Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 128742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 644(@200wpm)___ 515(@250wpm)___ 429(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128742 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 644(@200wpm)___ 515(@250wpm)___ 429(@300wpm)
A slow, hesitant smile spreads across my face. “Really?”
“If you’d like.”
I perk right up. He’s been promising me a chance to practice driving on the other side of the road for months. I’d given up on it happening.
“Oh my God. Of course I’d like!” I put the laptop back on the nightstand. “Let’s go for a drive.”
Jack flashes that grin that makes me all gooey inside. “I’ll meet you downstairs.”
27
WHEN WE PULL AWAY FROM THE CURB TEN MINUTES LATER, I experience a moment of hesitation, because this could be a long and uncomfortable trip in silence if Jack and I can’t figure out anything to say to each other. Our conversations come in fits and starts lately. I’d never give Lee the satisfaction, but he was right. Tempting the boundaries of the roommate relationship is inevitably going to affect your friendship. Hence house rule number one and only.
I’m racking my brain for neutral subjects that can’t possibly veer into dangerous territory when he breaks the ice first.
“Talked to my brother Charlie yesterday. Noah had a fight with his girlfriend.”
“The girlfriend we don’t like?”
“Bree. Noah’s been crashing at Charlie’s place since the fight.”
I grin. “Your mom must be popping champagne.”
“Charlie took his phone while he was sleeping and blocked Bree’s number,” Jack adds, laughing. “He was going to delete all the photos of her from his Instagram, but Noah caught him.”
“Know what you need to do?”
He glances at me from the corner of his eye as he merges onto the highway. “What?”
“You guys need to get someone else in there ASAP to distract Noah. Make him remember what life was like before her.”
“A new girl. Someone hotter and not batshit crazy.”
“Even better if she’s an old crush. Maybe the one that got away. Nothing turns the head like nostalgia.”
“I’ll pass that along to the team,” Jack says in amusement. “Shannon will love playing matchmaker.”
“How’s the rest of the Campbell clan?” I ask. “Last week, you were saying your brother Oliver’s got that surfing tournament, right?”
“Yeah. He was worried he wouldn’t come up with the entrance fee, and then, uh”—Jack focuses on a car up ahead— “some sponsor hit him up out of nowhere and gave him the rest of the money to enter. They’re going to cover travel and hotel too. Mum was relieved. She always feels like shit when she can’t afford to help out.”
“Aw, that sucks.”
“Yeah.” His voice roughens. “We aren’t exactly swimming in cash. Money was always tight when I was growing up. Even when Dad was alive, there wasn’t much to go around.”
“I imagine it wouldn’t be easy with five kids.”
“No, not easy. But they tried. And Mum’s still doing her best.”
The rest of the drive isn’t at all awkward. We chat about his family and my dad. My classes and his rugby schedule. Being with Jack comes so naturally. We just vibe.
About ninety minutes south of London, he pulls the beat-up old car over on a dirt shoulder in the middle of nowhere to let me get behind the wheel. Out here, it’s nothing but two-lane country roads covered in fallen leaves. Miles of brown hills and stone walls.
Now in the passenger seat, he watches me as I adjust the mirrors. “Remember,” he says. “The red sign with the word stop on it— ”
“Accelerate to eighty-eight miles per hour and ram it.”
Jack tightens his seat belt. “Just try to keep it between the lines and don’t run into anything.”
Truth is I’m a little nervous, so I keep my speed under the limit while I get the hang of feeling like I’m driving in reverse. To distract himself from the creeping terror evident on his face, Jack hums to the radio. Until there’s a slight miscommunication at the four-way stop.
“The one to the right goes first,” he says. But it’s too late. My foot is already pressing the gas. “No, to the right! The right.”
I mash the brakes, sending us both jolting forward. We end up nose-to-nose with another car in the middle of the intersection. The other guy starts laying on his adorable English horn.
“I’m sorry,” I say breathlessly. “I thought we got there first.”
“Oh, Christ. This was a bad idea.” Jack covers his eyes and sinks into the seat until we’ve cleared the intersection.
“Come on. Aren’t you going to tell me this isn’t half as scary as the time you bare-knuckle boxed a kangaroo when you were seven?”
He shoots me a disapproving scowl. “I regret this already.”
If he didn’t then, he certainly does when I nearly kill us attempting to navigate my first roundabout.
“For fuck’s sake, woman.” Jack braces his hands against the dash, slamming his foot into the floorboard like he could take control from the passenger seat. “Are you aiming for the other cars?”
Nervous laughter jumps from my chest when we narrowly escape unscathed. “Whoops.”