Joyride (19 page)

I should have attacked him like a rabid dog, on principle. I shouldn't have been afraid, I should have been ferocious. But then again, wouldn't that have proven that his opinion of me is true? That I'm a wild animal, incapable of complex human feelings and thoughts and emotions? He would have pointed that out to Arden right away, I know it. No, attacking him is not the way. Losing my temper is not the way. Losing Arden is not the way.

But neither is losing who I am. I'm going to figure this out, I will. The sheriff won't catch me helpless again.

And I can't imagine there won't be an “again,” because Arden and I just kissed. So maybe that's what I'm asking. If Arden and I are going to be a thing, I'm going to have to learn to deal with his dad a little better than pulling a knife on him every time he opens his mouth.

But that kiss. I can't forget that kiss. My lips still swelter from that kiss. They're still swollen with eagerness to do it again. And I'm pretty sure that makes me a bad person. Because I'm full of all this rage about what the sheriff did—what he said—and yet I'm thinking about Arden kissing me.

I'm a straight-up psycho.

Arden leans back against the door, giving me a long hard look. His eyes focus on me as if he were seeing me for the first time. “Not because I kissed you? I'm not sure what you're asking.”

I throw my hands up in the air, mainly because I still don't know what I'm asking. “Did you
mean
to kiss me, Arden? Or are you apologizing for that too?” My instincts tell me to open the door and run before I embarrass myself further.

His mouth falls open, and he gives a dazed look. “You're serious?”

I nod, aware that I'm holding my breath.

He closes his eyes and exhales. “Oh, I definitely meant to. I'll never be sorry for kissing you.” And just like that, he's on my side of the truck, pulling me into the crook of his arm. He rests his chin on the top of my head. “I'm just sorry it happened like that. That it will always be tainted with my dad going ape shit right afterward.”

“And the part about being your girlfriend?”

“I was getting around to asking.”

“Liar.”

He laughs into my hair. “Haven't you figured out that I'm afraid of you? I've been alluding to this for days now. You either suck at taking hints or you've been avoiding it. And I need to know which one.”

“I thought you just wanted it for show. Not, you know, for real.” Which is the truth. I thought he just wanted to give in to the rumors and let everyone think that they were right about us so we had a valid reason to hang out with each other. Now that they were actually
right
about us … How do I feel about it?

“Well, it is partly for show. To show everyone that you're not freaking available.” He pulls away completely then. “Wait a minute. Is this your way of rejecting me? You're not going to be my girlfriend?”

My hand has a mind of its own as it pulls his face closer to mine. I indulge myself by taking in a deep breath of his masculine scent. “I am so your girlfriend.” And then I kiss him. Arden Moss. But he's no longer
the
Arden Moss. He's
my
Arden Moss.

His response is hungry but not feral. He doesn't do anything I'd imagined Previous Arden would do to his oh-so-willing victims. He doesn't try to cop a feel. He doesn't put his hands up my shirt or down my jeans. He just holds me. Holds me, and kisses me like I'm the thing he's been craving since life began.

*   *   *

School becomes exciting in a weird sort of way. We thought by acting like a couple, everyone would just stop staring. But they don't. We turn heads, Arden and I, as we make our way from class to class holding hands. Arden makes it a point to kiss me as he drops me off at calculus—a class we don't have together. I make it a point to stand on my tiptoes and accept his lips. Screw the Public Eye. What harm am I doing? If anything, I'm acting more normal than I was when it looked like I was rejecting my Arden Moss.

He walks me to all my classes. We enjoy scandalizing our classmates as much as we enjoy the kissing. After the day is done, we go to the media center to drop off my borrowed laptop. It feels good to hand it over to Mrs. Goodwin and say, “I'm turning this in. I don't need it anymore.” I've decided to tell Julio that the school upgraded—that way he won't question where the new one came from.

Mrs. Goodwin is shocked. Maybe she's shocked that I'm turning it in. Maybe she's shocked that Arden Moss is holding my backpack open in order to do so. Maybe she's shocked that I'm wearing a laced-up bodice shirt and wedges instead of a T-shirt and tennis shoes.

