C
lassroom volunteer
was
definitely out.

He
back
ed
up to breakfast duty at the nursing home
. I
t had to beat cleaning out cages
at the shelter. He
hope
d
Cleo
wouldn’t be
too disappointed. Even though he knew she would be, she would just pretend
she
wasn’t.

He
should’ve been more on top of things, running
ahead to make sure they
got the one she wanted. But
he would
bet Natalie planned that
; g
etting
Eli
in line before
him
.

He knew that everyone wa
s probably going to get stuck doing something
they did
n’t want at least once. Maybe even a few
times over the year. The thing was, he didn’t want his
first
assignment with Cleo to suck. He
wanted to get her something that would make her happy.

He
vow
ed
that when the assignments change
d in a month, he would
be the first one in line.
And he would spend a solid month pretending a classroom full of little kids didn’t
grate on his nerves.

“Would you hurry up?” whoever
was behind him asked.

“Almost done,”
he said without looking back. He
scanned the list to see where Adam ended up. Ya
rd work. Cleo’s second choice.

He
finally g
o
t out of the line.
He
spotted Adam walking up to his
partner. Reece
jogged up to him and grabbed
hold of him before he had
a chance to talk to her.

“What are you doing?”
Adam asked. He was already giving Reece
a suspicious look.

It didn’t escape Reece’s
notice
that Cleo was watching him
with
raised eyebrows. Of course it
didn’t escape him, he realized. B
ecause as
always, he had
his
eyes stuck to
her about every other minute.

He he
ld up a hand, letting her know to wait just a second.

“Trade me!”
he
desperate
ly demanded. The smile Cleo had given him earlier, over his approval of outdoor work
wa
s li
ke a visual echo in his head. It had
been a long time since she
had smiled at him like that. Even if it was in regard to manual labor, he didn
’t want to lose that smile.

Adam looked at
him
in disbelief. “No.”

He d
idn’t even bother to ask Reece what he had
. H
e knew
it couldn’t
be good.

He turned to walk away.

“How about…”
Reece
rummaged around in
his
brain.
He was
trying to co
me up with something to make Adam change his mind. Adam loved hockey. Reece had
season tickets for the university’s ho
ckey games. A few of the games we
re already sold out. The best games, of course. “I’ll take you with to the season
opener.”

Adam eyed him up. Last year Reece had
taken Cleo. This year, Adam prob
ably expected—correctly—that Reece would
take him.

His answer? “No.”

“How about the season opener and the game against the Wolverines?”

They were Sheridan’s
biggest rival. The games were always intense. And
also
,
always sold out.

“No.”
But he looked like maybe he was on the verge of caving.

He
didn’t want to do this, but desperate times and all…

“I’ll
give
you the tickets to both games and another one of your choice. You can take whoever
you want.”
His dad was going to kill him
.

Interest bounced across Adam’s face.
He
almost had him.

“Lauren’s a big hockey fan, isn’t she?”
Reece
casually asked. Lauren and Cleo were friends.
He
remembered Cleo stopping to talk to Lauren at a few of the g
ames. “Front row, center ice,” Reece
prodded.
“Think of how impressed Lauren will be.”

Adam
made a sound like a growl. “Fine! But you owe me.”

Reece shrugged because no, he
didn’t. The hockey tickets were payment enough
.
He
wasn’t going to push it.
He
’d just deal with it later if it came up.

“Go switch it on the sign-up,” Reece
told him.

He expected Adam to argue. T
o tell him to do it him
self but h
e went
.

Reece
walked over to Cleo.

“I already heard the news. All of the good ones are taken. So,” she said dramatically
as she gave
him
a big, fake grin, “hit me with it. Dirty dishes or dog poo?”

“
Yard work
,”
he
corrected.
“I missed out on the classroom assignment. But at least we aren’t stuck inside.”

Her smile became real. “Seriously?”

He
nodded. “Seriously.”

“How did you do that? Emma just told me she and
Nicole
signed up for book repair at the library. She said it was the last decent assignment.
Nicole said
the only two left were the nursing
home and the animal shelter
.
You were practically the last person in line.
” Her eyes narrowed as she looked at Adam. “Reece, what did you do?”

He
shrugged and looked away.

Even if
they
were together, she
wouldn’t have approved of what he
’d just done. She
for sure wouldn’t approve now, Reece knew.

She sighed
and looked like she wanted to press
him
on the matter.

“Don’t worry about it.
I
really wanted this assignment,”
he
told her.
It was true. He just didn’t admit to her
why
he had really wanted it.

H
er smile was still lurking when
his
eyes drifted
back to her
s
. “Thanks
, I wanted it too
.”

“Yo
u’re welcome.
Next time I’ll be more on top of things. We’ll get the classroom assignment,”
he
assured her.

“Did you see who got it this time?” she wondered.

“Uh, Natalie
and Eli
,”
he
admitted.

“Of course,” she muttered.

“
Now take this.”
He
tried to hand
her
the
form
he
’d impulsively grabbed
off of the sign-up table
.

“What is it?”
she asked without taking it.

“The permission slip. So you can ride with me.”
He
was still holding it out to her.
He
was starting to feel stupid for even trying. She
was going to refuse. He could
see it in her eyes. Then
something shif
ted.
She
took
a little breath
, like she was
steeling herself,
and pluck
ed
the paper from
his
hands.

“What time are you picking me up?”