Fearless (The Story of Samantha Smith #1) (8 page)

I’d never been on a motorcycle before. Let alone gone more than maybe eighty-five in my parents’ Honda. 175 mph? Jesus. “Um, I don’t know. It sounds dangerous.”

“It is.” His grin shone confidently.

In-SANE!
I smelled death wish. So why did the idea turn me on? Maybe I was the insane one.

“Anytime you wanna go, you let me know.” He smiled confidently, like he went 175 mph every day.
 

“I’ll think on it. Right now I need, like, a million paper towels for the epic coffee tragedy in my car. Who’s going to give us that many?”

“We’ll find some. Come on.”

We walked to the dorm building adjacent to the parking lot. When we approached the main doors, he stopped.

“What are we waiting for?”

“You need a key card to get into the building.”

“Then how are we going to get inside?”

The doors opened and two guys with skateboards walked out. Adonis grabbed the door before it shut. “This way.”

“Isn’t this breaking and entering?”

“I didn’t break anything, did I?”

“So we’re entering?”

“Yup.”

We walked inside together. He surveyed the entry hall. It split off in two directions. We turned left. A barefoot girl wearing an SDU t-shirt, holding a bowl of Cheerios and milk in one hand and her textbooks in the other, struggled to open a door to one of the suite of rooms. She fumbled to get out her key card. She was about to set down her books when Adonis intervened.

“Let me help you with that.” He took hold of her books.

“Thanks.” She smiled. When she got a good look at him, she raked her eyes up and down his body. “Thank you very much.” She blushed.

“My pleasure.” Adonis cocked an eyebrow.

She dug out her keycard and waved it in front of the lock. The mechanism clicked.
 

“I’ll get that.” Adonis opened the door for her and held it. “Never can be too careful, what with all the psychos around.” He flashed his award-winning grin.

“No, you can’t,” she smiled bashfully.

Put your underwear back on, Cheerios! You’re getting milk on the floor!

Cheerios walked through the door and Adonis followed. He handed her books back to her then looked at me and cocked his head. “Come on.”

I grabbed the door before it closed.

He walked right into the suite’s bathroom. A girl in a bathrobe had just stepped out of the shower. She jumped when she saw Adonis. “Who are you?!”

“Don’t worry about us,” he said confidently.
 

“You guys can’t be in here!”

“Just need to borrow some paper towels. Ours ran out. Had a little mess. Be gone in a sec.”
 

Shower Girl’s eyes pivoted from side to side like a caged rat.

Adonis spun the dispenser’s handle, causing his forearm muscles to dance hypnotically. The spell broke when I saw he had wound out at least twenty feet of paper towels. He smiled at me. “You think this’ll be enough?”

“Uh, yeah.”

He wadded them up, and tore off a small chunk, which he ran under the faucet.

“What are you doing?” Shower girl asked.

“Gonna clean up a mess. Wet towels work better.” He balled up the wet towels. I could tell he was trying to keep as much water in them as possible. They dripped all over the floor. He thanked Shower Girl on our way out. She was horribly confused the entire time.
 

I was halfway to crazy myself.
 

“Better move before someone calls campus security,” he joked. He didn’t seem to be taking this very seriously.

“That’s not funny. Someone might.”

“For what? Entering and Borrowing?”

“Are you going to return the paper towels when you’re through with them?”

“I could. It would be messy, but if you think it’s the right thing to do.” He winked at me.

I smacked his arm. “You’re crazy.”

“To a degree.”

At my car, Adonis blotted up the remaining coffee with some of the dry towels, then went over everything with the damp towels. I watched. His back muscles did amazing things while he wiped.
 

“Let me help you with that,” I suggested.

“Relax. There’s not much to do. I’ll be done in a minute.” He dried up with the remaining towels. Why was a sexy men cleaning twice as sexy? I had no answer, but new it as fact.

He picked up the soaked napkins he’d thrown on the asphalt earlier and added them to the dirty wad he held in his hand. “Well, it’s not perfect. But it’ll do until you have a chance to hit up a car wash.”

“Thanks, Adonis. That was really sweet of you. You’re quite the Boy Scout.”

“Just trying to earn my carwash merit badge. I need to throw all this away.” He held up the sopping wad. He started back toward the dorms.

