Unconditional (4 page)

‘We’re just having a laugh,’ Adam says, defensive. He lets go of me. Jason doesn’t, in fact he tightens his grip on my waist even as I try to wrench away.

‘She doesn’t look like she’s having a lot of fun. Ash?’

‘They won’t let me go,’ I admit. Joe steps towards us and everyone apart from Jason steps away from me.

‘Let her go,’ he says, and although he hasn’t raised his voice and his face hasn’t changed there’s a weird undertone that is very, very menacing. Adam starts gabbling. ‘We were just messing around, mate,’ he says, raising his hands. Jason lets go too, but takes a step towards Joe. Oh God, they’re going to fight.

‘What’s it to you?’

Joe doesn’t answer, instead staring at Jason long and hard until the taller boy drops his eyes. Whatever their
weird silent exchange was, Joe clearly won.

‘Sorry, mate, I didn’t realise she was with you,’ Jason mumbles, though he doesn’t sound sorry at all. They slope off, Adam giving me an apologetic smile. I flip my finger at him, feeling brave now.

‘Thanks,’ I say to Joe gratefully, but he just glares at me.

‘What were you doing hanging around with those idiots?’

He sounds really angry.

‘I wasn’t,’ I snap back, folding my arms around myself feeling suddenly cold. ‘I was on my way home.’

‘On your own? Around here? Are you stupid?’ He looks furious now, and I’m not sure if I’m any safer with him than I was with Adam and his cronies. I mean, he just frightened all five of them off just by looking at them. I feel a bit like the heroine from one of my romance novels, thought the hero is usually a dashing English lord, not a moody teenage boy with a criminal record.

‘Well, anyway, thanks,’ I say again and go to walk off. He follows me.

‘I’m walking you home,’ he says when I look at him in surprise, ‘to make sure you don’t get yourself into any more trouble. They’re bad guys, Ash, you don’t want to be mixing with them.’

‘How do you know them then?’

‘Just from round here. That Jason tried to make friends when we moved in, until I made it clear I think he’s a jerk. Now he wants to fight me.’

I think about that.

‘Why didn’t he fight you then?’ After all, I think, he had his friends to back him up. Joe laughs, but there’s no mirth in it.

‘Because he’d lose. He won’t risk being shown up in front of his little friends.’

He seems so sure of himself.

‘Why did you help me?’ I ask, and he looks at me and shakes his head in disgust.

‘Why wouldn’t I? You think I’m like them?’

I shake my head but he just tuts and looks away. We walk on in silence. As we get out of the other end of the park I want to tell him I’m all right from here, but he carries on walking and I don’t say anything. If I’m honest, I’m starting to feel a bit shaky as I wonder what would have happened if he hadn’t turned up. I sneak a look at him. He’s got a great profile, and he walks very straight, like a soldier, not all slouchy and lazy like Dean or Adam.

‘How old are you?’ I blurt out, wondering if I’ve got things wrong. If I hadn’t met him with Dean, I might have thought he was about twenty-one.

‘I turned eighteen last week,’ he said, without looking at me.

‘Do you drive?’

He looks irritated by my questions.

‘I can, but I don’t have a car,’ he says shortly. Perhaps he just got into trouble for driving offences then. We lapse back into silence. He’s really not much of a talker, this guy.

Then he surprises me by asking, a few streets later, ‘Dannii told me you liked to read?’

‘I’m a bit of a geek,’ I admit.

‘Not at all. I like to read. Got into it when I was locked up, there’s not much else to do. Apart from the gym.’

Well he obviously spent a lot of time there, judging by his physique. I’m staring again and he notices, this time giving me a little half-smile that’s almost shy. I feel ridiculously pleased.

‘What did you do?’ I blurt out.

‘Got into a fight with a boy at my school. He was a bully; I caught him picking on some little lad.’

Playing the hero again. But I’m not silly, I know enough to know you don’t get sent to juvy for scaring off bullies. I say so, and he looks at me and sort of laughs.

‘Nosey aren’t you? But you’re right. I lost my temper, lost control, really laid into him and in front of people too. When it went to court, the boy I’d been defending in the first place was too scared of the bullies to give a statement in my defence. So now everyone thinks I’m just a thug.’

He sounds bleak. I touch his arm, wanting to comfort him. I’m not usually this bold around a guy, but hey, he did just rescue me.

