Slow Twitch - Реинхардт Лиз (бесплатные серии книг .txt) 📗

“Didn’t we come here to deliver that shirt, Bren?” Evan took a long, slow sip of her minty shake and ignored the semi-dirty look Saxon flicked her way for interrupting our effort to talk sense to Jake.

“Tony’s meeting with some vendors right now, but I’ll get the shirt to him if you want.” Saxon held his hand out, and I took the shirt out and passed it across the table to him. He unfolded it and his smile unfurled in increments until it changed the shape of his lower face. “Brilliant, Blix. As usual.”

“Thanks.” We shared a glance that was all about mutual respect.

“I need to go check something,” Jake snapped and hurried me out of the booth so he could stalk away.

I started to follow, but Evan put a hand on my wrist and shook her head. She trailed Jake to the truck, and Saxon fell onto the bench next to me, arm around my shoulders. I shifted uncomfortably, not sure what to do.

“He’s having a shit day, right? I shouldn’t be worried he’s going to come back and hammer on my face for complimenting your fucking art, should I?” I opened my mouth to reassure him, but he’d already switched tracks, and he leaned closer to me. “I’m dead serious now. You gotta talk him out of racing that piece of shit. I’m gonna tell you, no joke, and you know I’m no fucking gutless mama hen, that bike is a disaster waiting to happen and he’s lucky he hasn’t crashed and burned the last five races he rode it in. He doesn’t listen to dick I say, so it’s up to you to talk some sense to him.”

“It’s not that easy.” I turned so we were face to face, and I felt shades of the old excitement, the old challenge, but something new, too. Saxon wasn’t looking at me like I was a bet to win or a problem to solve. We were on a team now, united because we both cared about Jake. It gave me hope that there was still room for us to be something, maybe even friends. “Jake has serious attitude about his dad and all the Macleans. His vacation this summer just made it all worse. I think he thinks he’s got something to prove.”

“He’s going to prove himself a fucking concussion and lose the damn title if he rides that piece of shit. Sometimes, Jake is like the smartest guy I’ve ever met, and sometimes, he’s just a big frustrating tool.” He snorted, and I looked up at him and laughed.

“You’re telling me.” He took my hand, and I would have pulled back, except that he looked so sincere and worried.

“I wish Jake and I were still close enough that he gave a shit what I said or thought, you know? Once in a while, and it’s rare as hell, but every now and then, I can be pretty clear-headed about something he’s just being a maniac about.”

“I’ll work on him. Not that it will do much good.” I let Saxon pull me into a hug and even kiss my cheek, and when I got up, I saw Jake at the end of the hall watching us, hands in his pockets, the tips of his ears bright red on either side of his cap.

“Uh, you better go, Blix. I’ll take care of the tab, alright?” He gave me a stiff-handed pat on the shoulder as I made my way down to Jake.

“Evan said she was craving pizza.” Jakes words were mechanical, and he didn’t make any eye contact. “You ready?”

I put my hand on his arm, and he stared at it like it was a foreign object. “Jake, it wasn’t what you think. He’s worried about you and the race. Me, too. We were just talking.”

“Cozy talk.” The words clattered around like change dropped on the floor.

“Jake, please, trust me.” My stomach churned with too much icy chocolate syrup and acid. “I know how it looked, but you have to believe me, it was all about you.”

He nodded. “Well, I’m okay, so there’s no need for you to worry.” He lifted his eyes and squinted at me. “You really are worried, aren’t you?”

“Yes, Jake Roadrunner Kelly.” I put a hand up to his cheek.

“That one’s the worst.” He gave me a smile so tiny, I could barely feel it under my fingers. “I don’t ride on the roads.”

“Jake Speedy Gonzalez Kelly?”

“Wouldn’t people kind of expect me to be Mexican and Irish then?”

“Jake Speedracer Kelly?”

“I don’t have a cool enough ascot.”

I stood on my toes and kissed him. “I can get you one.”

“You think I could rock a killer ascot?” His lips were sweet and hungry on mine.

I pulled away, breathless. “A handsome motocross daredevil like you? You could bring ascots back in a big way. You might get your own ascot line.”

He wound his arms around me, picked me up, and laughed while he shook me back and forth. “I love you.”

“I love you, too. Now come on and take pity on poor Evan. Who knows what terrible excuse for pizza she’s had in Georgia? It’s our duty to taste-educate this girl.” I linked my hands through Jake’s and we left together. I didn’t look back at Saxon even though I heard the clack and roll of his skates on the floor not too far behind us.

Later that night, Evan sat on my windowsill, smoking her clove cigarette while I nervously checked the door.

“Bren, you’re going to have a heart attack. I’ll put it out.” She had popped the screen out and her long legs dangled down into the outdoors, her heels beating on the side of the house.

“No!” I shook my head. “My mom and Thorsten went to Our Place tonight. They always give them a comp bottle of wine, and Fa doesn’t drink much, so Mom’s out like a light.”

“I’m still gonna think you’re cool if you don’t want me smokin’ like a bad girl.” She laughed, and tiny bursts of grey-blue smoke coughed out of her lungs from the force of it.

“It’s not good for you.” I lit a berry candle, trying to look nonchalant about my attempts to cover up the tangy smoke smell.

She leaned back lazily and flipped open her little gold silver case. She stubbed the cigarette out and tucked it away. “You don’t have to worry so much, you know. About me. About Jake. You worry a lot.”

“Well, when the people I love stop murdering their lungs with carcinogenic smoke and racing badly operating machines at accelerated speeds, I’ll stop worrying.” I opened the window next to Evan’s and popped out the screen, then sat on the sill with her, my knees pulled up to my chest. The clear, warm night felt full of anticipation, even though we didn’t have plans that got any more exciting than watching old romance movies and whispering our girly secrets til dawn.

“You need to take more risks.” Evan pointed her toes and tapped me on the knee with them. “You’re young. You should be wild. You should stop worrying so much.”

I flicked her toe. “Last time I was wild, I worried a hundred times more than usual. Oh, and I almost ruined everything I had with Jake. And I nearly died of pneumonia. I’m not Marianne. I’m Elinor.”

“Are you talking Austen?” Evan wiggled her toes, shiny with green and silver polish that perfectly matched her outfit. “I always think of you as Lizzie Bennett.”

“I think I’m a little more of a romantic than Lizzie. Or maybe I can’t get over the fact that she had a billion sisters. And I sort of hated Darcy.” I clamped my hands over my eyes in shame after my confession as Evan tottered on the window ledge.

“Say that again, girl, because I know I must have misheard! You did not just take the name of Darcy in vain.” She clutched her celery green tank with silver silk-screened birches to her heart. “You have depths of insanity I’ve never imagined, Brenna Blixen.”

“Edward Ferrars is my main Austen man, gloved hands down.” I crooked an eyebrow up high at Evan. “So you’re waiting for your Darcy? Because you were kind of with…well, I was going to say Willoughby, but was Willoughby even that bad?”

Evan snapped and unsnapped her cigarette case. “Rabin? He was just a mess. If there’s a character in any book like him, I hope it’s a clearance-rack piece of crap no one ever bothers to read.” She pulled a piece of her long, dark hair over her shoulder and flattened it long and smooth between her fingers, over and over as she gazed into the descending dark. “Maybe I am looking for Darcy. Maybe I’m in the wrong book?”