Path of Destruction (16 page)

She wanted to talk to her mom about everything privately, but her mom mostly looked tired, exhausted actually. Every time the school called and her dad launched into another round of lectures on the importance of not throwing her life away, her mom’s hair seemed to get a little grayer. And when Brad Mason got really fired up, veins throbbing, face beaming red, typically because she just couldn’t muster up an acceptable explanation for why she couldn’t endure the inhumane torture that was mandatory grief counseling or Chem lab, he broke out the big guns.

“You would think, after what happened to your brother, that you would take life a little more seriously. Why are you making this so hard?”

That was when she would bail. Go to the ridge and stare at the horizon in hopes of finding some grand answer from the universe. When would she stop feeling like this? When would she feel normal again? Would a day come that she didn’t wake up feeling broken and empty all over?

No answers came at the ridge. At the end of the first week back after break, one did randomly appear in the Summit Bluffs High School parking lot though.

“Well, well. If it isn’t my favorite girl,” he’d said, stepping around from behind black SUV. “What brings you out here in the middle of the school day?”

Jarrod Kent was an athlete, but how he managed to stay eligible for sports when he skipped even more classes than EJ did was beyond her. Well, not completely beyond her. One thing she was learning was that there was certainly a different set of rules in Summit Bluffs. One that tended to be based on how much money certain families donated to the school and who had a parent on the school board versus how much a student actually showed up to class. Unfortunately for her, her family didn’t have the kind of money or connections that would allow her to receive straight A’s while getting stoned in the parking lot. But Kent’s must have.

“I left my homework in my truck,” she said evenly, glancing around to see if Hayden or Cooper were nearby. The two of them seemed to be on a tag team schedule of some sort, each of them managing to appear at the least convenient of times.

Jarrod Kent’s hazel eyes gleamed in the sunlight that glinted off the snow. “Come on now. We both know the Hope’s Grove rebel doesn’t do homework. Tell me what you’re really doing out here? Looking for Prescott?”

Ella Jane sighed. She had a new art elective so she’d convinced the teacher she’d left her intro project, a self portrait she was sure as hell never going to sketch out, in her truck.

“You writing a book about me, Kent? I didn’t know you cared so much.”

“I’m a very caring guy. In fact, I’m so caring, I’d like to help you out.”

Ella Jane leaned against her truck. “With what exactly?”

Jarrod’s eyes drifted down her body. Surely he wasn’t checking her out. She was wearing a hoodie for God’s sakes and not even one of hers. It had been Kyle’s and it was huge.

“I’m sympathetic to your cause. That sucks about your brother, but I bet it sucks worse hearing everyone say how sorry they are. Ever wish you could just escape it all?”

Her blood pulsed hard and fast at this guy she barely knew mentioning Kyle. “You don’t know shit about my brother. So don’t even bother offering your—”

“Condolences? Relax. I’m not. Shitty stuff happens all the time. My dad just got remarried, and I swear to God, this chick would suck my dick for half my inheritance. I know because she offered.”

Ella Jane winced. Yes, life was certainly different in the Bluffs. But between this and Hayden’s grandma, she could see that money didn’t always make everything better.

“My bad. That language wasn’t really appropriate for such delicate ears.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “I’m not as delicate as you might think.”

“Aren’t you? Wanna prove it?”

“By sucking your dick? Um, no.” She’d never said anything like that out loud and it activated her gag reflex. She didn’t hold back on her repulsed reaction to spare his feelings.

Jarrod chuckled. “Nah. I’ve got Stepmother Dearest for that. She’s only twenty-three and she’s smoking hot, in case you were wondering.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Yeah, well, step into my office and we can talk.”

“Your office?” EJ glanced around. A few pickup trucks sat near hers in the back but they were surrounded by luxury cars and decked out SUVs even the adults she knew couldn’t afford.

“Here, follow me.” Jarrod led her to a black Mercedes with tinted windows. “My lady,” he said, opening his passenger door.

EJ felt it, the weight her decision carried. It was one of those moments, like when her mom announced that her dad had left them, when she decided to give her virginity to Hayden, when her dad had come into her hospital room to tell her that, despite everyone’s best efforts, Kyle hadn’t survived.

This decision would have consequences, possibly extremely bad ones. But doing nothing, continuing to subsist the way she had been, felt a lot more dangerous. Going back into that building where she couldn’t breathe felt like a fate worse than death. Her stomach tensed just looking at the place.

“Ever wish you could just escape it all?”
Jarrod had asked.

All the time,
she thought to herself as she slid into a plush leather seat.
All the time.

Jarrod jogged around the front of the car and joined her in the driver’s seat. She watched attentively as he pulled a small plastic bag out of his glove compartment.

She might have been small town, but she recognized marijuana when she saw it. It made appearances at field parties from time to time. She’d just never had any desire to partake. Until now.

“We’re going to get high?” she asked when Jarrod began packing the green flakes into what looked like a pipe.

His grin was wicked and enticing. “Nope.” He pulled a lighter from the wood grain center console. “We are going to get fucking obliterated.”

B
y the time the weather had cooled and the threats of storms had passed, holiday break came and went with very little fanfare. He gave his brothers some of his old riding gear for Christmas and the three of them made breakfast for their parents. Goodwill and kindness was about all their family could afford to give each other.

