Page 50 of Tell Me It’s Right

I nod.

“You drove all the way down to Georgia,” he repeats.

“You want me to draw you a map or what?”

He blinks a few times, shakes his head, then resumes screwing in the handle. “All right. Just for future reference, I’m a great road trip companion.”

“You would’ve been yapping the entire time.”

He grins. “Exactly. No falling asleep at the wheel on my watch.”

I chuckle and shake my head. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“So how’s Gracie Collins working out at the shop?”

My stomach drops, and I glance at my watch again without thinking.

Fletcher catches it because he always fucking catches everything.

“Good, I think,” I say, my voice light. “Everything I’ve seen her do so far is a million times better than anything I could come up with. And she hasn’t quit yet. You sure you don’t want help with those?”

Fletcher waves me off with a smirk as I take a step forward. “You’ll put them on upside down or something. No.”

“You’re such a control freak. You’d be done in half the time if you let someone else help.”

“Where would the fun be in that?” He moves on to the lower cabinets beside the fridge. “Now, stop trying to change the subject and tell me about Gracie.”

I rock back on my heels. “She’s like a drill sergeant. Is making me be in all these pictures and stuff.”

A smile tugs at one corner of Fletcher’s mouth as he stands and leans against the counter, and I don’t at all like that look in his eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”

I sip my beer. “Then what did you mean?”

“Imean, I happen to know Gracie is on a date with Miles Cushing tonight, and in the five minutes you’ve been here, you’ve checked your phone eight times.”

It takes everything in me not to bristle at Miles’s name. Hearing it makes my imagination run wild. It digs up every memory I have of the kid, every fucked-up thing he’s been caught up in. The hazing he used to do to the younger kids on the swim team—pissing in their Gatorade bottles and filming themas a group of seniors forced them to drink it. Not to mention the drug arrests, the trespassing, the vandalizing school property. Not that he ever went down for any of it.

Maybe that’s what rubs me the wrong way the most. His damn cocky smile and thatI-can-get-out-of-anythingglint in his eye. I can’t even fathom what someone like Gracie would see in him.

“I don’t see how those two things are related,” I mumble.

“Right.” He sets his beer on the counter, crosses his arms, and shrugs. “I’ve always liked Gracie. We didn’t have a lot of classes together, but she was nice. Quiet, but nice. Weird fucking match with Miles though.”

Fletcher’s never acted younger than me, so it’s easy to forget the age difference. That he was in the same year as Gracie, so of course he’d run into her more than I did back then. A weird, prickly feeling sets up camp in my chest at the thought.

He’s not smirking at me now, exactly, but he’s baiting me, and we both know it. He’s always read between the lines better than anyone I’ve ever met, like he just somehow knowseverything. So I can either keep digging myself into a hole of lies here while he pretends not to notice, or we can both drop the bullshit.

“I’m…concerned,” I admit.

He hums.

“I don’t like Miles.”

He hums again. “Me neither.”

“And she’s…” I trail off, not knowing how to end that sentence.Too good for himdoesn’t begin to cover it. I don’t even like the idea of himlookingat her. I settle for “My best friend’s sister. And Leo’s not in town. Don’t think he knows about it.”

“So naturally the protective duty falls to you by default.” Now he’s smirking at me. “Do you know where they are?”

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