I give him the address and then climb on the back of his motorcycle. He waits for me to adjust the helmet before he pulls out. I can tell he’s holding back for my sake. As strange as it seems, I wish he’d go faster. Really let loose. I want to know what it feels like to do something a little crazy. But true to form, I don’t ask him to. I just squeeze my arms tighter around his middle and lean against his back.
He pulls up outside of the house. My heart sinks when I see the blue muscle car sitting next to Ivy’s silver sedan. Jon is here.
I climb off the bike, awkwardly and hand Tank the helmet. “Thanks for the ride. And for what you did tonight. I know Sasha really appreciates it.”
He flips up the front visor on his helmet. “I wish things had gone differently. My goal was to scare him, not get both of you banned.”
I kick a loose pebble near my foot. I wish I could pretend that losing the job didn’t matter. But the loss of that income is even more important now. Mr. Marshall’s offer looms in my mind. One conversation with Tank and all my troubles could be over.
“I had to deliver a package to your father today.”
His face immediately closes up. “Did you?”
“He’s a nice old man. He always asks me about school and how things are going.”
“Yeah, he’s a model citizen all right. I’ll wait until you get in the house before I take off.”
Something must show on my face because his eyes narrow. I can tell he’s about to say something else so I wave and walk toward the house. All I have to do is go inside and wait until he drives off. Then I can walk back to the law office. As soon as I close the front door behind me, I hear the sound of the motorcycle as he races off.
I take a quick shower and then stuff some fresh clothes in my bag. There’s a soft thud against the wall that separates my room from the hallway. The door to my room is slightly ajar. I tiptoe to the door and peer through the crack out into the hallway.
Ivy stands in the living room, staring at her phone. Jon comes up behind her and she suddenly puts it in her pocket. I can’t hear what they’re saying but when Jon grabs her wrist and yanks her toward him roughly, I gasp. I cover my mouth with my hand but they don’t seem to have heard me anyway. Ivy shoves Jon away and stalks back down the hall. He follows and then I hear her door slam.
After the way Jon behaved this morning and what I just witnessed, this is the last place I want to be. I stand in the doorway, for a moment, listening. They don’t come back out so I grab my bag and head out. It’s exactly twelve minutes later when I lock the front door behind me and skip down the front steps.
I want to weep at the thought of walking a little over a mile at this time of night. But my mind flashes back to this morning and I suddenly would rather be anywhere else. Jon has never been quite that blatant before. It’s usually just the lecherous looks and the comments. I made the mistake of telling Sasha last week that Jon was hitting on me and wish I hadn’t. She wasn’t exactly subtle with her offer to crash on the couch tonight. But I don’t need charity or to impose on my friends.
Contrary to what she thinks, I’m not all heartbroken and depressed because my sister is being such a bitch to me lately. There was a time when Ivy would have stood up for me. Before our parents died, she would have told Jon he could take her or leave her. But ever since then, she’s been different. I’ve been different, too. I can hardly fault her for changing when I’m not the same person either.
It’s eerily quiet as I pass the dark houses on my street. There’s no one out this late. I hook the long strap of my messenger bag over my head so it doesn’t get in the way. No doubt I’ll have blisters by the time I get there but I should be able to curl up on the sofa in the waiting room and catch a few hours of sleep before Mr. Stevens comes in for the day. It’s embarrassing enough that he knows I do it but to have him catch me would be even worse.
I turn the corner onto the main road. It borders a wooded area that always gives me the creeps. So when a dark shape moves out of the corner of my eye, I whirl around, my bag slapping me in the back of my thighs, fists at the ready.
“Going somewhere?”
Once it registers who it is, I scream in frustration. “Tank! What in the hell are you doing? You almost gave me a heart attack!”
“Where are you going, Emma?”
“None of your business.”
He taps his fingers against the helmet resting on his thigh. “Is there some reason you don’t want to go home?”
He’s going to make me say it out loud. “Do you just get off on annoying me or what?”
“Something like that.”
It’s the lack of pity in his eyes that tears the words from my mouth. It’s the understanding. Like he’s been in my shoes a time or two and knows how much it sucks.
“My sister’s boyfriend is there and he’s just … I just, don’t want to be there, okay?”
He nods, a quick perfunctory motion, like he was just waiting for me to finish so we could move on. “Get on.”
“Wait, what? I just told you I’m not going back there.”
He starts the engine and the loud sound startles me in the stark quiet of the night. “I know. You’re coming home with me.”
At any other time I would have a million arguments ready. I’d rail at him for making assumptions or make a joke about “what kind of girl do you think I am?”
But it’s late. It’s dark. And he represents the only safety I’ve had in a long, long time. So I do something that makes no sense.