‘I don’t think you’re a thug. Well, not now anyway. You didn’t hurt Jason or Adam.’

He grins at me. It’s the first time I’ve seen him properly smile and he looks younger and more boyish. My tummy does this weird little flip.

‘What do you mean, ‘not now?’ You’re funny.’

He really seems to find me amusing. Well, at least he’s not glaring at me anymore.

‘Well, at Dannii’s you were kind of rude, and she said you’d been in jail for fighting. So it wasn’t the best first impression.’

His smile vanishes. I’ve offended him again.

‘Sorry.’

‘Huh?’ I wasn’t expecting that.

‘For being rude.’

I don’t know what to say to that, so we walk on again in silence, but it’s a more comfortable one now. I’m thinking over everything he’s said when something occurs to me.

‘Why did Dannii tell you I like reading? We hadn’t even met.’

He looks embarrassed.

‘Dean was trying to set us up. I told him I wasn’t interested.’

I can’t stop my face falling, and he continues in a rush.

‘In girls in general I mean. That was before I saw you.’

So what does that mean, that he is interested? My stomach’s in knots I realise I want him to be, very badly. I wait for him to say something else but he’s gone quiet again and we’re not far from my street now.

‘So, are you going round Dannii’s this week?’ As if that doesn’t make it obvious I want to see him again.

‘Maybe. I’m at work all this week, at the garage near Dean’s.’

‘You’re a mechanic?’ I can’t help imagining him in overalls, all oily. My mum has one of those old Athena posters from when she was younger, the one that features the guy with his top off, carrying tyres and looking stupidly hot. I can just see Joe in the same pose, and the thought makes my face hot, and not just with embarrassment.

‘I’m great with cars,’ he says proudly. ‘I want my own garage when I’m older.’

‘You’re lucky to get a job so quick, I mean with having a record.’ That was insensitive, I’m such a dork sometimes. But he doesn’t seem to mind, he just nods, agreeing with me.

‘Yeah, I know. My boss, Bob, knows all about it and still gave me a chance. There are some good people around.’ He shoots a sideways glance at me as if he thinks I’m one of those good people, or maybe he means he is, in spite of his recent past. I think about my statement to Rianne earlier that he was bad news and feel mean, but I don’t know him well enough to know that the version of events he’s given me is true do I? Though instinct tells me he’s being straight with me.

I’m trying to think of a way to make it clear I want to see him again without making it too obvious. I couldn’t even
give him my number if he asked for it, because my phone’s dead and I don’t know my own number off by heart. There’s no way I’m asking for his, that’s way too forward.

‘This is my road,’ I say as we turn into my street.

‘It’s nice,’ he says shortly. It’s just a typical street, I think, but I suppose compared to the Estate it must seem a lot different. It seems to bother him, where he lives, and it occurs to me that he thinks I’ll look down on him. We reach my house and I stop, desperately searching for something to say. I almost want to invite him in, but I don’t want Mum grilling him and making him retreat into his shell again. But if I just go in I’ll kick myself for not saying something.

‘Are you on Facebook?’ I ask, cringing as I hear myself say it. Dannii’s obsessed with it and I’m always teasing her about it, now it seems like a great way to communicate.

‘We don’t have the internet.’

Of course not. Now he looks cross again, and I feel stupid. I shift from one foot to the other.

‘Well, maybe I’ll see you around then. Thanks for earlier.’ I turn to walk up my path but he touches my hand. I look at him, surprised.

‘Ash, promise me you won’t go walking round there at night on your own again?’ His voice is soft.

‘I promise,’ I say, touched by his concern. He smiles, a real smile again that lights his whole face up, transforming him from a slightly intimidating – but very sexy – guy to a happy teenager. It’s like the sun suddenly coming out on a miserable day.

God, I’ve got it bad. Then I realise he’s looking at my mouth. Hardly daring to hope, I step towards him slightly, fizzing with nerves.

And he does it, he kisses me. Leans down and brushes my lips with his in a way that makes me tingle all over. I wrap my arms round him and kiss him back hungrily, all
shyness forgotten. His lips feel warm and soft against mine, and then he kisses me harder, claiming my mouth with his, pushing mine open further. When I feel him flick his tongue against mine it makes my thighs quiver. We press into each other but then he pulls away, looking down at me with one of those inscrutable expressions.

‘Sorry.’

