Shot Through the Heart (17 page)

That elicits a look of amusement from her, but she doesn’t take the seat.

“Look, Pey, I’m going to lay it all out. What Drew said at lunch yesterday? Not true. I don’t have anything going on with Molly and zero interest in going out with her. However, on the first day of school, she sent me a text that was kinda flirty. Since we’ve been friends for a long time, I assumed I was reading it the wrong way and blew it off. A few days later, she sent another. Then I started getting them once or twice a day. Josh was convinced she’d developed a crush on me because I was extra nice to her after Drew dumped her last year.”

“You
were
extra nice to her. But she needed it.” Peyton eases to the inside of the kitchen archway, but no closer. She hooks her index fingers in the front pockets of her denim shorts. “How did you respond?”

“For the most part, I didn’t. The few times I did, I was careful not to say anything that could be taken as interest. I swear, I didn’t flirt back.” I hold up my hand like a boy scout taking an oath.

She shakes her head. “You still don’t owe me an explanation. What’s up with us…well, you don’t owe me. Whether or not you flirted back with Molly Cannon has nothing to do with me.”

“Maybe I don’t
owe
it to you, but I want you to know what really happened.” Her lips twist as if she wants to argue the point, but I don’t let her. “The day Senior Assassin started, Molly sent me four texts. It was getting out of hand, so I asked Josh how I should handle it. I didn’t want to hurt Molly’s feelings, given what happened with Drew last year and the fact I value her friendship, but I didn’t want to get her hopes up, either.”

Peyton’s expression softens, so I plow ahead. “First, Josh told me that I should just ask Molly out and see if it went well. Maybe I’d discover that we’d be good together. I told him that as much as I like her, I didn’t want to go out with her. That’s when he suggested I mention to a person or two that I was going out with you. It’d get back to Molly, and she’d know to ease off the texts without me having to tell her that I don’t think of her in a romantic way. It’d give her a way to save face. Josh also pointed out that, because I’m at your house all the time anyway, no one would question it. I told him you might have something to say about it—”

“You think?” She rolls her eyes heavenward. “I even bet when you said that, he told you it wouldn’t matter because it’s not like I’m anyone’s real girlfriend, and being a girlfriend-by-rumor is the best I can expect.”

I make a face. She certainly knows her brother. “I told Josh I’d rather find another way to dissuade Molly without hurting her feelings. I’m not into all that drama.”

Her voice is quiet, but even. “But you ended up doing it anyway. Not the spreading rumors part, but with me—”

“No!” How can she believe that? “Maybe when Josh made the girlfriend suggestion I started looking at you in a different way—I’d never thought of you like that because you’re Josh’s sister—but I had no intention whatsoever of using you to discourage Molly. None. I haven’t told a soul what’s been going on between us this last week.”

Relief creeps into her gaze, but she doesn’t budge from her position against the arch. “Still, you had to suspect we were being watched. Like Drew said, it’s Senior Assassin time. Everyone’s being watched.”

“No.” I scrub a hand over my face. “I mean, yes, everyone’s being watched, but that’s not why I kissed you.”

Her gaze drops to her toes when I say the word
kissed
. “But—”

“Think about it. The first time we were alone in my room. No one could see what we were doing.” Since she refuses to sit, I stand, moving so I’m only inches away from her, close enough to smell her coconut shampoo and the mint of her toothpaste.

I glance at the cereal bowl on the counter. Josh won’t touch shredded wheat with a ten-foot pole, while Peyton never leaves a bowl unfinished. She must have raced to brush her teeth while I waited on the porch.

Miraculously, I find my voice. “Peyton, I kissed you because it felt like the right thing to do in the moment. And it was. It was amazing. I kissed you again because the more I thought about you and about everything we talked about, the more I knew that we could be great together. We have more in common than I ever imagined.”

Her gaze snaps to mine. “You sure about that, Mr. Superjock? Mr. Popular?”

