AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Oh man, it was a collision of hands again, mine over hers. “I’ll carry it,” I said assertively. Which was not what I meant to say. I wanted to know what she meant about the sugar content, but my heart was racing and the tingle up my spine was causing my mind to spin.
And while I was trying to gain control of my hormones, she wrenched the bag from my grip. “It’s okay. You’ve got your own bags.” She fiercely hoisted the backpack onto her shoulders, picked up her tote and kept moving.
I skipped to catch her, yep, skipped. “Hey. What’d you mean about the sugar?” She continued walking, focused on the path ahead like she was worried about tripping. “Sierra?” I prompted.
“I always thought you had no tastebuds, but I’m guessing Coach is strict about your diet,” she said.
“It’s just during play-offs,” I tried to play it down, not wanting her to think I was some fastidious freak who obsessed over every gram of sugar and fat. Even though, by default, I did. “Gotta keep it lean,” I tried to sound humorous, but Sierra stopped dead in her tracks.
She puffed out a breath and said, “I left the donuts in your room. I didn’t want you to miss out, and I’m really sorry if you got into trouble.”
“Wha—what?” I was both shocked and thrilled at the same time. The horror that Sierra had gone into my room, but also the joy that Sierrahadgiven me the donuts and not my mother.
“I felt bad about your Dad not letting you have one, but I didn’t realize you were on such a strict diet. I mean it’s not like your body—” She gestured her hand at me and seemed stuck for words, “uh, you know, that you’re not in good shape or anything.”
A flash of color flooded her cheeks, and she lowered her eyes. Strangely, her blush made the heat rise in my own cheeks, causing my stupid big mouth to act without consulting my head.
I moved closer and nudged her side. “Ha! I know you’ve been checking this bod out,” I said with a cocky laugh. “You couldn’
Now, normally Sierra would give as good as she got. If she was ever hanging with Sawyer and me when I was at the Huntington’s house, she’d join in the banter over movies, gaming, football. I expected she’d punch me in the arm and tell me not to be such an arrogant jerk.
But she didn’t.
Sierra stepped up her pace and muttered a sulky, “I was not.”
A little stunned—okay, a lot stunned—I caught her up, and those few long strides caused my heart to pitter patter in an unjustifiable way. I mean, my fitness was so high that my heart shouldn’t be palpitating all of a sudden.
“I was just joking,” I said with a laugh that sounded entirely wrong. She probably thought I was mocking her, and I wasn’t, or hadn’t meant to. “Sierra?”
My sports bag slipped off my shoulder and while I adjusted it, she put more distance between us, her lengthening strides purposeful as if the prospect of a ten minute car ride together was mortifying.
She stood impatiently at the passenger door, arms folded across her chest, waiting for me to click it open. She’d taken off her backpack and rested it by her feet, her lips pressed tightly in a straight line as if signaling that she didn’t want to speak to me. That she didn’t want anything to do with me.
The easy thing would be to open the door and drive her home, but my heart finally connected with my brain and a deluge of thoughts swamped me. Seeing Sierra looking at me with such disdain was worse than any of Dad’s extra workouts, was worse than five minutes in the ice tub—the things she’d just saved me from.
I dumped my bags down with a thud, but there was no reaction from her. If anything she hugged herself a little tighter.
“Thank you for the donuts,” I said. Her eyes remained down on her arms, stoically refusing to acknowledge me or my words. “They were great by the way. The best.” I hoped for a reaction of some sort, a flutter of eyelashes, a pursing of her lips. “I wondered if you’d given them to me, but I thought there was no way you would’ve gone into my room.” Her feet shifted slightly, weight transferring from one to the other. “Hey,” I lowered my voice to a whisper, “please don’t tell anyone I still have a teddy bear on my bed.”
I had her—immediately she lifted her head, and her gorgeous brown eyes widened, giving me the courage to carry on. “Yeah, that’s Brady.”
“Brady? Like in Tom Brady?”
I nodded. “Uh huh.”
“You sleep with him?” She was suppressing a smirk.
“I can’t answer that,” I said with a laugh. “You might tell Millie, and then it’ll be all over the Covington Times that the football captain sleeps with his teddy bear.”
“I wouldn’t tell,” she said softly, relaxing her arms to her sides.
“I know you wouldn’t,” I said, believing her in a heartbeat.
A car drove past us, coming from the staff parking lot, making me gather up our bags and throw them in the trunk. Dad would be leaving soon and I didn’t want to still be here.
“C’mon,” I said. “I better get you home.”
I started the car while Sierra clipped up her seat belt. “I haven’t been in this before,” she said, glancing at the dashboard. “You got it for your birthday?”
