“You know, you did the right thing tonight.”
I turn to look at him, but I can’t make out much about his eyes. “Running from the police and climbing on your back like a monkey? As embarrassing as it was, I agree.”
“No,” he says, voice gruff. “With George. Shoving him aside. A guy like that doesn’t deserve your first kiss.”
“Oh.” My cheeks instantly flame. “Yeah, well, if it takes me another seventeen years to get that kiss, I’ll probably regret it.”
“It won’t.” He looks away, and for a second, I think that’s it. I wait, but when he remains silent, I turn to leave again. His voice stops me. “I don’t know where you got it in your head that you’re not…” He pauses, and when I turn back to him, his expression has hardened. “That you’re not, like… desirable or whatever, but it’s not true.”
I stare back at him, too stunned to form words.
Did Reyn just say I’m desirable?
“I know it’s my fault,” he continues, voice rough with an emotion that hurts to hear. “That your life got so fucked-up, and that you think you’re broken. That your parents watch you like a hawk, and Emory thinks he’s gotta carry the key to your chastity belt. But they almost lost you. It scared the hell out of them.” He rubs a palm over his forehead and it tips his hat up enough that when his hand drops, I can see the way he’s looking at me. It feels like a fist is tightening around my heart. “It scared the hell out of me, too.”
It’s a loaded confession, and I’m no more prepared to hear it than I am to see that pained, haunted look in his eyes.
I wring my hands together. “Reyn—”
“So, I know, okay? I know you missed out on a lot of firsts because of what I did, and,” he exhales like he’s trying to fold in on himself, “that you might feel…pressure. To just take something because it’s there, for the sake of having done it. But you shouldn’t do that, V.” He pins me under his stare. “You shouldn’t just settle for anything.”
I choose my words carefully when I start, “The way my family is has nothing to do with you.” He scoffs, looking away, and I can’t stand it—the way his features go so stony and dark, hidden from me again. “It doesn’t, Reyn. They were always going to be like that. I mean, do you even remember what it was like for me in middle school? I couldn’t even go to that stupid Valentine’s dance.” I roll my eyes, remembering the epic fight that had spanned an entire week. “The accident gave them a reason, but let’s be real here. There was always going to be a reason, however big or small. This one just happened to be big. But the first time I came home crying about a boy, they would have thrown away the key.”
His mouth curves into a sharp smile, and I can’t help but mirror it.
I add, “Honestly, it’s my fault more than yours. I never pushed it.” I shrug, shifting my feet around in the leaves. “I never had that moment, you know? Where I just…showed them I was my own person. I spent so long—” High. “—not caring, that it’s never seemed worth putting them through more worry. In a way, I guess I coddle them as badly as they coddle me.”
And yeah, this isn’t the most comfortable realization to have.
“You Halls sure do have a way with that.” Reyn stares toward our houses, standing bright behind me. His jaw goes tight. “It could be worse.”
I nod. “I know.”
He nods back. “Just…things might get intense, with all these Devil rituals, so I need you to know that you can count on me if you need someone to help you get through them. You shouldn’t feel just stuck with someone.”
“Because you owe me,” I reply slowly.
“Right.”
“So…” My mind runs a million miles a minute, and I’m only half-joking when I say, “If I wanted to have my first kiss—just to get it over with—you’re offering to take one for the team?”
His chin pulls up and he’s looking at me blankly. I’m filled with a sharp panic that the half-joke came out far too earnest, and maybe the thought hadn’t even crossed his mind. I basically want to crawl into a hole, right here. The forest will be a good home. It’s quiet out here. Forward my mail, Mom, because I can never show my face again. My cheeks burst into a crazy heat, but before I can backtrack and explain that I was just being funny, ha ha, he shrugs.
“If you mean the team of ready and willing teenage boys, then sure.”
My low laugh has an edge of hysteria to it, because he’s agreeing. Agreeing. It’s insane. Maybe he doesn’t realize how wrong he is. There is not a team of teenage boys lined up to do anything with me. Regardless, this whole idea is wrong on more levels than that. He’s Emory’s best friend, which makes him unilaterally off limits. He’s a senior, and gorgeous, and popular, which makes him completely out of my league. And he’s… well, he’s the boy I shouldn’t even be out in the woods with, or talking to, let alone kissing, because we could both get in huge trouble.
But foremost, he’s Reynolds McAllister, and it strikes me uncomfortably why my mind had leapt there. It has very little to do with him being gorgeous and smelling amazing. It was all that stuff he said about not settling. It just makes a perfect kind of sense. He was the first boy I ever fell for. If I had a choice for my first kiss, it’d be him.
It’d have to be him.
“Okay,” I say, trying to sound more casual than I am, because my insides have just imploded. I feel a little faint. “Ready?”
“What?” His head snaps back. “You mean now?” his voice rises, eyes roving around the forest like my brother or Jerry or someone is about to jump out.
Once the words left my mouth, I couldn’t take them back. I try to sound cool. Aloof. This kind of thing happens to me every day. Talking gorgeous seniors into kissing me is boring stuff. “Why not? I just went to my first party, drank nasty punch, committed a party foul, and escaped from the police. What better night to get my first kiss?”
He reaches back to rub at his neck, and I remember vividly the way it felt against my cheek. “Point taken.”