“Mr. Wants-to-go-to-MIT.” Careful not to move too aggressively, I take one of her hands from her pocket and capture it in mine. “I keep my mouth shut about what I want most because I’m afraid of how my friends or family will react. And I’m serious about my schoolwork and my future, even if people don’t view me that way.”

When Peyton remains silent, I rub my thumb across her knuckles. She looks at our joined hands as if she wants to pull free, but remains still. “Peyton, we have all of that in common. But I want to know the rest. The stuff we don’t have in common is as interesting to me as the stuff we do.”

I move to kiss her, but she ducks, her fingers slipping from mine. “Connor, no.”

“Peyton—”

“I can’t. It’s not that I don’t want to.” Her eyes meet mine. Desire is visible, deep in her gaze, but then she blinks and straightens, crossing her arms in front of her so I can’t hold her hand anymore.

As if she’s willing away the impulse to be with me.

I let out a breath. “Why?”

She worries her lower lip, wrestling with what she wants to say. “It’s just…if you aren’t interested in Molly, and you were so dead-set on dissuading her, then why did Drew say you two were flirting in the hallway? You said you wanted to explain things to me, but you didn’t explain that. And you could’ve done it even before Drew confronted you at lunch. When we were here on the couch, you were acting all guilty about what happened at Blanchard’s. I told you not to feel bad. In fact, my exact words to you were, ‘it’s not like Molly’s doing you a favor in the hope you’ll notice her and ask her out,’ and you didn’t say anything. So what’s the truth here?
Did
you use her interest in you to get her to help you with Senior Assassin?”

“First, she was flirting with me, but it didn’t go both ways, like Drew said.” I keep going, despite the fact her blue eyes are widening by the second. “What Drew saw was Molly was offering to act as bait to draw Drew out into the open. I said no at first. I told her I didn’t feel right about it, but…well, she was holding my arm and begging, and she told me that I could help her in the next round, so I caved. I shouldn’t have, given that I thought she had expectations, but I did. Then when you said what you did on the couch, I froze.”

At Peyton’s look of distress, I add, “But that’s not everything. After you left the courtyard yesterday, Molly came back to the table to apologize for all the things Drew said at lunch.”

“Why would
she
apologize?”

“That’s what I asked, because I was all set to apologize to her, to tell her that I’m her friend—and only her friend—and that it was wrong of me to accept her offer.” I flail for the best way to explain this so Peyton doesn’t hate me. “I was afraid I’d been using her. Turns out it was the other way around.”

“Come again?”

“She was only flirting with me to make Drew jealous. Those texts? She sent them whenever her friends were around, figuring that they’d talk about it and Drew would eventually find out. It’s the same reason she put her hand on my arm in the middle of the hallway. She knew Drew was standing there.”

“Molly planned this.” Peyton’s voice is flat, disbelieving.

“Yep. But there’s more.” I step back to the counter and take a seat again. This time, when I gesture to the empty barstool, she sits, though she leaves more space between us than I’d like.

“I’m telling you this because I want you to trust me.” Even though it may mean Josh will kill me. “It’s major. And it can’t leave this room.”

She spins her hand in a get-on-with-it motion.

“Molly rigged Senior Assassin.”

Peyton opens her mouth to protest, but as she processes the information, her lips form a stunned O.

“I couldn’t believe she’d pull a stunt like that, but she did, thanks to Jayne.” I puff out a breath.. “Josh and I figured it out after lunch yesterday, when Molly mentioned that she’d spent an entire day last spring planning out how she could get Drew back.”

“You mean get back
at
Drew?”

I shake my head. “Nope, get Drew back. She knows Drew’s never liked me. She figured that if she flirted with me at the same time I was trying to knock Drew out of the tournament, his ego wouldn’t let him stand by and take the double whammy.”

“Flirting with you wasn’t enough?” Confusion etches her features. “But wait a sec. When you and Josh eliminated Drew, she didn’t want anything to do with him. She told him she was teaching him a lesson, right?”

