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Jamie Kearny, Edward Kearny’s son and the boy who had watched from the window as his father spit on my mama. Just great.
“Hey, man,” Red Shirt said, taking a step toward him. “We got this covered—”
Jamie punched him in the face and Red Shirt went down hard in the gravel, not even breaking his own fall. I cried out, bringing my hands up to my mouth. I was shaking all over. As Jamie hefted Red Shirt up and dragged him under his armpits to his car, I quickly took stock of myself. My sweater was torn and hanging where Red Shirt had grabbed it, and my eye felt like it was quickly swelling closed. I brought my finger up to my mouth, and when I took it away, there was blood on it.
Jamie threw an unconscious Red Shirt into his still-idling car and then reached in and pulled the keys out of the ignition. He leaned in and did something I couldn’t see, and when he leaned back up, he was holding a pair of jeans in one hand and the keys in the other. He slammed the door shut and brought his arm back, throwing the keys into the forest next to the highway.
“You all right?” he asked, throwing the jeans over his arm and turning toward me.
I nodded my head shakily as he approached me. His lips thinned as his gaze moved over my face, but he didn’t touch me. “Come on, I’ll drive you home.”
I hesitated. True, I’d gone to school with Jamie for the last four years, but I didn’t really know him, and I tried not to think about him at all. In fact, I avoided him whenever possible—I could only figure he didn’t look too fondly on any member of my family, including me after what he’d witnessed.
He watched me now as I hesitated and then he reached in his pocket, bringing something red and shiny out. He walked it over to me, holding it out so that I could take it from his outstretched hand. It was a Swiss Army knife.
“If I try anything that makes you uncomfortable, you stab me in the eye with that,” he said, a glimmer of a smile on his lips.
I released a breath, my racing heart slowing enough that I could get a full breath through my body again. I took the knife from him. I didn’t say anything, but I followed him to his car and got in the passenger side. He got in and threw the jeans in the back seat. I glanced back at them, confused, and then sat huddled against the passenger door as Jamie pulled out onto the highway. I looked out the back window—Red Shirt still hadn’t sat up in his car.
“What if he’s dead?” I asked.
Jamie glanced in his rearview mirror. “He’s not dead. He’s just going to wake up with a big headache and a massive hangover…and he’ll have to walk himself back to his hotel…pantless.” He looked over at me, and the side of his lip quirked up slightly. I stared at him, my own lip quirking up too, as I pictured Red Shirt walking along the highway naked from the waist down. But then my expression sobered.
“He might come back to Al’s,” I said.
Jamie glanced at me before he turned off onto the road leading up into the hills. “You live up here, right?”
“Yeah. I’ll show you where to turn.”
“That man,” Jamie said, “he won’t bother you. I’ll make sure of it, okay?”
I glanced at him. “Okay.” I don’t know why I trusted that he would, but for some strange reason, I did. The way he’d said it had been so incredibly sincere.
I thought about what little I did know of Jamie, other than that he was a Kearny. I knew he hung with the popular kids, the small group at our high school who lived in Evansly and had parents who were executives at the mines—the rich kids. I didn’t know if he’d be considered “rich” by all standards, but by mine, he most definitely was. Our lives were legions apart.
I directed him up the hill to my trailer, and when he pulled up in front of it, he sat staring at it for several moments. I was too achy and numb to care. In that moment, my little trailer looked good to me and I wanted to get inside and lie down on the small couch I slept on. I pulled the door handle and the door clicked open.
“Hey, Tenleigh,” Jamie said and I paused, but didn’t turn toward him. “This is kinda weird timing, but would you, uh, want to go to the prom next week? I mean, with me?”
I looked back over my shoulder. Jamie was good-looking—not in the same way Kyland was—but he had a nice face, a kind face, actually, now that I was really looking at him. “Thanks, Jamie, but uh, no. I don’t dance, and…” I can’t afford a dress or shoes and I’m kinda desperately in love with someone.