School kicked back up after New Year’s and Cooper’s life took on a very strange pattern. One he had no desire to change.

Weekdays involved getting up, fixing his brothers some breakfast, working a few hours on whatever needed done on the farm, picking up a shift here and there at the docks, heading to school to check in with EJ and then sneaking into the back stairwell and into the utility closet to make out with Cameron.

When this had started, Cooper hadn’t expected to be at Summit Bluffs much longer, so blowing off some steam with Prom Queen wasn’t dangerous. But now, it felt different—both of them prolonging their interactions with no end in sight. As much as he hated to admit it, he’d missed her over the break, and he had felt strangely pissed off that he didn’t even have her phone number to contact her. Especially considering the way they’d left things before break—screaming at each other in the basement of the school. But that was behind them now, and thankfully, she’d shown up the first day back to school as if she’d missed him as well. He’d planned on apologizing to her the second he saw her, but she beat him to it.

“I’m sorry for acting like a royal bitch the last time we were down here,” she’d said. He’d wished that he hadn’t been so forgiving. Wished he’d made her sweat it out a little the way he had the entire time they were out of school, but damn it if he didn’t see the regret in her eyes and melt like a snow on the first day of spring.

“You’re forgiven,” he’d said easily, ending their first official fight as a couple. Or whatever the hell they were.

“Don’t stop,” she moaned against his lips during their lunch period. Her legs wrapped his waist, and he tried to remember why they had to stop. Everything she said and did turned him on so hard that it was painful. But the bell had rung and they were going to be late to fifth period.

“I don’t want to, darlin’. But we’ll be late to class. I’m still on behavior notice. One tiny slip and I get a week’s worth of detention. Or worse.”

“I’d give you conjugal detention visits.”

This time, it was Cooper’s turn to moan. “Damn girl. It’s like you’re trying to kill me.”

Her pliant body went instantly rigid. He didn’t know if it was his words or how high his hand had slipped up her skirt that made her go still, but he pulled back.

“Sorry. You okay?”

Even in the dark he could see that her face had paled. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine. You’re right. We should get to class.”

She was like this sometimes. Hot then cold. A match that burned out pretty fast if he said or did the wrong thing. Sometimes, their time together felt like navigating a minefield. But it was worth it.

She wasn’t the kind of girl he could have long term. He knew that. She was slumming it with farm boy, having some Prom Queen identity crisis. But if he had to go to school every day to keep an eye on Ella Jane, he might as well enjoy it. He was happy to let her work out her issues on his mouth. And all other parts of his anatomy were at her disposal as well.

Just as the bell rang to signal the start of fifth period, a loud alarm rang out immediately after.

Tornado drill. He knew from previous experience she was likely to lose it a bit.

She pulled her phone from who knew where and started clicking away. He knew what she was doing—trying to open her weather app, the one she obsessed over every time the wind blew too hard.

“It’s a drill, babe. Has to be. There’s snow on the ground for Christ’s sake.”

“You never know. Storms are unpredictable,” she said without taking her eyes from the screen.

Cooper sighed. She was a lost cause when it came to this. He rested his hand on her bare thigh. “Okay. We might as well wait the drill out in here. Keep me posted on the latest Doppler radar updates.”

Surprisingly, she looked up at him. He felt her thigh muscles tense beneath his hand. “Do you think I’m crazy?” It was a whisper and a plea.

“No, I don’t. I promise I don’t. If I’d gone through what you did, I’d be the same way probably.”

She’d told him that she’d been hunkered down in a cellar during the storm and some debris had knocked her out. He hated that she’d been all alone.

“Really?” Her eyes rounded and he smiled.

“Well…maybe not quite as extreme. But it’s not my place to judge you, babe. If it makes you feel better to watch the weather app, so be it.”

She bit her lip, smiling sheepishly as she set her phone aside. “There’s nothing on it. You’re right. It’s just a drill.”

“Hmm…” He let his hand slide higher until he felt the silky edge of her panties. “What should we do to pass the time?”

“Make me forget storms even exist, Brantley.” She pressed her lips to his neck. “Make me forget.”

That he could do. He let two of his fingers slide inside her, taking their relationship the furthest it had ever been. The warm wetness that greeted him, and the welcome moan that escaped her, weakened his knees.

“Yes, ma’am.”

After some seriously intense foreplay that left him with visible evidence of what they’d been doing in that closet, Cooper adjusted himself and helped Cameron down off the cabinet she’d been sitting on. They exited the closet and blended into the sea of students headed back to class. Aside from her flushed cheeks and his raging hard-on, which he hoped he’d successfully hidden behind his zipper, there wasn’t any way anyone would know they’d done anything other than participate in the storm drill.

He wanted to kiss her once more, tell her that she was beautiful, or thank her for letting him touch her that way. But they had a live audience now, so she was steadily avoiding him.

As she should
.

He swallowed the hurt that her not acknowledging him in public caused. It wasn’t a big deal. A few weeks and they’d probably never see each other again.

He wasn’t sure why, but for some reason, that wasn’t as reassuring as it had once been.

“W
hat brings you here today, Miss Nickelson?” Mrs. Farber—or Diane, as she’d introduced herself—asked. She moved her fingers across the tablet she was holding in front her. “Ahh, I see here that you were injured in the storm. How are you feeling?”