Prologue #2
She could’ve sworn his features hardened, but she was probably reading into it, looking for the support she wanted. Because, in reality, he didn’t say a word. He just stood there, giving her no emotion whatsoever. Her heart seized up.
But she had to shake it off. He didn’t have to join her in hating Leia Collins. “Well, thank you for catching the raccoon. I still won’t sleep tonight, but it’s better than running away from home when I’m so close to graduating.” She smiled, hoping he’d get the humor.
He didn’t. “No problem.”
As he headed for the door, her pulse rioted. Because he was leaving. And it struck her that, in a matter of weeks, school would end. All the moments she lived for—waiting for him to saunter into Algebra or pass her in the hallway on his way to gym—would be gone. Over.
Forever.
This obsession had filled her every waking hour, kept her company, and let her escape into a world of fantasy. And not once in all these years had she let him know how she felt. She’d never asked him to go for a hike or get a smoothie. Nothing.
Did she really want to wonder if something could’ve happened between them if she’d only had the courage to ask him out?
The moment his hand closed over the doorknob, she blurted out, “Do you want to go to prom with me?”
He shot a look over his shoulder. “Prom?”
Shame burned a path from deep in her gut all the way up to her earlobes.
He’d spat the word out as if she’d asked him to play Barbies. He might’ve been a senior at Calamity Falls High School, but he was nothing like the other kids. He didn’t go to football games or dances. He cruised on the outer edges.
“What happened?” he asked. “Your date bail on you?”
It was a fair question. The dance was in a few hours, after all. But she shook her head. “I don’t have one.”
“Why not?” He seemed truly confused, which, she supposed, was flattering.
“No one asked me.” It drove it home, though, how different their experiences were. She wasn’t a nerd or an outcast or anything like that. She was friendly with a bunch of different people, but she didn’t have a group of her own.
And she’d never had a boyfriend.
Because she’d only ever wanted him.
He grew thoughtful. “I saw your vision board.”
Oh God.
She wanted the floor to give way so she could go crashing to the bottom of the earth.
She’d been so worked up over the raccoon, she hadn’t considered that Jude McKenna had been in her bedroom.
What else had he seen? Her bras. Her underwear?
Oh, please. Not the journal. She’d for sure left it out. She knew that because she’d been writing in it.
Had he noticed his name scrawled all over it?
Drowning in mortification, her chest squeezed tightly. She could barely take a full breath.
“I’m not that guy,” he said.
“What guy?” Her voice came out as a hoarse whisper.
“The guy who wants to live on Bloom Lane and do block parties and shit. Can you imagine me coming home from work, roaring up the street on my Harley? The moms, in their designer jeans, would snatch up their kids and get them inside their houses, pulling the curtains shut. Me, mowing a fuckin’ lawn? Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.”
She didn’t like that he’d seen right down to her most tender core, but at the same time, his assumption pissed her off. “I’m not asking you to marry me, Jude. It’s a dance.”
“You got your whole life planned out,” he said with a hint of accusation.
“What’s wrong with that? People with goals wind up more successful in life.”
“Nothing wrong. I just don’t know why you’re asking me now, when school’s almost over, and we’re going in very different directions.” He shrugged. “You want to be a teacher, have kids, live on Bloom Lane.”
He made it sound like it was the most boring life in the world, but she wouldn’t apologize for the future she longed for. “And you want to go ride free—or whatever the club motto is. Cool. But I love it here. Calamity’s the most beautiful place in the world, and it has literally everything.”
Including you.
For now, anyway, it has you.
“And yet, no one asked you to prom. And other than Willa, you don’t have many friends.”
He’d plunged a blade into her heart. “God, Jude.”
“No, I don’t mean it like that.”
“Well, how did you mean it? Because I just told you what happened in sixth grade. It was literally the worst thing I’ve gone through in my entire life, and I’m sorry, but it’s not easy to trust people after something like that.
” She let out a huff of exasperation. “It’s not like I don’t want to have friends. ”
“No, I get it. I’m just saying… Forget it.” He opened the door.
“No, you don’t get to leave me hanging like that. What do you mean?”
But he’d already walked out.
What just happened?
How had it all gone so wrong?
She stood there, reeling, wishing she’d kept her mouth shut about Leia.
Worse, why had she asked him to prom?
He’d seen her vision board and knew what she wanted out of life. Leia probably wanted to become an ambassador. Travel the world. No doubt, she’d become someone important, live an international life filled with State dinners and yacht parties hosted by celebrities.
