The thought hit me and then left me. It was such a crazy thought that my brain wasn’t able to process it. But then the thought hit me again, and again, and again as I stared at the face on the photo looking back at me. I brought the picture in closer, until it was almost touching my face.
No, it couldn’t be. . .
Could it?
Brown eyes peering through yellow-lensed glasses.
Bleached white, spiky hair with a red and white bandana tied around the front.
Surely, it couldn’t be?
A slim body wearing an oversized red baseball shirt.
Baggy jeans with silver chains hanging from the pockets, big purple platformed sneakers.
Large, silver loop earrings in both ears with matching silver necklaces.
Or could it?
Kneeling down on one knee, arms outstretched, fingers beckoning you through the photo.
Smoldering, yet innocent and intense look on face . . .
Could. Not. Be.
Could.
Not.
Be!
I heard a noise and looked up to see Mark standing in the doorway. His eyes dipped down to the photo in my hand and then a look washed across his face. It was easy to read. I did not need to be a facial expression reading expert to know what I was looking at.
Horror.
Absolute, eye-popping, jaw-dropping, red-cheeked horror.
CHAPTER 55
“What the hell are you doing here?” Mark asked angrily, his voice loud, almost a shout. I’d never heard it like that and it unsettled me.
“This is you, isn’t it?” I held the picture up and scrambled to my feet. “This is you, right?” I waved the photo back and forth in the air.
“This is an invasion of privacy. What are you doing here?” he asked again, his voice getting even louder. He walked up to the box I’d been digging in, grabbed the platinum record and shoved it back in.
I waved the photo even more. “You are M.J. from Step To That, aren’t you?” My voice was shaking now as I looked at him carefully. He looked very different now. Older, completely different style, longer hair, slightly bearded today (God, that suited him), but his eyes were the same chocolate brown that I’d stared into when I was young. It was him. My teenage crush. The voice I’d listened to over and over. That I’d swooned to and cried to and danced to and turned to in my most lonely moments. And my moments had been so lonely. On some days it had felt like his voice was the only voice that had said anything kind to me at all.It was him!
“M.J.,” I said.
“Mark!” he corrected sternly.
He met my eyes for a moment, holding my gaze with an intensity that made my hairs prick up. And then, he broke it. It felt like he was ripping something away from me that, until that moment, I hadn’t known how much I needed. He snatched the photo from my hand, so fast that the paper made my fingertips tingle, and also shoved it into the box. He took the box and started walking away. I followed him.
“Wait!” I called out, but he kept on going. He was moving so quickly that it was hard to keep up. I broke into a jog.
“It is you, isn’t it? Oh my God. You are him! I can’t believe this.” Words started gushing out my mouth. “I knew you looked familiar. I mean, I should have seen it sooner. I stared at your face for years as a teenager. You were on my ceiling staring down at me, for heaven’s sake. I should have seen it. Oh. My. GOD!” I squealed. “I can’t believe this. You’re M.J. The wild one.”
“Mark!” He swung around and looked at me. His eyes zoned in on mine. This time they seemed cold. I stopped talking as his chilly gaze froze me. “I’m not that guy. The ‘wild one.’ ” He gestured air quotes and spat those words out with venom. Slowly. One at a time. He turned again and carried on walking to the house. Even though he didn’t look like he wanted to talk about it, I wasn’t ready to drop this.How the hell could I drop this?This was not something you could drop!
