Page 45 of Dark and Dangerous

She finds thatSpace Jammovie and hits play. Then she getsonthe bed, and I stay exactly where I am. After a moment, she huffs, “I can’t see with your Gigantor ass in the way.”

I turn to her, sitting against her head board, cross-legged, a bunch of pillows behind her.

“I won’t bite,” she laughs out, and then she’s tugging on the back of my shirt, pulling it until my back hits the mattress.

I slip off my shoes, then I sit down beside her. Not close enough that we touch, because touching her means sparks, and those sparks make me only want to touch her more.

Makes me want to taste her again.

Her lips. Her tongue. Her flesh.

Every fucking inch of her.

Even though Michael Jordan’s in the movie, Harlow can’t honestly expect me to sit through two hours of this. I must really suck at hiding my reaction, because it takes all of ten minutes for her to switch outSpace JamforGlory Road. “I have a feeling you’ll like this one,” she says. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of it first.”

“We’ll see.”

Twenty minutes in, and my eyes are glued to the screen.

The movie is based on a true story about a coach of a girls’ basketball team who gets hired at a Division I college in El Paso, Texas back in the 1960s. Coach Haskins recruits based on talent rather than race, and you can imagine how that went back then. The movie is raw and real, and I find myself sitting taller every time there’s game play involved. At one point, one of the players clutches his heart, and next to me, Harlow gasps. It’s the first time she’s made a sound since the movie started, and when I turn to her, she’s wiping at her eyes. “It’s been so long since I’ve watched this, I forgot…”

I look from her to the screen, where the player reveals his heart condition, and then focus on Harlow again. She sniffs once, her breaths shaky as she wipes away her anguish, and I don’t know what to do.

I struggle with dealing with my own emotions. How am I supposed to deal with hers?

I do the same thing I did that night down at the creek and again in the school parking lot. I put my arm around her and hope that it’s enough. Harlow nuzzles into my chest, just like she did the other times, and I feel the warmth of her tears soak through my shirt. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “Do you want to stop watching?”

She shakes her head against me, holds a hand to my chest. “It’s okay.”

We watch the rest of the movie in silence, and I’m so drawn into it I don’t even realize until it’s over that we’ve both somehow shifted to a lying position. She’s half on top of me, her head resting on the crook of my elbow, her arm over my torso, and she’s snoring. This quiet little sound that I couldn’t even hear while the movie was on.

“Harlow?” I whisper, and she doesn’t move.

My hand’s on the dip of her waist, and I don’t know how it got there.

I lift my head, just enough to look down her body, and regret it right away. Her shirt’s ridden up slightly, revealing her tiny sleep shorts that outline her perfect ass. My fingers twitch, begging to move those few inches lower.

I groan, drop my head back on the pillow.

I should leave.

Just wake her up and tell her I have to go.

I should leave.

Just slip out from beneath her and drive away.

I should do anything other than close my eyes, stay still, and savor the warmth of her body pressed against mine as it lulls me to sleep.

30

Jace

With theHaloopening music blasting through my headphones, I peer up from my game for the third time since lunch started. Harlow’sstillwatching me, a cute little smile playing on her lips, and I look back down, try to focus on my game. This morning, I left her house at the crack of dawn and headed home. I would’ve stayed until she woke, but last night, when I came home to shower, my grandpa wasn’t there. I wanted to leave enough time this morning in case I needed to find him. He wasn’t in the living room or in his bed, and so I sent Jonah a message to pick up Harlow. It was about ten minutes after I’d normally leave for school that I found him in the backyard, face up, beer in one hand, clutching dead grass in the other. For one split-second, I almost thought it was time. That he’d passed. And then I nudged him with my toe, and he gasped awake.

I got him settled into bed before driving to school and entered the classroom a few minutes late.

Harlow smiled when she saw me.

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