“I’ll come with you.”

“You sure? We might get arrested for Clean and Run.”

“Okay, that’s stupid.”
 

“Assault with a cleaning weapon?”

I shook my head.

“Mess-slaughter?”

I giggled. “Nope.”

“No? Well, what have you got, Shakespeare?”

“First Degree Maider?”

He groaned.
 

I smiled. “You’re dripping.”
 

We looked behind us. We had dripped all the way from the car.

“Well, it’s almost as good as a trail of bread crumbs. We can follow it back to the wicked witch’s VW. It’s not gingerbread, but it smells like coffee.”
 

I gave him another smack for that. I was no wicked witch.

We found a trashcan and he stuffed everything inside.

Why was I thinking in terms of “we” all of a sudden? And why was I letting a guy who I’d just met, then stared at naked a few hours ago, clean my car?

Because I was certifiable. That’s why.

Or maybe because my first impression of Adonis had been wrong. Maybe he wasn’t really a self-centered bad boy. He’d saved my ass this morning when he punched that fat guy. Now he was cleaning my car for me? That was hardly selfish. I’d been ready to write him off, but maybe he deserved a second chance. Otherwise, I’d feel like a judgmental bitch.

We arrived at my car.

“Thanks again, Adonis.” I shifted from foot to foot nervously. I needed to go, but I didn’t want to.
 

He was staring at me with his amazing eyes.
 

I stomped my foot and stifled a giggle. “What?!” I didn’t want to sound like a giddy teenager, but I did.
 

“Just looking.”

“At what?”

“A work of art.”

“Shut up! That’s
so
stupid.” I reached around and twirled my finger through my pony tail.
 

Then I realized I was being played. He’d probably said the same thing to Skylar and a hundred other women this week alone. It was a variation on the some crap I’d heard a thousand times in the past from similar men.

Guys like Adonis were a dime a dozen. No, make that a penny a dozen. Scratch that. You couldn’t pay me to take anymore of this sort of verbal fertilizer. I’d had my fill a long time ago. “Thanks again for all your help, Adonis. But I’ve got a buttload of homework, and I need to run some errands on my way home. So I’ve really got to go.”

In the corner of my eye, I noticed a police car turn into the parking lot. It drove toward us.
 

“When can I see you again?” Adonis was determined, I’d give him that.

“I’m not really—” The police car pulled to a stop right beside us, blocking my car and Adonis’ motorcycle. Two officers got out of the car. Was this campus security?

“Good afternoon,” the office with a mustache said. “Can I talk to you two for a second?”

Adonis didn’t respond. I saw his jaw muscles dance.

“Sure,” I said, eyeing the other officer, who was female. “Is something wrong?”

“We received a complaint about a tattooed man and young woman trespassing in one of the dormitories,” the female officer said. “Do you two know anything about that?”

Caught. This was ridiculous. We took some paper towels. So what? I glanced at Adonis. He didn’t appear ready to talk.

“Are you both students here?” Mustache Cop asked.

“Yeah.” Well, I was. I’d
assumed
Adonis was too. But maybe he wasn’t. He hadn’t been carrying any books or a laptop, or even a regular old notebook. Maybe he wasn’t a student. And in that case, what was he doing on a college campus? And how old was he, anyway? Was he even in college? I took a deep breath. I was getting ahead of myself. He obviously was the art model this morning. So even if he wasn’t a student, he was supposed to be here.
 

“Can I see your I.D. and your Student I.D.?” mustache cop asked.

Adonis pulled out his wallet while I dug through my purse. It was going to take awhile to find anything in my bag. I swear it was bigger on the inside than it was on the outside. I found an old tube of black lipstick I thought I’d thrown out.

Emo. Goth. Witch.

I would’ve tossed it into the bushes but I didn’t want to get fined for littering. Adonis handed two I.D.s to Mustache cop. I recognized one was a student I.D. So Adonis
was
a student. Or had been at some point.

Mustache cop sat down in the police car and started typing into the car’s computer. I kept digging for my I.D.s. I glanced at Adonis.
 

His hands rested casually on his narrow hips, and was drumming his fingers on his jeans. He stared at the ground, ignoring me.
 