Why is he sorry? That was amazing. But he’s stepping away now and I feel suddenly bereft.

‘Bye,’ I say weakly, trying to process what has just happened.

‘I’ll see you soon,’ he says, which could mean anything, though before he walks off I see him touch his mouth with his fingertips, as if he can’t quite believe it either.

I watch him walk down the road, waiting for him to look back, but he doesn’t. I let out the breath I didn’t realise I had been holding and go in. Mum’s in the kitchen and she looks at me and frowns.

‘You didn’t walk yourself home did you?’

‘Mitch walked me,’ I lie, not sure why but not wanting to tell Mum about Joe. For all that she worries about me not being interested enough in boys, I’m not sure he’s someone she would approve of. Besides, I don’t know what to make of him myself. My lips are still throbbing from the kiss, making me feel things low down in my body that I definitely don’t want to discuss with her.

‘Your dad phoned.’

I frown. He knew I was at Rianne’s, he had dropped me there, so he must have phoned hoping to talk to Mum. I eye her suspiciously. She looks flushed, happy, though that could be because her work’s going well.

‘I’m going to bed,’ I say, all of a sudden wanting to be alone. She just nods, looking distracted. Normally she would want to know all about my day, or question why I
was going to bed so early.

‘Night, baby.’

On impulse I give her a quick hug before going up to my room, and she ruffles my hair affectionately. I get upstairs and throw myself down on the bed, pushing thoughts of Mum and Dad to one side. I want to think about Joe. About the way his mouth felt on mine and that gorgeous body pressed against me…but then he had stepped away. Was I too full on? I think about the way I threw my arms around him and kissed him back, and blush. As if I do that with boys all the time, which is probably what he thinks now. I think of him telling Dean, of them discussing me in the way guys do, and it makes me cringe. I think about the way Adam and his friends had talked about Dannii. Joe seems more mature than that, but how would I know?

Remembering Adam and the way the other boy had grabbed me makes me feel icky. I’m lucky Joe came along when he did. Overwhelmed by the day’s events I feel myself dropping off, a swirl of images in my mind. Rianne feeding the baby, my dad, Adam’s sneering face and finally, Joe’s mouth coming closer to mine, until they all blur into one and I fall asleep without even taking my coat off.

The next morning, I’m at work. Poppy’s is the only diner I know that opens on a Sunday, serving up roast dinners alongside its usual fare of breakfasts and burgers. It gets surprisingly busy. There’s a couple of families in today as well as the usual people. I think the Sunday dinner thing is catching on.

I quite like working here, even though when I do the early mornings in the school holidays it gets hectic and I’ve been known to drop things or mix the orders up. But I love the friendly atmosphere and the banter with the customers. Today though I’m distracted, unable to stop my thoughts constantly turning back to last night and to Joe, and that kiss. My cheeks go hot and my tummy all fluttery every time I remember the way he leaned down and kissed me, and I’ve built the whole thing up to a big romantic scene in my mind that wouldn’t be out of place in one of my novels. In romance stories though, the hero doesn’t tend to abruptly pull away and walk home. I don’t know what to make of it. He must like me, or why kiss me? But then, why apologise? I’ve been tormenting myself with it all morning.

‘Damn.’ I realise I’m burning the bacon and quickly get it onto the plate. If I arrange the beans carefully the customer won’t notice the burnt bit, hopefully. I finish the rest of the breakfast, butter the toast and take it out to the old lady in the corner, who comes in every Sunday at lunchtime and orders an all-day breakfast. She smiles at me as I lay the plate in front of her and I feel bad about the bacon.

I’m behind the counter making a coffee when a voice makes me look up, startled.

‘Ash.’

‘Joe!’ I nearly spill sugar all over myself. He grins at me as I wipe it off. ‘What are you doing in here?’

‘Came in for a burger.’

Oh. I try not to look disappointed, and I’m about to put on my best waitress voice and ask him what he would like to drink, and if he wants normal fries or curly ones, when he laughs.

‘I’m joking, Ash. I came in to see you. Dean said you’d be here.’

I push the coffee over to the woman waiting for it and take the money without speaking. My heart is pounding. Get a grip, I tell myself. Shutting the till, I give Joe my full attention. He gives me a heart-breaking smile, and I see a little round dimple in his chin that I haven’t noticed before. I feel an urge to kiss it.