“I see,” he murmured, sounding amused.
“I’m sure that you do,” she said, starting to nod only to decide to stop when the move caused her queasy stomach to do things that she really didn’t want it to do.
“Is there a reason why my niece is holding a Freddy Kreuger mask?” he asked conversationally.
“Prank gone wrong,” Jen yelled up. “I found an old Kreuger mask in lost and found, couldn’t resist the temptation, hid in Dr. Lawson’s closet, and accidentally scared Shawn for which I will profusely apologize for. Now, about this incident that has my full attention. How exactly did you shut the school down for a whole week?”
“Never mind,” Aaron said, laughing as she felt a rope wrap around her waist. “Are you ready to get down now, Joey?”
“Yes, please,” she said, nodding only to frown when he followed that up with, “You’re going to have let go of the tree first.”
“I really don’t think that I can do that,” she said, making him chuckle.
“I promise I won’t drop you.”
She worried her bottom lip and shook her head because she really couldn’t-
“Let go, baby. I’ve got you,” Reed said as she felt his arm wrap around her.
Without a second thought, she let go.
“What happened to your forehead?” Reed asked as they slowly made their way down the tree.
“Discovered that I can’t run without tripping over my own two feet.”
“I thought you learned that lesson when you were ten,” he said, tightening his hold around her.
“I was hoping that I outgrew that phase.”
“You didn’t.”
“I know,” she mumbled sadly as they finally made it to the ground and-
“Where’s Jen?” she couldn’t help but wonder as she looked around and noted that the teenager that she was looking forward to tormenting with a ten-page paper was nowhere in sight.
“Praying for mercy,” Reed said, releasing her and-
“Run,” he said, making her frown.
“What?” she asked as she looked back at Reed and quickly decided that this was probably one of those times that she should keep her mouth shut and-
“Run.”
“Good idea,” she said, noting that the muscle in his jaw had already started to tick as she began to make her way back to the school only to turn around, go up on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek with a murmured, “Thank you,” before she turned right back around, grabbed Shawn’s hand, and headed back to school, missing that smile that would have told her everything she needed to know.
He loved her.
Chapter 43
“So, who is it?” Matt asked while Joey sat there, struggling to stay awake.
“Who are we talking about?” she asked, giving up on trying to stay awake and folded her arms around the large book on ancient civilizations that she’d helped herself to from the school’s library and closed her eyes.
“Reed’s mystery woman.”
“There’s no mystery woman,” Joey mumbled into the book that she’d planned on reading to keep her mind off the fact that she wasn’t going on the field trip today. Not that she wanted to go on the field trip, because she didn’t, she told herself as she did her best not to pout.
She’d been looking forward to going on her first field trip but ended up having to change her mind when she found out that Shawn wouldn’t be able to go since his mother couldn’t get the day off. Joey volunteered to be his field trip buddy so that he could go, but there weren’t enough chaperones to make that possible. So, she’d decided to switch places with John so that Shawn wouldn’t have to stay behind alone.
“Then you do know who it is,” Matt said, sounding intrigued.
“Please don’t make me kill you,” Joey said with a pathetic whimper, wondering why he wouldn’t just let her sleep.
“At first, I thought it was some bar bunny, but then I remembered who we were talking about here and realized that there was something more to it,” he explained.
“Uh huh,” she mumbled sleepily.
“Then he went out of his way to sneak her in here when I was out back in the shop working every night. That got me thinking, she’s either a teacher or a parent, which makes the most sense since he never goes out,” Matt murmured, sounding thoughtful and making her sigh.
“It’s me,” Joey said, hoping that would be enough to get him to shut up so that she could sleep.
“Sure it is,” the little bastard said with a condescending pat on the head and a sigh.
“It is,” Joey said, raising her head to glare at him to find Garrett, who looked like he’d had another run-in with their mystery neighbor across the street, running his hands roughly down his mud-splattered face with a “You really can’t be this fucking stupid,” as he headed back towards the back door. For a moment, she considered following him, but even the prospect of finally finding out who their mystery neighbor was, wasn’t enough to temp her into getting up.
“So, who do you think it is?” Matt asked, ignoring them.
“I give up,” Joey said, dropping her head back onto her folded arms with a sigh.
She considered going upstairs and crawling back in bed and passing out, but she didn’t have the energy to move. Not after last night. They’d made love against his truck, in the back of his truck before they came home and made out in his truck, against the front door, on the stairs, against his bedroom door before moving to the bed where he’d made love to her one last time before he’d carried her into the shower where he’d taken his time caressing her. Once he’d had her boneless and ready to fall into a coma, he’d given her a quick kiss and a playful slap on her butt and told her to get ready for work.
“Maybe it’s Julie,” Matt said as he began drumming his fingertips against the table and really making her regret promising not to kill him. “It would make the most sense.”
“It’s not me,” Julie said from her usual spot next to him where she waited for her daily entertainment to start with a stack of gossip magazines, a large cup of coffee, and a-
“I really should know better by now,” Julie grumbled, letting Joey know that Matt had finally noticed that large blueberry muffin that she’d foolishly brought with her.
“You really should,” Matt readily agreed.
“It’s not Julie,” Reed said as he walked into the kitchen.
“Then who is it?” Matt asked, making her sigh even as she considered crawling beneath the table so that she could pass out.
She just wanted a little sleep before she had to drag herself to work. She really didn’t want to go to work. Not today. Today, all she wanted to do was pass out in his bed and stay there until she could open her eyes again without feeling like she was dying.
“Why do you want to know?” Reed asked, dropping into his chair.
“Why wouldn’t I want to know?” Matt asked, snorting in disbelief. “The woman has you screaming to the rafters every night. Of course, I want to know who it is.”
“I already told him that it was me,” Joey mumbled weakly, wishing they’d take pity on her and let her sleep.
“She really did,” Julie said, sounding amused.
“Fine,” Matt said, sighing heavily. “If you’re not going to tell me who it is, then at least tell me why you needed a favor at six in the morning.”
“I need you to wait here for Trevor and Jason and give them a ride to school,” Reed announced, making her frown.
“Why?” Matt asked the question that she didn’t have the energy to ask.
“Because I need extra chaperones so that Joey and Shawn can go on the field trip,” Reed said, and admittedly it took her sleep-deprived mind a few seconds to grasp what he said, but once she did…
“Really?” she asked, shoving her chair back and scrambling over the table and onto his lap so that she could wrap her arms around him as she kissed him.
“Oh, my god! What is the meaning of this?”
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