The female cop narrowed her eyes at Adonis and put the heel of her hand on the butt of her gun. Was I missing something?
 

Mustache cop fingered the radio on his shoulder and mumbled something into it.

After what seemed like forever, I found my wallet and both my I.D.s. I offered them to the female cop. “Here you go,” I said with as much lightness and merriment as I could muster.
 

She looked at them. Looked at me. Looked at the I.D.s again. Flipped them over. Looked at me, then glanced at her partner, who nodded at her.

A second later, another cop car pulled into the parking lot, lights flashing, but no sirens. Mustache got out of the cop car and walked around Adonis until he was behind him. “Sir, please step up to the vehicle and put your hands on the hood.”

What was happening?

The other cruiser stopped behind the first one and two more officers got out.

“Sir?” Mustache asked again.

Adonis’ face screwed up tight while he ground his jaw. His full lips compressed into a thin white line and his eyes swiveled menacingly. He looked ready to spring.

What was he going to do?

The female cop stepped toward Adonis. “Sir, up against the vehicle and place your hands on the hood.”

Finally, Adonis moved. He walked up to the cop car and leaned his hands on the hood. Mustache stood behind him and pushed Adonis’ legs apart by bumping them with his knees. He patted Adonis down thoroughly. “Place your hands behind your back, sir. You’re under arrest.”

I panicked. “Wait! What’re you doing?”
 

“Please step back, ma’am,” the female cop commanded, her palm held up like a stop sign.

Adonis did as ordered. Mustache pulled out a pair of handcuffs and slapped them on.

“Is this because of the paper towels?”

“Paper towels?” The female cop was confused.

Mustache opened the back door of the cruiser. “Please step into the vehicle, sir.” Adonis complied.

“We took some paper towels. From one of the dorms.”

Now the female cop eyed
me
suspiciously.

I was making this worse. I took a deep breath and blinked back sudden tears. “I spilled my coffee all over my car this morning. I didn’t have anything to clean it with. We were just trying to clean up the mess. We went into one of the dorms to find some paper towels. We, uh, borrowed a bunch from one of the suites. If that girl hadn’t—” I stopped myself before I said too much.

The female cop frowned. “What girl?”
 

Shit. Damage control. “The one who’s bathroom we took the paper towels from. To clean up my car. I guess she was mad we were taking so many paper towels. But it was a big cup of coffee.” I hoped that made it sound more innocent.

She nodded, satisfied. But Adonis was still in the back seat. I tried to catch his eye. He didn’t notice. Like he’d forgotten I was there. “So, um, why are you taking him in again?”

“There’s a warrant out for his arrest, ma’am.”

Shell shock. “What?! A warrant? For paper towels?”

“For assault, ma’am.”

“He didn’t hit anybody!“ My mouth Oed then clamped shut. This morning. Red Faced fat guy and the Mercedes. But it couldn’t be. That guy swung first, hadn’t he? I wasn’t entirely sure anymore. But Adonis was protecting me. Isn’t that like self defense? Shit, this was my fault.
 

Mustache Cop was already in the car, and the female officer was climbing into the driver’s seat. Before she closed the door I blurted, “Wait! Where are you taking him?”

“Downtown. To book him.”

“No! You can’t!”

“Please, ma’am,” she said. “You should go home. You don’t want to waste your time on a guy like this.”

What a bitch! I can’t believe she said that! Adonis cleaned my car!

Adonis brooded in the back seat, leaning forward because of the handcuffs. His head hung between his shoulders. As the police cruiser drove off, he drilled me with his jeweled eyes for a brief second before his thick lashes slid closed. He looked…pained.

A wave of nausea bloomed in my stomach, overshadowing my sadness. It was obvious that Adonis was trouble with a capital T.
 

The cops showing up had scared the shit out of me. Maybe I was better off with Adonis gone. There was a good chance that after his arrest, I’d never see him again.
 

Why did that suddenly make me feel so damn sad?

I’d known the guy for less than twelve hours. That wasn’t enough time to get to know anyone.

The only thing I knew for sure was that I missed him already.

I stopped at the grocery store on the way home. When I caught my reflection in the rearview mirror, I noticed my mascara had run. When had I been crying? I hadn’t noticed I was.