Maybe she should get over it.

“Uh, thank you, Carly,” she says.

“I have a new laptop,” I can't help but tell her.

Arden grins at me. I grin back. Life is good.

*   *   *

“So, the point of mudding is to get your truck stuck?”

Arden rejects my proposal with a scoff. He changes gears and mashes the gas again. The tires spin and spin but we don't move forward. Mud shoots everywhere. The woods around us are no longer visible through the red clay caked onto all the windows and windshield. “We're not stuck. And point? There's no
point
to mudding. It's just fun.”

But by the tone of his voice, it doesn't sound like he's having fun. It sounds like he might be a bit frustrated. Which is why I shouldn't say, “It's like the road took a crap on us.” But I do.

He flashes me a disgruntled look. “A little dirt never hurt anyone. Matter of fact, I'm pretty sure dried mud is what keeps this truck in one piece.”

Switching us into reverse, he braces his arm on the back of my seat and turns around, I guess to get a better view of us not going anywhere. “How often do you get stuck?”

“We're not stuck. This is just a puddle for ol' Betty.”

“My. God. You named your truck?”

Again with the gear changing. I love the natural bulge of his biceps when he's grasping the steering wheel. But not as much as I love the natural bulge of his biceps when they're wrapped around me.

“She's not just a truck.”

“Oh, but she is.”

“And we're not stuck.”

“But say we are. Then what—”

“We absolutely, positively are not stuck, are we, Betty?” He pets the dashboard before revving the gas again but to no avail. Then his butt rings. He pulls himself up enough to dig in his back pocket for his phone. “Yeah, man?” he answers.

A male voice greets him on the other end, but I can't tell who it is or what he's saying. “We're on our way,” Arden says. “About fifteen minutes out.” Then, “We hit a hole right past the old creek sign … Yeah … No, we're not stuck … Everyone's there already?” He scowls at me. “Well, maybe you'd better come get us then.”

I waste no time in confronting him when he hangs up. “Someone's coming to get us? So we're definitely, absolutely stuck.”

He rolls his eyes. “The word ‘stuck' implies that our situation is permanent. That's not the case. Betty would have gotten us out of it eventually, but since we're the only ones not at the party, I thought you'd want me to get us there quicker.”

Oh, right. I'd want to get to a party full of his obnoxious friends quicker. I'm not even sure why I'm coming—except that he's been doing his part of the bargain. He's actually been studying and doing his homework every day. In exchange, I'm trying to make an effort to get to know his friends. I mean, we sit with them at lunch sometimes. That's enough for me, frankly. But a tailgate party in the middle of the muddy woods with a bunch of rich kids? No thanks. Still, Arden thought it was a good idea to let our friends—his friends, since I don't have any—“acclimate” to our new relationship.

I can't tell if this is a test for me or a test for them. Maybe both. Or maybe Arden is testing out whether or not
he
can adjust to having a girlfriend. Either way, I'm stuck going. He actually got an A on his last social studies test—I owe him this much.

“That's very considerate of you.”

He smirks at me. “Do I get a reward for being considerate?”

I inch across the bench seat, until there's no space left between his lips and mine. He pulls me into his lap to get a better hold on me. That's how his friend Braden finds us a few minutes later—or how he would have found us if not for the dirty windows. Maybe mudding has its benefits after all.

Arden waits for me to move back to my seat before opening the driver's side door and greeting his friend. I think Braden is on the football team—he's certainly big enough to be—but I'm not sure. Braden stands at the edge of the “puddle” we're not stuck in. He's got a big chain in his hand, which ends in a big hook.

Arden balances himself between the door and the truck and pulls himself up onto the roof. Getting dirty is inevitable at this point, but I guess it's better than actually walking around in what looks like several feet deep of red clay. When he maneuvers onto the hood of Betty, Braden carefully tosses him the chain, which Arden catches with the grace of an old pro. Arden crawls to the front and leans forward with the chain. After a few grunts and shifts, he's crawling back into the truck cabin.

