“Your usual?” she called. She was still following Boomer, walking backward as she waited for my answer.
“Yeah, and something with caffeine in it.” I grabbed a squeegee from the bucket bolted on the side of the pump and said to Alec, “You sure you don’t want anything?”
He already had the gas cap off and was selecting a grade. “No, I’m good.”
“All right, but don’t look at me when you get hungry,” I teased. “This girl doesn’t share Cool Ranch.”
Before he could answer, his phone rang.
“Sorry,” he apologized and pulled it from his pocket. He didn’t bother looking at the ID. “Hello?” The person on the other end responded, and whoever it was made Alec frown. He listened for a moment before saying, “Something came up.” Alec’s voice was flat, like whoever he was speaking to had sucked life out of him.
I kept my gaze focused on the windshield, scrubbing a spot that was already clean, and tried my best to look uninterested in his conversation. In reality, I wished he would put the phone on speaker.
“Why? Can’t land a deal without me?”
Whoever he was talking to started to yell. Alec flinched away from his phone, and I could make out muffled ranting on the other end. He let it go on for a good minute before finally interrupting.
“King—King!” His face went slack, like interrupting had zapped all Alec’s energy, and he was too exhausted to fight. “I’m sorry, okay? I promise I’ll make it up to you… Well, no. Not right now. I kind of, er, left town.”
Was Alec in trouble with this King person because he offered to drive me to San Francisco? The thought made me go stiff. I dumped the squeegee back in the bucket of gray-looking water and stepped out of earshot. Alec’s conversation went on for another thirty seconds or so, but I only moved back toward the car after he shoved the phone into his shorts with more force than necessary. I waited for him to say something, but he glared at the cars whizzing by on the road as if I wasn’t there.
Mind your own business, Felicity. If he wanted you to know, he’d tell you…
I tried to bite my tongue, but the tension in the air built between us like an invisible wall. I needed to break it down before Alec clammed up. “So…” I said warily. “Who’s King? A business partner or something?”
He snorted. “King is my dad.”
I gawked. “You call your dadKing?” Alec mentioned his fatherwas controlling…but making his son refer to him as king? That was just ridiculous.
“It’s his name,” he explained. “Sebastian King Williams. No clue what my grandmother was thinking when she gave it to him. Actually, she probably knew exactly what she was doing. It fits him perfectly.”
“He’s mad at you for missing the party, isn’t he?”
Alec exhaled through his nose and offered me a curt nod.
My face fell. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to take you away from your work.”
“Don’t apologize,” he said. “It’s not your fault my dad’s an ass.”
I searched for something to say, but my thoughts and words were muddled with guilt. Alec must have been lost in his own head too, because we both fell quiet. The pump finished fueling as the door to the Gas Exchange swung open.
“Look who scored!” Boomer yelled in his megaphone voice. He held a huge bag of Swedish Fish over his head like he was Lloyd Dobler inSay Anything. The smile on his face was all teeth and enthusiasm. Asha followed. In one hand was a cardboard drink carrier with a slushy, a soda, and coffee. In her other hand, she clutched a plastic bag, which presumably held my chips, her Pop Rocks, and whatever other junk food the two had purchased.
“We ready to go?” she asked.
Alec hung the gas nozzle back up and nodded. To Boomer he asked, “You still want to drive?”
I watched my friends, waiting to see if they picked up on the shift in Alec’s mood. Neither did.
Boomer gave another toothy grin. “Most definitely. Let’s bounce.”
***
The rest of the afternoon flew by. Sometime after leaving the station, Alec pointed out the city of Salinas as we passed through. He told me it was the birthplace of John Steinbeck, and that he’d set many of his novels in the area, likeOf Mice and MenandEast of Eden. Steinbeck was far from my favorite novelist, but that Alec noticed and remembered my love of American literature was enough to keep me smiling for the rest of the drive.
At some point I must have dozed off, because I woke to the sound of someone gently whispering my name. “Felicity, wake up. We’re almost there.”
My eyelids fluttered open, and I blinked in confusion. The last I remembered, I was listening to music with Alec, and the sun was still out. Now, dark-blue and purple hues had chased away the daylight. I lifted my head. There was a kink in my neck from sleeping at a weird angle, and my hair was matted to the side of my face. I stretched out my arms and—