I want to point out that girls aren’t always logical, but rein in the urge. “Over the last week or two, she’s come to realize that she and Drew aren’t the best match. She even hinted that she might be interested in someone else.” I hold up a hand. “Not me, though. Definitely not me. You can ask Josh. Of course, then he’ll know I told you that Molly rigged the tournament assignments. We agreed to keep it on the down low until we figure out what to do. It’s not our fault, but it’s not right, either.”

“Wow. Guess I missed a lot when I left the courtyard.” Peyton leans back to rest her elbows on the countertop. We’ve kicked back like this dozens of times with Josh, mostly while we wait for Mrs. Lindor to fix snacks or order pizza, but Peyton doesn’t have her feet on the lower rail of my barstool the way she usually does. Instead, she’s turned at an awkward angle so her feet are propped on the bottom of the stool Josh prefers.

I reach over and spin her barstool so her feet smack into mine, then ease my hands onto either side of her thighs. As much as I want to slide my hands upward, toward the fringe of her denim shorts, I keep still. I want her full attention. “Pey, all of this is a very long-winded way of saying I’m sorry and that I don’t want Senior Assassin or Molly or even Josh to get between us.”

After a heartbeat, she says, “Josh could be a problem. I’d never want to get between the two of you—”

“You won’t.” I inch my hands higher, leaning in so I can kiss her doubts away. We can deal with Josh later. What’s important is that we get things straight between the two of us.

That and take advantage of the time Josh is at Cumby’s.

Her hands clamp down over mine. “Connor, no. Let me finish.”

I withdraw, reluctantly leaning back on my stool to give her space.

“All this week, while you’ve been dealing with Molly and Drew, I’ve had to deal with Tessa. She’s been on a nonstop whine about…well, it doesn’t matter what it was about. The upshot is that I told her that if she really wants something, if it’s her dream, then she needs to shut up and
do
, and not let anything or anyone get in the way of her goal.”

“Okay.” I’m not following, but Peyton’s tone twists my gut into the same knot I experience whenever I’ve run too hard at soccer practice and want to hurl.

“She told me I should take my own advice. And you know, she’s right.” Peyton crosses her arms the way she always does when she’s nervous. “More than anything, I want to get into MIT, but I got so caught up in everything going on this week…with Senior Assassin, with Tessa, with
you
, that I blew an assignment. It’s not a big deal. Most people who forget an assignment say an ‘oh crap’ and forget about it an hour later. But it bothers me. I know that makes me boring and unlikeable to a lot of people. They think, ‘Peyton Lindor, she’s no fun,’ or ‘that freak Peyton, she’s always studying,’ but it doesn’t mean I don’t want to have fun. It only means I don’t want to risk my future over it!”

Not only is she babbling, which is never good, her tone grows more emotional the longer she speaks. Hoping to show her how ridiculous she’s being, I spread my hands. “You’re saying that I’m risking your future?”

“That’s just it. I don’t know!” She swipes a hand through her hair. “But I know what distractions have done to Tessa. And I know what distractions have done to me this week. I look down the road and part of me thinks, ‘Wow, something with Connor could be great.’ But the other part thinks, what if it’s not? Will I mess up your friendship with Josh? Will I get so upset and distracted that I blow my SATs at the end of the year? Tessa did fine on her SATs, despite all her screw-ups, and Josh did great, even though he hardly studied. But I’m not like Tessa or Josh, no matter how much everyone seems to expect it. I can’t just show up at an exam and have everything go my way. I have to study for every single point.”

I stare at her. Did she not get it when I told her how much we have in common?

“That’s the thing, Peyton. You
aren’t
like Tessa or Josh. You’re you. Just like I’m not like some stupid Mr. Superjock. We’re each more than a first impression, you know?” If she can’t figure this out herself, what chance do I have of convincing her? “We’d be good for each other, Pey.”

Her eyes fill with tears. They hover on the edge of her lashes, but don’t spill over. “I know you want me to trust you, Connor, and I do. But—”

“But you don’t.”

Her words come out in a whisper. “I don’t trust
myself
.”

In that instant, I glimpse the large packet occupying the far countertop, wedged in the space between the paper towel holder and the toaster oven. It doesn’t belong to Josh.