“Braden's going to pull us out,” he says cheerfully.

I wipe some of the orange mud off his arm, then rub my hand on the seat between us. “Braden is nice?” I say without looking at him. He must be somewhat civilized if he's willing to leave a party to come tow his friend out of a mudhole.

Arden puts his hand over mine. “They're all nice, Carly. Once you get to know them.”

When we finally get to the party—which turns out to be a clearing in the woods with a bunch of trucks backed up to what looks like an actual pond of mud—I'm mortified to find that I should have worn a bathing suit. All the girls, every single one, are wearing bikinis. Small bikinis. Microscopic bikinis.

“You didn't say anything about swimming,” I accuse Arden.

“There's nowhere to swim here.”

“Please tell me they're not mud-wrestling. I swear I'll bludgeon you, right here and now.”

He presses his lips together. “August ended like, yesterday, Carly. It's still hot out. They like to wear their bathing suits. It's not a big deal.”

But it is a big deal. I'm in a T-shirt and shorts. I'm already different from them in so many ways. Couldn't he have just prepared me for this one thing? “I could have worn my swimsuit.”

“I've seen you in your swimsuit, Carly. And there's no way you're wearing it around this bunch of perverts.”

I grin. Also, I blush. “You did it on
purpose
? To, like, protect my honor or something?”

“I'm protecting their noses from my fist.” He sounds gruff and agitated, and it's adorable.

“I've never seen a jealous Arden Moss.”

“Take a good look,” he says, giving in to the slightest of smiles. He lifts me out of the truck then, pressing me into him before letting my feet touch the ground, so that I slide down the length of him.

It's definitely hot out.

“Hey, Arden,” a girl calls out. “It's about time you showed up. Where have you been lately?”

He nods to the voice behind me. “Hey, Jen,” he says with too much familiarity. Or is it just me being jealous now? “I've been around.”

Does he have a past with this Jen? Does he have a past with every girl here? How am I supposed to
not
think about that now? I know his reputation. I know the rumors. But I haven't directly asked him about any of it. Clearly I was in denial. Because now I want to know all of the things.

“Let's go to Chris's truck and get some food. He usually brings a grill, and I'm starving,” Arden says, taking my hand and hauling me behind him. “You like hot dogs and chips and other gourmet items, right?”

“I eat school lunches,” I tell him. “I got this.”

We find an empty tailgate and manage to hoist ourselves up on it without spilling the contents of our Styrofoam plates. Everyone who walks by greets Arden—a few people even know my name, at which I'm impressed.

“The new will wear off soon,” Arden says quietly. “Just give them some time.”

“How many of these girls have you been with?” Yep, I just said that out loud.

He pauses before taking a bite of his second hot dog. He gives me a quizzical look. “Not everything you hear about me is true.”

I nod. “How many?”

“Not as many as you think.”

We're quiet for a while, and I try to decipher his answer into actual numbers. I watch the girls in the bikinis watch Arden, and the general consensus seems to be
Why is he here with her?
That, or I'm letting my imagination run rampant and free.

Either way, I'm in a pretty terrible mood by the time we're done eating.

“You want to go watch the trucks climb out of the pit?” He motions toward a hill ahead of us, behind which all sorts of trucks come and go. We'll have to walk halfway around the “pond” to get there.

“Sure.”

He hops off the back of the truck, and his hands are at my waist, ready to lift me down, when Braden walks up, a pretty blond girl wrapped around him piggyback style. He sets her on the ground. “Hi,” she says to me. “Carly, right? I'm Eve.” She holds out her hand and we have an awkward shake.

Eve looks at Arden. “We should all get together sometime. How about a movie on Friday?”

He looks at me. I can't tell what it is he wants me to say. His expression is expectant though, so he definitely thinks I should say something. “I actually have to work Friday,” I tell her.

“Oh,” she says. “Well, how about we go to the beach Saturday?”

“I work Saturday too.” I try to sound apologetic. I don't think Eve has to work to get the money for her highlights or her perfect French manicure.