“No way.” Shawn was as surprised as I was when my name came out of her mouth. He was the kind of guy who had game.
“Hot.” Link just stared, with his mouth open. “TDB hot.” Third Degree Burns. The highest compliment Link could pay a girl, even higher than Savannah Snow hot.
“Looks like trouble.”
“Hot
girls are trouble. That’s the whole point.”
She walked right up to me, sucking on her lollipop. “Which one of you lucky boys is Ethan Wate?” Link shoved me forward.
“Ethan!” She flung her arms around my neck. Her hands felt surprisingly cold, like she’d been holding a bag of ice. I shivered and backed away.
“Do I know you?”
“Not a bit. I’m Ridley, Lena’s cousin. But don’t I wish you’d met me first—”
At the mention of Lena, the guys shot me some weird looks, and reluctantly drifted off toward their cars. In the wake of my talk with Earl, we had come to a mutual understanding about Lena, the only kind guys ever come to. Meaning, I hadn’t brought it up, and they hadn’t brought it up, and between us, we somehow all agreed to go on like this indefinitely. Don’t ask, don’t tell. Which wasn’t going to be much longer, especially if Lena’s odd relatives started showing up in town.
“Cousin?”
Had Lena mentioned a Ridley?
“For the holidays? Aunt Del? Rhymes with hell? Ring a bell?” She was right; Macon had brought it up at dinner.
I grinned, relieved, except my stomach was still wrenched into a massive knot, so I must not have been that relieved. “Right. Sorry, I forgot. The cousins.”
“Honey, you’re lookin’ at the Cousin. The rest are just children my mother happened to have after me.” Ridley hopped back in the Mini Cooper. And when I say that, I mean, she literally hopped over the side of the car and landed in the driver seat of the Mini. I wasn’t joking about the cheerleader thing. The girl had some powerful legs.
I could see Link still staring as he stood next to the Beater.
Ridley patted the seat next to her. “Hop in, Boyfriend, we’re gonna be late.”
“I’m not… I mean, we’re not—”
“You really are cute. Now get in. You don’t want us to be late, do you?”
“Late for what?”
“Family dinner. The High Holidays. The Gathering. Why do you think they sent me all the way out here into Gat-dung to find you?”
“I don’t know. Lena never invited me.”
“Well, let’s just say there’s no keeping Aunt Del from checking out the first guy Lena’s ever brought home. So you’ve been summoned, and since Lena’s busy with dinner and Macon’s still, you know, ‘sleeping,’ I drew the short straw.”
“She didn’t bring me home. I just went by one night to drop off her homework.”
Ridley opened the car door from the inside. “Get in, Short Straw.”
“Lena would’ve called me if she wanted me to come.” Somehow I knew I was going to get in even as I was saying it. I hesitated.
“Are you always like this? Or are you flirting with me? Because if you’re playing hard to get, just tell me now and we’ll go park at the swamp and get it on already.”
I got in the car. “Fine. Let’s go.”
She reached over and pushed the hair out of my eyes with her cold hand. “You’ve got nice eyes, Boyfriend. You shouldn’t keep them all covered up.”
By the time we got to Ravenwood, I didn’t know what had happened. She kept playing music I’d never heard, and I started to talk, and I just kept talking, until I had told her things I had never told anyone, except Lena. I can’t really explain it. It was like I had lost control of my mouth.