More than flattered, she let him pull her down the hall…away from the cafeteria, it appeared. “Hey, where are we going?”
“It’s a surprise.” He pulled her to his side, draping a heavy arm over her shoulders. The length of his body was fit against hers like it was made to be.
“Are we leaving campus?”
“Yep.”
“Are we going to get in trouble?”
He stopped, turning her in his arms. They were almost chest to chest, his arm still around her shoulders. “Questions, questions, Bethany. Trust me. You won’t get in trouble with me.”
She arched a brow. “Because of your charmer skills, huh?”
“Exactly.” He grinned.
Dawson continued on and she went with him, imagining what her mom would do if they got caught and the school called her. Mandatory pregnancy tests were in her future. She glanced at Dawson and decided it was worth it.
As they went out the back doors, she expected an alarm to sound and the rent-a-cop to come running at breakneck speed. When that didn’t happen and their feet hit pavement, she started to relax.
Dawson let go of her hand, picking up the pace as he dug his keys out of his pocket. “Where I want to take you is two blocks down. We can drive if you want.” He glanced over his shoulder, his eyes starting at the top of her head and drifting all the way to her toes.
Geez, when he looked at her like that, did he expect her to be able to communicate? She was mush now, useless mush.
His smile tipped higher, as if he knew what he was doing to her. “It’s kind of too cold for you.”
“What about you?”
He faced the front, flipping those keys around. “I’m fine. This is your world, though.”
She smiled at his back. “It is kind of co—” Her words ended in a startled shriek as her foot hit a thick patch of ice that hadn’t thawed. Before she knew it, her arms were flailing as she sought to keep her balance.
Not going to happen.
In those teeny, tiny seconds, she’d resigned herself to cracking her skull wide open in front of Dawson. An ambulance would need to be called. Mom would find out. Dad would get summoned from work. She’d be grounded, with a concussion. Or worse.
Warm arms surrounded her, catching her a half second before she went splat. And there she remained, suspended in air, her hair brushing the slick asphalt. Dawson’s face was inches from hers, eyes closed in concentration, face tight and grim.
Bethany couldn’t even speak around her shock. Dawson had been several feet ahead. For him to get to her so quickly was mind-boggling.
Breathless, she stared up at him and swallowed hard. “Okay. You have the reflexes of a cat on steroids.”
“Yeah,” he said, sounding almost as out of breath as she was. “You okay?”
Wetting her lips, she nodded and then realized he couldn’t see that. “Yes, I’m fine.”
Slowly straightening, he had her back on her feet before he released her. His eyes opened, and Bethany couldn’t believe what she was seeing. The irises were still a beautiful green, but the pupils…the pupils were white.
Without realizing it, she took a step forward. “Dawson…”
He blinked and his eyes were normal. “Yeah?”
Shaking her head, she didn’t know if her mind was messing with her or what. Pupils couldn’t be white. And he was fast—like Olympic gold medalist fast. And quiet, too. Quiet as a ghost on a weight loss program. And his friend could melt ping-pong balls…
Chapter 8
Over the next month, Bethany saw more and more of Dawson. They hung out as much as they could at school. How he managed to finagle his way out of fourth period on a consistent basis amazed her. Charm? Hell, he needed to bottle that stuff.
On the days they shared lunch, he took her to the Mom and Pop diner down the street. There hadn’t been any more near-death experiences in the parking lot and no more amazing feats of speed on Dawson’s end.
And no more glowy pupils. It sounded crazy now and even she wanted to laugh, but every time they touched, there was an electrical shock that passed between them. Lately, it was more than that. After the initial static charge faded, it felt like his skin…hummed or vibrated.
It was the strangest damn thing.
Pacing back and forth, she was wearing a path in the floor. Ordinarily, she was never this wrapped up in a boy. But there was something about him. He was a constant shadow in her thoughts.
They talked every day, in between classes, at lunch, on the phone at night, and what not, and even though she knew a lot about him, there was still so much she didn’t know. Like she didn’t know anything about his parents, very little about his siblings, and she had a suspicion that he may be related to one of the teachers at school, because she always saw him with the guy.
She’d just been scratching the surface of Dawson. Knew his likes and dislikes and his love of hiking and being outside, discovered that stupid jokes made them both laugh and that he wasn’t big on TV. But the real stuff? His past? Nope.
Glancing at her bed, she stared down at Phillip. He’d wanted to watch her paint after school and had fallen asleep on her bed. Now he was all curled up like a little lima bean, his thumb in his mouth and his cherub face peaceful.
A flash of white light shot across her laptop as the screensaver kicked on. It was a moving image of falling stars.
Sitting down beside her brother, she stared at the screen. The white was intense, consuming. Like Dawson’s pupils had been. But she’d been seeing things, right? Stress-induced reaction caused by nearly sucking face with the icy pavement. There was no logical explanation for what she’d seen afterward. Not that it really mattered. He could be a llama in disguise and she’d still be…fascinated by him.