Page 84 of The Facade

“No time for another one of your lessons?” She arched an eyebrow, a flirtatious smile on her lips.

I studied her raspberry-colored mouth, the image of us kissing flitting through my mind. “You want a lesson right here in the school’s parking lot?” I licked my lips as anticipation swelled in my veins.

“You do have tinted windows.” She glanced at my vehicle behind me, her lips parted in a seductive way. “It could be a short lesson.”

Okay, who was this girl? And what had she done with the innocent little sister of my best friends?

I swallowed. “Dinner isn’t for another thirty minutes. I think I could make time for a brief lesson.”

I took her backpack from her and set it on the far end of the second row of seats, pushing my gym bag over with it. I was just about to climb in myself, planning to pull her onto my lap, when voices sounded from behind us.

I craned my neck to see who the voices belonged to, and that was when I saw Carter and Ava walking toward Carter’s truck a few parking spots away.

Crap!

They could not see us.

“What do we do?” Cambrielle asked, her eyes wide with panic as she looked at her brother. “My car is on the other end of the parking lot.”

I glanced at our surroundings, trying to find a place for her to hide. But there were no cars or trees in the immediate vicinity that she could hide behind.

Carter and Ava were presently looking at each other, so they hadn’t seen us yet, but any big movements would bring their attention to us.

“Just hide in here,” I said, gently shoving her into my car.

I’d pushed her in there just in time, because as I was shutting the door, Carter and Ava finished laughing about something and looked my way.

“Oh, hey Mack,” Ava said, waving to me with a big smile on her face.

“Hey.” I shut the door the rest of the way and hoped the window tint was dark enough to hide Cambrielle. I cleared my throat. “This weather is great, isn’t it?”

Why did I just randomly bring up the weather?

If that wasn’t a way to make someone suspicious, I didn’t know what was.

“Um, yeah.” Ava frowned, looking around at the trees that had their last leaves clinging to their branches. “It’s, uh, it’s beautiful if you’re into chilly, overcast days, I guess.”

“My favorite kind of day,” I said, plastering a smile to my lips. I actually preferred sunshine and cloudless skies, but I’d started this conversation so I needed to stick with it. “Anyway, I better get going. See you guys tomorrow.”

“See ya,” Carter called, a confused frown on his lips as he opened the passenger door of his black Ford Raptor for Ava, like he knew I was acting weird but didn’t understand why.

But if thinking I was weird distracted him from seeing his sister in my SUV, I was fine with it.

I walked behind my vehicle to climb into the driver’s seat. As I pulled my seatbelt around me to buckle in, I glanced at the second row where I expected to find Cambrielle.

Only, instead of finding Cambrielle sitting where I’d set her, she was now crouched down on the floor in a contortion I could never get into, especially in a school uniform.

“What are you doing down there?” I asked.

“Hiding from Carter and Ava, of course,” she said.

“But I don’t think they can see into the back,” I said. “You don’t need to sit down there.”

“It’s fine,” she said, barely lifting her head. “I’m small and can fit.”

“I guess that’s true,” I said. Tiny people could fit in tiny places, I supposed. “We’ll just wait for Carter to drive away, and then you can sneak out.”

I looked through my driver’s window to see if Carter was pulling out yet. But when our gazes met, he made a waving motion with his hand.

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