Chapter 13 The Doppler Effect #2
She glanced at Tage, who was still busy with his phone and not missing her at all. I’ll just take a quick stroll across the bow and check it out, she decided. She made it halfway across the deck, before a booming voice stopped her dead in her tracks.
“Hailey!” Tage shouted it as if he were calling a play on the field. Several couples turned and stared. “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry—that was my recruiter blowing up my phone.”
“Your recruiter?” Hailey said grudgingly. She was curious but not wanting to excuse his rudeness whatsoever.
“Yeah,” he said cheerfully. “Just found out I’m going to West Point.
I’ll be studying physics—and playing football,” he added with a wink as he led her back to the table.
“Look,” he said, and he ceremoniously turned his phone off and tucked it away, just as the appetizers appeared. “I got a scholarship from DOPPLER to—”
“What did you say?” She cut him off more harshly than she’d meant but recovered quickly. “I…I mean... What was that about DOPPLER?” In all her grief, she’d completely forgotten the confidential folder.
“DOPPLER? It’s a research group. They’re sponsoring my scholarship, so I’ll go work for them as an Army officer after I graduate.”
“What do they research?” she asked, trying not to sound as interested as she actually was.
“Weapons, mostly. Some psychological warfare, I think.” His face twisted in confusion as he picked up a piece of bread.
“Actually, I’m not really sure. My dad said they do a lot of sleep studies.
They didn’t give me a lot of information, and what they did say was pretty cryptic.
They work with the military, so it’s all secret-squirrel, hush-hush. ”
He took a massive bite, and Hailey nodded politely while he chewed.
“I saw that acronym recently,” she said, studying his reaction.
“Where at?” he asked through a mouthful of sourdough.
“It was on one of the police files…one of Holly’s files.”
“That’s weird,” he said after he swallowed, looking away with a curt chuckle.
“Do you know what it stands for?”
“No. You really saw that on Holly’s file?” he asked, pulling his chin back, and then he shook his head. “I’ll ask my dad. He’s been working for them forever. I think that’s why I got the scholarship. Where are you going to school?” he asked.
For a moment, she wondered if he was changing the subject to throw her off, but he seemed genuinely interested.
“Alaska,” she said.
Tage nodded, still chewing, so she continued.
“I’m still not sure if I want to study nuclear or veterinary science, and they have both…uh…physics and biology.” Kind of. “It’s a small school, called Bear Towne.”
“Ah,” he said. “I heard you might be going there.”
“How?”
Hailey hadn’t told anybody aside from her uncles, and she doubted any of them were spreading the word around the high school.
Tage shifted in his seat.
Hailey watched him suspiciously.
“Honestly, Hailey, I don’t remember where I heard that.”
“But you’ve heard of Bear Towne?”
“Yeah, it’s one of the schools I could’ve gone to with my scholarship.
It’s a great school. My dad really wanted me to go, but they don’t have a football team, so…
” He shrugged and dug into his mashed potatoes, but then he spit his food back onto his fork, set it down, shoved his plate aside, put his hands flat on the table, and looked up. “Actually, that’s a lie.”
Hailey looked from his hands to his face, and quirked a brow.
“That’s what I’m telling everyone at school, but actually…” Tage shook his head. “I didn’t get in,” he said with a shrug, and Hailey froze mid-chew.
He sighed heavily. “And boy was my dad pissed. I mean, it was all set up—we had the scholarship; we had an actual offer in hand from the university, and then…” Tage shook his head.
Hailey raised her eyebrows, waiting.
“…and then?” she muffled through a mouthful of buttered bread.
“And then I got a post card—not a letter, not an explanation—a frickin' post card, with one sentence, that they were withdrawing their offer of admission due to—” He made air quotes “—current circumstances.”
“What does that mean?”
He threw his hands up. “But Dad says I can apply again for the Spring, so I dunno. Maybe you’ll see me there in January,” he said.
“After football season,” Hailey said brightly, and Tage chuckled, but they finished eating in silence.
Following dinner, the mood changed dramatically.
Tage walked the perimeter of the deck with her, staring over the railing and chatting about all things from football to Irish dance to school and the structural integrity of the bridges over the Monongahela until the boat docked and surprised them both.
By the time Hailey got into Tage’s mother’s car, she’d forgotten the uncomfortable start to the night and had almost slightly enjoyed herself on her first date.
She stole a glance at him. He really was handsome. And smart. And kinda fun. If dating him didn’t come with the added joy of incessant attention from the gossipmongers, she might like to go to prom with him.
But Tage was no Fin. He was driving slower than Uncle Pix.
At least the conversation was quick.
“By the way,” Tage told her, “I think your hair looks great like that. You look like one of those California girls.”
“Which one?”
“The one every guy dreams of,” he said, throwing her a wink and a cocky smile.
She scoffed loudly. “Sure, the dream girl that no guy ever looks at or asks out or kisses?” Oops.
“Never been kissed?” Tage said with surprise in his voice, and Hailey sank into her seat, going three shades of crimson.
“I don’t know why I said that,” she mumbled. “You should watch the road.”
“Maybe you want me to kiss you.”
This was unbearable. Hailey couldn’t stop herself from babbling and gesticulating wildly as she spoke.
“No, that’s not it at all, Tage, I just…
I don’t…well, I certainly don’t want to hear all about it in history class tomorrow, and even if the galloping gossipers didn’t find out about it directly, they’d sense that something juicy was afoot with their hag antennas—not that you were going to kiss me in the first place, or that I was daydreaming about it on the boat, because I only thought about it for a second when you told me how much you enjoyed seeing Holly and me dancing…
” Hailey slapped both hands over her face to make it stop, and Tage stifled a laugh.
Watching him through her fingers, she wished he’d drive faster. They were only half-way home.
“I really did like watching you guys dance,” he said, checking his side view mirror. “It’s amazing. The sound is incredible.”
“Thanks,” said Hailey, smiling slightly as they pulled up to the curb.
He stared at her for more than a few seconds, and Hailey scooted toward her door.
“Well,” she said, grasping the handle, “I sure hope you can run faster than you drive, quarterback,” she told him, laughing as she opened her door.
Tage sprinted from the driver’s side in time to catch it before it opened all the way. He offered his hand and helped her out.
“How’s that for fast?” he asked, keeping her hand as he walked her to the door.
“You may just survive college football,” she said when they reached the landing.
“I was driving intentionally slow, you know.” He leaned into her, pulling her hand so it touched his waist.
Her heart pounding, Hailey held her breath as he brought his lips close to hers, but right before he kissed her, he stopped. Frozen in an unnatural lean, Tage stared dreamily into Hailey’s eyes, his lips partially puckered, as if he were stuck in some sort of trance.
Hailey shrunk away from him.
“Tage!” she barked.
He blinked several times, dropped her hand, and straightened up into a great stretch.
“Well,” he said yawning as he turned away from her, “I’ll see ya tomorrow, Hailey.”
With that, he shuffled down the walkway and left.
Once again Hailey stood slack-jawed as she watched his departure, trying to figure out what just happened.
And to think—she left her rose on his dashboard almost completely unintentionally.