Page 27 of Like You Know

Between the feelings of freedom and the feelings stirring between my legs, I wasn’t paying any attention to where we were going. We could’ve been riding for twenty minutes or two hours. I had no idea. All I knew was the feel of him pressed against me, the shift of his body as he controlled the bike, the lashing of the wind and roaring of the engine.

Everything else fell away, and for a little while, I didn’t have a care in the world.

And then we pulled onto a quieter street, somewhere totally unfamiliar. Jet took a few turns and parked at the edge of a strip mall.

“Where are we?” I asked once he killed the engine. The shopfronts didn’t give any clues.

I struggled to get the helmet off as much as I’d struggled to get it on, so we got off the bike and Jet helped me with it.

“Does it matter?” He gave me a dimpled smile as he put my helmet away.

“It does if you’re about to murder me and bury my body behind that Wendy’s.” I nodded toward the first store on the strip. The signage was faded, the door rusted in the bottom corner.

“That sounds like a very Amaya thing to say.” Jet shook his head in disappointment.

“Right. Forgot we were playing this stupid game.” I put on a plastic smile. “Oh my gosh, Jethro! I can’t wait to see what you have planned!”

He chuckled and took my hand, pulling me along. I followed willingly, matching his pace up the sidewalk.

Unfortunately it wasn’t a long walk. In the middle of the strip mall, the biggest storefront belonged to a thrift store. We paused at the entrance to let an elderly man with a cane exit, and then Jet dragged me inside.

It smelled musty—like a closet full of clothes that hadn’t been worn in a decade. I supposed it was exactly that. Racks and racks of clothing that hadn’t been worn in years. At the back of the store was a section with some furniture and housewares, sad-looking toys, and faded paperbacks.

I raised an eyebrow at Jet. He was already looking at me, trying to stifle a laugh.

“This is a thrift store.” He leaned in and spoke low. “All the items in here—”

“I know what a thrift store is, asshole.” I cut him off with a smack to his stomach. The back of my hand stung for a second—it felt as if I’d whacked a brick wall.

I’d been to plenty of thrift stores—usually in the city. It was amazing the kind of things people threw out. You could find some real fashion treasures if you were willing to dig through the literal mountains of polyester trash.

“Let me guess.” I turned to face him. “You’re going to find the ugliest outfit you can for me, and I’m going to find the ugliest outfit I can for you, and then—”

“Nope!” He gave me a self-satisfied grin. “I’d never try to tell you who you should be or how you should dress. This is about being whoever the fuck we want to be. Pick your own outfit, beautiful. Just make sure it’s oneAmayawouldn’t go for.”

With that, he walked off, strolling down an aisle packed with men’s pants.

For lack of anything better to do, and secretly excited to get into this weird little exercise, I headed for the ladies’ section.

Before I knew it, a half hour had passed, and I had about a dozen items slung over my arm—half of them quirky, fun finds I could actually work into my wardrobe. I even had a whole series of posts planned for Instagram. One of my finds was a vintage nineties Diesel denim skirt. There was no label on it, and it was creased in all the wrong places, but I knew Diesel when I saw it.

The other half of the items were things I’d never wear in my regular life.

I flicked hangers from one side to the other swiftly, going through the last rack of dresses. Most of them were hideous.

“I swear it wasn’t me.” Jet popped up on the other side of the rack, startling me. He was wearing a golf hat that had seen better days, and his own pile of clothing hung over his arm.

“What?” I snapped, pressing my hand to my chest in a vain effort to get my heart to stop hammering. That seemed to be a losing battle whenever Jethro Collins was around.

“The look on your face.” He pulled his lips into an almost snarl—apparently an imitation of my expression. “You look like you’ve just walked into a fart cloud. Just saying it wasn’t me.”

I forced my features into a blank mask, embarrassed he’d caught me letting my thoughts show.

Jet’s teasing smile faltered. “Hey, no, don’t do that,” he said softly, leaning his forearms on the rack between us. “I thought you knew by now you can’t hide from me.”

Yeah, that’s what I was afraid of.

“I was offended by the horrendous scraps of fabric that pass for clothing in this place,” I said, ignoring his statement.

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