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Silver took her to the Pizza Hut near the school, a place with sticky tables, a sticky floor, and sticky toddlers screaming over the ancient jukebox in the corner.
It probably had sticky buttons. She didn’t want to find out.
Kate raised her eyebrows at him when the waitress brought thick plastic cups of soda. “Really. I say I’m hungry and this is where you take me.”
He ignored her. “What did you learn today?”
She took a sip of her soda and cast a glance around the room. Harried mothers, tired servers, bored busboys. Silver looked completely out of place in the red vinyl booth. But then, she probably did, too.
She shrugged and swirled the straw in her glass. “They’re boys. One of them got in a fight right in front of me and was stopped by a teacher.” She rolled her eyes. “We could probably go back and take them out right now.”
“If we take out one, we have to take out all. We can’t risk collateral damage.”
“Say ‘collateral damage’ again. That sounded sexy.”
He didn’t smile. “Are you not taking this seriously, Kathryn?”
His voice was low and dangerous, but she was still smarting from his treatment in the parking lot. It made her long for the easy banter of the text messages she’d exchanged with that boy with the piercings and tattoos. Hunter. How quickly he’d defended her this morning, standing up to those idiots in the school office.
She wondered what kind of kisser he was.
Then she squashed the thought. She had a purpose here. She couldn’t let Silver catch her being distracted.
And that boy, Hunter, had shoved a girl in the cafeteria. He’d picked a fight with Gabriel Merrick. He’d seemed so collected, so controlled.
Then she’d seen it all go to hell in less than a minute.
rced himself to take a long breath, letting it out slowly, forcing his hands to relax while he walked.
“Hey, Jackass. Hungry?” A hand hit the edge of the tray and flipped it up.
Hunter jerked back. The chicken and salad missed him.
The soup didn’t. Hot liquid hit him square in the chest.
That spring snapped. Hunter whirled and threw a fist.
Gabriel Merrick hit him back.
Hunter stepped into the punch, using his opponent’s momentum to trap his arm and send a knee into his gut.
Then they were being dragged apart. Too soon. Hunter tasted blood on his lip—but he let himself be dragged.
That assistant football coach got between them, and he was talking, though Hunter wasn’t really listening. Something about fighting and the guidance office and . . . Hunter didn’t give a crap.
His eyes were on Kate, standing there among the gathered crowd, next to Nick Merrick, Gabriel’s twin.
Nick was talking, his tone full of an almost resigned exasperation. “So now you’ve met my other brother, Gabriel . . .”
Hunter wasn’t listening to him, either.
He was staring at Kate. Or more precisely, her hand.
And the way it was resting on Nick Merrick’s arm.
Hunter slouched in the chair in the guidance office and stared at the corner of Vickers’s desk. His shirt was wet and tacky from the soup, and somehow it had turned ice cold on the walk down here. He didn’t want to give Gabriel the satisfaction of hearing him complain about it.
Kate and Nick. How had that happened? Wasn’t Nick dating Becca’s friend, Quinn?
