Page 32 of Heartbreaker
“I’ll do my best.”
I shoo away a few of the chickens and reach down into the first box to pull out two eggs, gently placing them in the basket. When I glance back at him to ask how he slept (once we finally turned in for the night), his gaze is locked on the wall, his mind somewhere else.
“John?” A second later, the realization churns in his eyes before he meets my stare. “Is everything okay? You seem distracted.”
“Oh, yeah. Everything is…Everything’s fine.”
“Well, as yourfriend, I’m here if you want to talk,” I say, reaching into another box. So far, we’ve collected six eggs, but I’m not going to make him stand here and wait for me to clear out this whole coop. Shooing another chicken out of the way, I feel it as soon as I step down—the odd angle my foot lands in—and when I try to avoid stepping on the animal, I stumble over my own feet.
A strong arm wraps around my waist, catching me before I can eat dirt—or in this case…well, I don’t really want to think about it. John’s hand holds tight to my side as he steadies himself. Wide, inky blue eyes meet mine before flickering to my lips briefly, his tongue poking out to wet his lips.
Wait, is he…Is he leaning in? Or is it me? If it’s me, he hasn’t pulled away. Should I pull away? Shit, if we get any closer, we’re going to—
“What the hell?” His body jolts as if struck by lightning. It doesn’t take long to figure out the culprit behind the intrusion…At our feet, Buddy the Chicken squawks loudly. He stares intently at John’s denim-clad leg, and without warning, he leans in and pecks it.
John jumps out of the coop, and I double over in laughter. A big, bulky guy, over six feet tall, running out of the chicken coop because of a teeny, tiny chicken. That might be the funniest thing I’ve ever seen.
“Looks like Buddy wanted to say hi,” I say, covering my mouth to try and hide the laughter still on my lips. Still chuckling, I reach into a few more boxes, collecting eight more eggs before I leave the coop and drop them into the basket John still holds. “C’mon, that should be enough for now. I’ll get the rest later.”
“You cannot be serious,” Cassandra says, pushing through the crowd to catch up to me and Kingsley. My best friends drove from Alexandria to join us for the New Year’s celebration. After all, Kingsley could hardly pass up an opportunity to witness the Taco Drop again.
What’s the Taco Drop? It’s our little town of Celestia’s version of the Ball Drop to ring in the final moments of the year. A giant taco, decorated by the high school senior class, descends a 120-foot pole placed in the middle of town square. This year, the seniors chose Candyland as the theme, and they went all out. The seven-foot-wide LED taco is slathered in a rainbow of candies, and I’ve heard more than once how it looks good enough to eat.
The twins ran off the moment we arrived to find their friends and fellow seniors; they wanted to watch their handiwork and bring in the new year together. My older brothers have helped me keep my friends entertained, including Nash, who can’t stop flirting with Rae. Every time they seem to get lost in each other, I notice that Wolf and John glance at Brody, who ignores them. Mamá and Papá are in charge of one of the stalls, selling Mamá’s homemade empanadas and a flurry of other homemade snacks—they’re always a hit at these events.
“Savannah, please tell me you’re joking about meeting your ex-boyfriend tomorrow,” Cassandra pleads, and I roll my eyes. They had sequestered me from the rest of the group under the guise of finding some spiced wine, but I knew it was really to corner me about Jaxon. I made the mistake of telling them about running into him, and that he invited me to coffee, and that I said yes.
“What is the point of going?” Kingsley asks.
“That’s what I’d like to know. What reason could you possibly have for meeting up with Jaxon Gallagher?”
“He’s not that bad, Cass,” I say, pushing through the crowd when I see one of the spiced wine stalls up ahead. Cassandra, unlike Kingsley, knows him, because we went to high school together. She moved to Celestia the summer before sophomore year, and we’ve been friends ever since. We were roommates the first year at Thornebrooke, and when I joined the Wildcats, Kingsley turned our duo into a trio.
“He’s a dickwad, and he treated you like shit in school.”
Was Jaxon kind of a jerk sometimes? Yes. Was he a cocky, teenage football star who thought he was better than everyone? Also, yes, but he wasn’tthatbad. He never cheated on me. Never called me names. Jaxon was just a self-absorbed kid who wanted a trophy wife, not a partner, and as time went on, that became abundantly clear. Unfortunately for him, that wasn’t me. Unfortunately for me, he had a way with words, and that’s how he always managed to pull me back in…until I ended things once and for all after a big fight at the state championship game our senior year. I said some not-so-nice things to him right before he went on the field, but hey, we still won. Still, he offered to give me a ride home from a party that night, and we had the same conversation, minus the yelling. We agreed ending things was for the best, and then he started dating Olivia Jakes two weeks later.
“Seriously, Sav. You have a beautiful man right in front of you, and you’re going to chase some old high school fling—”
“What are you talking about, Cass?” They both give me a knowing look. “Who, Brooks? You guys, we are not—”
Kingsley dismisses me. “First, let’s not pretend like you call himBrooks. You are the only person I have ever heard call him John. Second, why not?”
“Because we’re just friends. And—”
“Who slept together.”
“And I don’t want to date someone I work with. That could really complicate things.”
“Sounds like an excuse to me,” Cassandra says, stepping up to the counter of the small hut selling wine. “Hi, Mrs. Daniels!”
“Evenin’, girls. Savannah, glad to see you could get some time off,” says Celestia’s resident town gossip, Mrs. Joyce Daniels. A Cheshire smile extends past her eyes that twinkle beneath the multicolored lights of her bungalow.
“It’s been good to be home,” I say, offering a tight smile of my own.
“Rumor has it you brought some of your more famous friends with you, including two very strapping young men. One of them yours?”
Cassandra looks right at me, and I roll my eyes. “No, ma’am. We’re just friends.”
