“Is it wrong to be excited about the two of us heading off for adventures on the West Coast?” Dee asks.
“No, it’s the only positive that came out of today.”
“That, and your parents agreeing to therapy.”
“Let’s be honest, that was long overdue.”
“Can’t argue with that. Don’t get me wrong, I love your parents, but you were a Disney cartoon away from becoming Rapunzel locked in a tower.”
“Can’t argue with that,” I laugh and nudge her shoulder with mine.
“So what time are we leaving?”
“Leaving?”
“Well, I have a car and there’s no other way of telling Jackson what’s happened, thanks to our overbearing Matron, the douche-bag-hottie bodyguard, and your prying parents. I am of course assuming that you want to see him before you put a continent between you both?”
“It’s a four-hour drive and that’s just one way.”
“So? Road trip! I say we leave in the night to get there for early morning. If we’re lucky, no one will have noticed we’re gone.”
“So, we turn up, tell him that I can’t be with him for a couple of years until I’m properly immortal and he’s going to be so okay with this that everything is going to miraculously work out?” I ask incredulously.
“No, dumbass. We go there, tell him that nearly everyone we know is paranoid-crazy and give him your number this time. That way no matter how many times your parents replace your phone or delete his number he can still call you. Now, I know from my own internet snooping, that he’s not on any social media, but there’s this genius thing called email. And being the business mogul that he is, I bet his account is hack proof…even for your parents and Tristan. If they can’t delete you from his inbox, then he’ll always have a way of communicating with you. Hell, if he’s that into you, maybe he’ll come to the West coast with us; there’s nothing your parents can do about that.”
“True, but there’s a small part of me that can’t ignore the logic that maybe it would be better for us to wait until I’m less easy to kill?”
“You said that having him lose you once would probably make him so determined to protect you that he’d be the best bodyguard you could ever have. But, if it’s genuinely a concern, then there’s nothing wrong with emailing for a couple of years. He’s waited this long for you, will a couple more years really make that much difference?”
“Why would you drive a five-hundred-mile round trip just so that I can see Jackson?” I ask.
“Because you’re my best friend and I’ve never seen you the way you are when you’re thinking about him. I haven’t seen you both together, but I can tell there is some epic-love-story-shit going on between you two and I’m not going to stand by and watch you sacrifice that to save your mom’s sanity. As noble as it is, it isn’t your job. Your mom is surrounded by people who care about her; people who should’ve helped her deal with her issues without you having to break up with the sex god.”
Good answer.
So at three in the morning, we walk silently – and invisibly, thanks to Dee’s power – down to her car. Thankfully, it’s not parked so close to the sorority house that the sound of her engine disturbs anyone.
It’s a long drive North on the I-91, but the adrenaline coursing through my systems keeps me from falling asleep. My stomach churns and I’m too wired and jittery to sing along to the radio like we normally do.
I find myself checking the wing mirrors and looking over my shoulder to see if we’re being followed, a sick knot in my stomach warning me that this may not go the way I want.
“Relax, we made a clean getaway,” Dee reassures.
Hours later we arrive and I direct Dee to a parking lot as close to Jackson’s frat house as possible – I’m hoping he hasn’t moved out since I was last here.
As we walk around a corner and in the direction of Jackson’s house, I see him running up the street towards us wearing black, basketball shorts and a white, sweat-soaked t-shirt that leaves little to the imagination.
I didn’t have him down as a runner, but that just highlights the gulf between what he knows about me and what I actually know about him.
What I do know is how I feel around him and right now I wish Dee had stayed in the car. Sweaty men don’t normally do it for me, but Jackson seems determined to be the exception to every rule I have because I want to lick him all over.
“If that’s what the students here look like then I went to the wrong school,” Dee says, blatantly perving.
I push down the angry flash of jealousy and take a moment to remind myself that she’s never met Jackson, so she has no idea who this insanely sexy male specimen is.
“That’s Jackson,” My voice comes out lighter and more distracted than I intended; the man really does disorientate the higher functions of my brain.
He looks up at the sound of my voice.
“Wow,” Dee’s eyes widen comically as she digests the full-frontal assault of Jackson Smoak’s wickedly beautiful face.
“Emilia?” His step falters before he sprints the remaining distance between us at full speed. He barely slows as he reaches me and hauls me into his embrace.
His sensual lips find mine and I don’t care about my crazy parents, my audience of one or how sweaty he is; all I care about is this kiss and how I can’t bear the idea that I won’t be able to kiss him like this for years.
It hurts to even contemplate it.
There has to be another way.
Dee coughs behind us.
“New bodyguard?” he asks, reluctantly ending the kiss.
“She’d be a definite improvement on the last. This is Dee, my best friend and my ride,” I smile. “Dee this is Jackson.”
He pulls away from me just enough to shake her hand but keeps one arm firmly wrapped around my lower back.
“Not that I don’t love the surprise, or that you’ve come all this way to see me, but you didn’t call or message me yesterday and now you turn up first thing? I realize I sound like a needy teenager, but you got me a little worried; is something wrong?”
“Yesterday did not go well and that’s putting it mildly. They don’t want me anywhere near you until I’m fully immortal – they’re terrified I’ll die again.”
“I get that, but it’s not like they had to watch it the first time,” his tone is grim.
“They want me in the Corps, which is the easier of yesterday’s consequences to deal with as I was already contemplating joining,” I say, lighter than I feel.
“That puts you on the West Coast. I thought you’d be going straight into business with your dad?” I can hear an edge of panic in his otherwise perfect voice.
“I’m guessing that means you’re tied to business on the East Coast for a while?”
I look at Dee, not able to hide my disappointment; I’d obviously become attached to her idea that maybe he’d join us in San Francisco.
“For the most part, FireStorm runs itself with the team of executives I have in place, but I am CEO and that doesn’t stop even when I’m studying. There are certain things that only I can do and I need to invest some time in being physically present.