Page 59 of Did It Have To Be Gnomes?!
Wow.
I couldn’t remember the last time I had someone help me with work… or with anything in my life.
My heart lurched in my chest.
Winter was such a sweet guy.
Even if he didn’t stick around long-term, I’d just have to enjoy the time I had with him.
And if I pretended that he meant he wanted to date me—and not just do the whole date-leads-to-a-one-night-stand-thing—well, no one needed to know my secret hopes.
Chapter Eighteen
Miles
The car parked beside my truck was the shittiest thing I’d ever seen. Honestly, I had no idea whatsoever how it was even running at all. It was covered in rust and looked about a million years old.
Which was the opposite of the kid who stepped out of the driver’s seat. And he was most definitely a kid.
There was no way he was eighteen. I’d guess fifteen,maaaayyyybesixteen, tops. How the hell was he running a business, and a necromancer one no less, if he wasn’t even a legal adult?
Would he even be able to help us? Weren’t teenagers usually still coming into their powers or figuring them out? Was he powerful enough to break a curse? Was he evenallowedto help us? Like, could we get in trouble for hiring a fifteen-year-old necromancer?
Maybe he was older than he looked.
Regardless of his age, he certainly dressed the part. All black clothes, black vest, black ass-kicker boots, rings on his fingers—several with skulls—some long silver necklaces around his neck, and even his hair was black, dyed if I had to guess.
The only non-black thing on him were his eyes. They were bright green and seemed to sparkle in the sunlight.
His skin was pale, he was short, maybe five-six, and he was so, so, so skinny. I had a feeling it wasn’t because he had a great metabolism. I was pretty sure the kid hadn’t had regular meals in years.
A flash of dirty blond hair and brown eyes flickered behind my mind’s eye, and pain lanced my heart so suddenly, it took my breath away.
I had to freeze and suck in a lungful of air, then slowly blow it out before I could continue on my trek to the car.
Just like it always did, thoughts of that sweet girl made the sorrow so strong, it was difficult to carry on.
But I couldn’t let that stop me right now. She wouldn’t want it to stop me.
So I pushed all those thoughts and feelings away and concentrated on the too-skinny boy in front of me.
It was the middle of the school year, wasn’t it? Didn’t they serve up free lunches to all the kids?
I froze for a brief second. If the only food a kid got was his free school lunches, what the hell did he eat on the weekends?
Like today.
It was Sunday. Oh my god, schools were closed tomorrow too.
Had the kid eaten anything since Friday?
I couldn’t stand seeing kids suffering like that.
I glanced at Winter. He’d invited me out for a lunch date—well, he’d said lunch or dinner—I was going to have to ask if we could do dinner. Hopefully, he wouldn’t mind, but Ihadto get some food into this kid. Ihadto.
As soon as I stepped within ten feet of the teen, I was hit with a well of emotions.
Nervousness, excitement, hopefulness, pessimism, despair, but most of all… I could tell the kid felt really, really alone.
