Page 29 of Buck This
Buck gestured to the huge fountain in the middle of the clearing. It was visible from the outdoor eating area, and there were a few kids running around it, playing.
“It’s pretty,” she said softly.
“Come on,” he said, digging into his pocket for the pair of pennies he’d put in there earlier.
He’d planned this. Buck didn’t know why he wanted to do this. He’d never done it before, but he’d eaten out on that huge patio last year and watched a couple throw pennies into the fountain, and he had wondered often what normal people wished for in moments like those.
Maybe today he wanted to feel normal. Maybe he wanted to banish the nervous jitters that were eating up his stomach every time he thought about bucking tonight. Maybe he wanted to feel like a good man with Torrey.
“Here,” he said, placing a penny in her palm, face up for luck.
“What is this for?”
“To make a wish.” He drew up to the edge of the huge fountain and stared at the coins scattered all over the tile floor of it. So many wishes.
“I wonder how many of those wishes have come true,” she murmured, eyes trained on the coins.
“Maybe none of them.”
“Or maybe all of them.”
Huh. “I saw someone make a wish last year when I was here, and they seemed to know what they were doing.” He placed his hands on her shoulders and gently turned her around, her back facing the fountain. “Close your eyes, make a wish, and throw the coin over your shoulder. Don’t miss.”
Torrey took a deep breath and nodded, closed her eyes. He watched her lips move slightly with whatever she was saying in her mind, and God, he wished he knew what she was thinking.
She tossed the penny over her shoulder, and it flipped end over end until it splashed into the water.
“You wished for that five hundred thousand dollars, didn’t you?” he teased.
Torrey’s eyes opened slowly, and she smiled cheekily. “I can’t tell you. If you tell a wish, it won’t come true.”
“Look who knows the wish-rules.”
“It’s science.”
He chuckled and gave his back to the fountain, closed his eyes, and thought,I wish I could keep her for more than two days.And just as he tossed the penny, a gust of wind blasted through the clearing, and he muttered a curse as he turned just in time to see the coin fall onto the edge of the fountain, missing the water completely.
“Wow, the universe did not want you to make that wish,” she said through a giggle. “If you were wishing for that money, I don’t have a good feeling about us being rich by tomorrow night.”
He approached the coin slowly, his stomach clenching with some emotion he didn’t understand. It felt kind of like dread. The coin had landed on tails. With a frown, he pushed the penny over the ledge of the fountain and watched it flip in the water three times before it landed on the tile bottom.
Disturbed, and feeling like his wish was stolen from him, Buck wrapped his hand around Torrey’s and led her back toward the parking lot.
Maybe the universe was justified in whatever had just happened.
Buck really had been trouble since the day he was born, and Torrey was good. Torrey was the kind of down-to-her-bones good that lit up rooms, and banished darkness. All he had was darkness. Of course he wasn’t meant to keep her for more than two days.
“Are you okay?” she asked, jogging to keep up.
“Hey Torrey,” he said, turning on her.
“Yeah?”
“You don’t have to tell me the real stuff. We can do this pretend thing all you want.”
Confusion swirled in her pretty blue eyes. “Okay.”
“But if you ever do get the urge to share the real, I won’t judge you. I can’t. I’m more fucked up than you could ever be.”
