The Problem With Forever

In the back of my head, I wondered how...how okay this was. I didn’t want to pull away and break the connection, but I thought that maybe I should. This was innocent. It had to be, but it was also different.

“Do you have someone to eat lunch with normally?” he asked, and his voice seemed off to me. Deeper.

Keeping my eyes closed, I wasn’t sure how to answer that and I also didn’t pull away. I wasn’t sure what that said about me or if it said anything at all.

“Mouse?”

“There’s a girl in my English class. She...invited me to sit with her.”

The arm around my waist seemed to have tightened. “Who?”

“Keira... I don’t remember her last name.”

A heartbeat passed. “I know her. She’s in our speech class. Pretty cool girl. You going to take her up on the offer? If not, I can meet you for lunch.”

But he had a class right now that he was supposed to be in.

Then it hit me. Rider... Wow, he really hadn’t changed. Even after four years, even if he was supposed to be in class and even though he had a girlfriend, he would be there for me if I told him I needed him. Stupid tears pricked at my eyes. “You don’t need to do that. I’m going to sit with her.”

His fingers moved along my neck, searching out the muscles. “You sure?”

My heart was a puddle of mush. “Yes. She invited me... She asked if I wanted to try out for cheerleading.”

Rider’s hand stilled. “Mouse...”

I grinned.

“You’re not considering that, are you?” he asked after a moment. Then he trailed off and suddenly pulled back, arms and everything.

The sudden loss of the closeness forced my eyes open. His profile was to me, jaw taut, and he was staring out over the pavilion, toward the parking lot. There was a car idling in the rows of parked vehicles, some sort of sedan. From what I could tell, the windows were tinted to the point you couldn’t see who or what was inside.

A door shut, and my attention swung toward the exit we’d come out of earlier. I saw Jayden walking out, hitching up his pants as he walked across the pavilion, toward the steel gate.

“Shit,” Rider muttered under his breath.

I stiffened as a sense of wariness slipped over him. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah.” He watched Jayden slip out the gate and make his way to the car. The younger boy bent at the waist as the driver’s window rolled down. Rider patted my leg, drawing my gaze. “The bell’s about to ring. Why don’t you go ahead in?”

Something cold and hard was etched into the lines of his face. I didn’t like it. “Rider...”

“Everything is okay. I promise,” he said, tapping my leg again, and then he stood as the double doors opened again. This time it was Hector who was coming outside, and the look on his face said he was not happy. Rider took my hand, pulling me up. “I’ll see you in class.”

Nodding, I gathered up my stuff and stepped over the bench. Hector didn’t look at me as he joined Rider, and neither of them spoke as they pivoted, heading toward the gate. I watched them, knowing deep down that something was up and whatever it was, it wasn’t okay.

Chapter 6 (#ulink_982310ff-3dc2-5628-aee2-f6d0cc426ba5)

I didn’t see Rider in speech class.

His seat was empty, and I couldn’t help but think it had something to do with that car that had shown up. Although we got to spend some time catching up, I knew nothing about what Rider had been doing these four years beyond living with Hector’s grandmother.

Some would probably disagree, but I wasn’t completely naive or sheltered. I’d grown up in a house where I saw a lot of stuff. The month I’d spent in the group home was also pretty educational. Guys would hang around outside the building, recruiting younger kids to run drugs. I’d seen older kids in that house pass out mid-conversation. In a matter of a month, I knew kids who simply vanished, lost to the streets. I also had a good idea why Jayden’s eyes were bloodshot yesterday, and a tinted-out vehicle rolling up into the parking lot probably wasn’t full of people selling Girl Scout cookies.

A niggle of worry formed in my belly as I wondered what kind of stuff Rider could be up to. But under the worry was something else, something I wasn’t sure I should acknowledge. Because Paige wasn’t in class, either, and I wasn’t stupid. Rider had left school. So had Paige. Whatever was going on, they were probably together. A burning sensation hit the center of my chest, and I told myself it was indigestion, that it had nothing to do with Rider holding my hand, telling me I was beautiful when I knew he had to be telling Paige the same and meaning it in a totally different way.

It took effort to focus on Mr. Santos’s lecture about different types of speeches. Santos paced, moving his hands wildly as he spoke. Excitement practically poured from the man. I glanced down at my binder, seeing only a half a page of notes. Not good. I focused, scribbling as much as I could.

When the bell rang, I felt a little better about my notes. I headed out into the hall, busy shoving my notebook in the bag, and I didn’t realize that Keira had been waiting for me until she sidled up beside me.

“So, did you get a chance to think about cheerleading?” she asked.

Closing the flap on my bag, I winced. I seriously hadn’t thought twice about her offer. I shook my head.

She sighed as she wrapped her fingers around the strap of her bag. “Yeah, I figured it was probably a stretch, but hey, doesn’t hurt to try.”

No, it definitely didn’t hurt to try. That whole theory pretty much summed up my life right now.

“Anyway,” she said, catching the door to the stairwell and holding it open. “I saw you at lunch today.” There was a beat as we were crammed onto the steps. “You were with Rider Stark.”

Warning bells went off as I looked at her sharply.

Her smile remained, completely open and friendly. “Do you know him?”

I nodded as I crossed the landing to the second floor, guessing she was going to follow me to my locker.

“Since you’re new,” she said, raising a shoulder as she glanced at me, “how do you know him?”

Part of me felt like it wasn’t anyone’s business, but then again, she was curious, and I probably would be, too, if I were in her shoes. Talking to her made me nervous, but I pushed past it. “We...we knew each other when we were younger.”

“Really? That’s cool.” Keira leaned against the locker next to me as she pulled out her phone, glancing at the screen. “I figured you two had to know each other. He was really...uh, hands-on with you, which is strange.”

Shoving my history text inside, I grabbed my English book since I had homework. I looked at her as I closed the door. “Why is that strange?”

“We’ve been in the same school since we were freshmen, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him hold another chick’s hand, including Paige’s,” she said, grinning. “And they’re together.”

And why did that make me all kinds of warm and happy inside?

“Or something like that,” she added.

What did that mean? And come to think of it, why hadn’t I asked him about Paige during lunch? That would’ve been a normal question. But he had kept me busy answering all of his questions.

She laughed, because what I was thinking must’ve been plastered across my face. “I mean, I don’t get the impression that whatever he and Paige have is really serious.”

The warm and happy started to grow, and I stomped it down. It had no place here in this conversation.

“Anyway, he was in one of my classes last year, and you know, he kind of showed up whenever he wanted to. Me and Maggie—you don’t know her—but anyway, we used to say he was gracing us with his hotness. He wouldn’t take notes or really participate in class. Sometimes I swear he actually slept,” she continued. “But anytime he was called on, he knew the answer. No one could figure it out, especially the teacher. Used to drive her crazy and it entertained the rest of us. One of my other friends, Benny, was in his class last year when we were taking the MSA exams, and he overheard the teacher saying that Rider totally blew the rest of the class away in terms of scores. One of the highest in the entire junior class supposedly.”

That sounded like Rider.