Page 72 of Give Me Redemption

“Hey, I was kidding,” I say.

She snaps out of it. “Yeah.” I narrow my eyes at the change in her mood, and as we near a lantern, I notice she has dark circles under her eyes.

What’s this girl hiding?

“So, you grew up in the city, right?”

“Yes,” she says.

“What made you decide to be a librarian?”

“Books. I love books.”

“You read a lot then?”

“As much as I can.”

I nod. “What about your childhood? I’ve told you about mine. Tell me about yours.”

She exhales, looking over at me. “It was a normal childhood. There’s nothing to tell.”

“Nothing at all? Like what did you do for fun? What were your parents like? Do you have a sister or a brother?”

“Parents are great and were great.” I turn left and she follows. “My life is pretty boring,” she says. “Sorry.” She shrugs, but she’s lying. I know it.

There’s so much more to her life than she’s letting on. It pisses me off that she won’t open up to me. I’m at a loss here. I can be a jerk about it, or let it all go just so we can be around each other, but what good is being around each other when I never know who she really is?

“God, remember that?” she asks looking at a dead-end. Two teens are making out, hands all over each other. They’re hidden, but not hard to see if you’re looking.

“Yeah,” I say. “Hormones were a bitch.”

She laughs. “They were.”

“Who was your first kiss?” I ask.

Her face falls a little, but she covers it. What the fuck? I grow more frustrated with her.

“It was actually on Halloween. A dumb boy from school who thought first kisses meant going down my pants, too.”

“I take it you didn’t let him?”

She looks over at me. “No. He got mad and told everyone I was tease.” She rolls her eyes.

“Little punk,” I say.

She grins. “Yeah. What about you?”

I shrug. “Some girl. I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“Guys don’t really give a shit about that kind of thing.”

“Then why did you ask me?”

“I wanted to know. I’ve only kissed you once, and I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m sure that guy’s been living in hell for however many years.”

She looks over at me, her lips parting, her cheeks softly flushed. Goddammit, I want nothing more than to lift her up, have her legs around me, and be as close to her as possible.

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