And as interesting as that might sound, it left Finlay flat. She didn’t want any of it.
A lot of things embarrassed her—and trust me, asking Jude to the prom just shot to the top of my list—but not her vision board. Not her dreams. She wanted them fiercely.
So Jude could hook up with Leia. Hang out with his biker friends. He could think she was a prissy, na?ve little girl with small dreams of being a teacher, getting married, and living in a pretty house on Bloom Lane.
But it wouldn’t change who she was and what she wanted.
She went to close the door but found Jude on the landing.
Lowering his chin, he flicked a thumb over his bottom lip. And then, he looked up at her. “Yeah. I’ll take you to prom.”
What the hell were you thinking?
Unfortunately, Jude knew exactly what he’d been thinking.
As he stood in the living room, strangled by a monkey suit, he knew he could never say no to Finlay. She was just so pretty and sweet. She didn’t know it, but the way they “randomly” ran into each other after school was neither an accident nor a coincidence.
He went looking for her.
“Here.” His dad lifted the collar of Jude’s white dress shirt and wrapped the black bow tie around it.
To say they ran in different circles was an understatement. She was a good student, and the teachers loved her. If she were associated with Jude McKenna, it would ruin her reputation. He wouldn’t do that to her.
Worse, if she hung out with him, she’d be around his friends. That would be bad.
But most days, he couldn’t stop himself from visiting Wild Wolff Village just to catch a glimpse. Didn’t she wonder what he was doing there? He didn’t live anywhere near the ski resort.
Today, though, seeing that vision board in her pink bedroom with the frilly bedspread—with all her hopes and dreams on display like that—had weakened his resolve to keep his distance.
In his world, people were jaded—no, guarded. It seemed like, after enough brutal disappointments, they’d stopped allowing themselves to hope. It hurt too much when expectations were dashed.
But not Finlay. She was strong. Courageous. The fact that she wasn’t afraid to dream, to put herself out there… He admired the hell out of her.
He wouldn’t expose her to his ugly world, but now, with school ending in a few weeks, what would it matter if they were seen together at prom?
His phone vibrated on the coffee table, but he ignored it. As usual, his friends were up to something he didn’t want any part of. He’d take this one night to be the kind of man Finlay would be proud to date.
A yearning took hold of him, a longing. He could almost see himself on her vision board—
But he shut it down. He could never give her the kind of life she wanted. He wasn’t built like that.
The stiff shirt was buttoned to his neck, cutting off his air supply, and he jammed a finger under the collar to loosen it.
“Stand still.” His dad fiddled with the tie.
Ava came into the house and dropped her purse on a side table. “Oh, don’t you look handsome?”
“I got the wrong size.” Of course, he had. Everyone else had rented their tuxes months ago. He’d had to take what was left.
“Should’ve gotten the clip-on.” His dad wasn’t having an easy time with it.
“Here.” Ava hip-checked his dad and took over, her familiar perfumed scent calming him.
She’d been their nanny and babysitter from the day they’d arrived in Calamity when he was six, and the closest thing to a mom since his had passed away.
After getting the job done in thirty seconds, she stepped back and patted his chest. “There you go.” She turned to his dad. “You got a limo?”
“No,” his dad said. “They’re going with other couples. There’s a party bus.”
“Perfect. Okay.” Ava ran her hands through Jude’s hair. “You want to comb it?” She tugged on his scruff. “Maybe trim your beard?”
“I’m good.” He didn’t see the point. No matter how he dressed or shaved, people still saw him as a scary biker.
Except for Finlay.
Huh. So for her, yeah, maybe he’d do it.
He headed up the stairs.
“Where’re you going?” his dad called. And then to Ava, he said, “He just said he wasn’t going to trim his beard.”
“Well, don’t make a big deal out of it,” she whispered. “Just let him do it.”
Jude flicked on the bathroom light and shut the door. In the mirror, he saw the man people crossed the street to avoid and the bad boy girls handed dirty notes.
Meet me under the bleachers.
Gazebo tonight at midnight.
My parents are out of town this weekend…
And the thug teachers and cops eyed with disgust because he’d been such a pain in the ass as a kid. Somewhere around middle school, though, pranks started veering into criminal activity, and that was when Jude’s path began to separate from his friends.
He might’ve stopped being reckless a while ago, but people in small towns had long memories.