“Well, youdokind of look like you’re a member of a secret service detail, assigned to protect Belle. The only things missing are the black suit and an earpiece. And maybe a sidearm under your jacket.”
“Hah,” Jules said. “That’ll be the day.”
“Ah could teach yew to shoot if yew want me to, City Boy,” Hobbit said in an exaggerated southern drawl. But then he quickly backpedaled. “I mean, at targets, in a firing range, with adult supervision. That wasn’t meant to be a... a... sexual inuendo.”
“I knew what you meant,” Jules said, “but thanks so much for making it impossible to ignore the double entendre. Damn, child.”
Hobbit blushed furiously. “Oh, my God, I’m so sorry, Grampa. I just... I didn’t want you to think that I’d intentionally...” He exhaled hard and started over. “I’m stupid, not creepy. Iknowyou don’t need lessons?—”
“Kevin. Breathe. It’s okay.”
The kid had really shined himself up for this party. He was wearing freshly-washed jeans and a button-down shirt, sleeves rolled to his elbows, in a pretty green color that accentuated the hazel of his eyes. His hair was artfully gelled—clearly Shelly and Sadie’s handiwork. He looked freaking adorable.
Jules, however, was wearing the same clothes he’d had on earlier in the day—his slightly ragged Mighty Mouse sweatshirt and jeans that were a day if not mere hours from the laundry hamper. When he’d picked up Hobbit he’d instantly recognized his mistake. If this really was a date, he would’ve—should’ve—gone to at least alittleeffort.
“Shit,” he’d said as Hobbit got in the car. “I should’ve changed.”
“Actually.” Hobbit graciously gave him an out. “This will read right. Your costume is perfect.” He chef-kissed his fingers for emphasis. “You’re you and a senior, and well, I’m me and I’m... me. It makes sense that my character would, you know. Try harder.”
“I guess,” Jules said. “But still...”
“It’s really okay,” Hobbit said. “This is just make-believe.”
They’d purposely arrived at Carter’s before Belle, in order to make a careful circuit of both the grounds and the house itself.
There was a bathroom not far from the kitchen door which was good, in case Belle needed to use the facilities—which she surely would since she’d be drinking beer. They’d already set up a signal. If she started to loudly singWhat I Did For Love, that meant she needed to pee. At the very firstKiss today goodbye,Jules would go into the kitchen—ahead of her, so it wouldn’t look like he was following her—leaving Hobbit to continue to watch the backyard. Jules would hang inside until she was ready to go back out.
If she started to sing anything else, that was the signal that she was feeling a little wonky or odd—or that she simply wanted to end this charade. Jules had been adamant about that, and Tom was in full agreement. If Belle got spooked, foranyreason, she should trust her instincts, and they would all leave.
If she impulsively started to dance, however, she’d been careful to point out, she was just being herself.
As Jules and Hobbit had done their circuit, they’d also gotten a good look at who was at this party, so far at least, since it was still pretty early. But the early-bird crowd pretty much included everyone on the previous party-goers list from the evidence board, and then some. Because God forbid you arrive late, after the keg was empty.
Rodney Burke and his soccer boys were parked on the big sectional sofa in Carter’s family room, and the way Rod had looked up at them as they passed through had made Jules extremely aware that Hobbit washisperennial target. Thewhole leaving-Hobbit-alone-out-in-the-yard thing suddenly seemed fraught with peril.
Jules found himself wishing he’d been able to talk the others into asking Joey and Topher for help.
But Belle had been adamant. For all they knew, Joey or Topher or JoeyandTopher were their perps. Jules was dead certain they weren’t, but shewasright that both had appeared on the frequent party-goers list—along with most of the rest of the upperclassmen of the school, to be fair. Still. They fit their profile for Suspect X. Strong enough to carry an unconscious girl into the woods, check. Access to a motor vehicle, check. Possessing a penis, check.
Until Jules spent a little time making sure they had alibis—the crime drama lingo had been flying fast and furious at this point in the pre-party conversation at the summer house—he’d had to agree it probablywasbetter to hold their cards tightly to their chests.
So yeah. After unintentionally making sure Rod and his idiots saw that they were in attendance, Jules and Hobbit moseyed on outside, stopping in the kitchen to grab a couple of bottles of the Dr. Pepper that Tom had bought and that they’d helped drop off earlier that afternoon.
The tops were sealed tightly, and as they claimed seats at one of the patio’s empty picnic tables, the bottles opened with reassuring clicks of breaking plastic and a rush of carbonation.
“Top back on whenever you’re not drinking,” Jules reminded Hobbit, who nodded.
And there they sat, until Belle arrived and immediately joined the line for the keg. Despite the autumn nip in the air, her costume—and Jules was certain she’d chosen it carefully for the role she was playing here—was a very short pair of cut-off jeans with a black crop top T. Her shapely legs werearound two miles long. Of course, the clunky black boots she wore on her feet added to the whole Daisy-Mae effect.
“Watch her with your peripherals,” Hobbit told Jules now, his voice soft so that no one would overhear them. “It’s a stage-acting thing. When you’re in a play, you can’t look directly at the person you’re about to bump into, for example, but youcanpay attention to what’s happening at the edges of your vision. So right now, to everyone else, it looks like I’m looking at you, but I’m really watching Belle.”
Jules stared back at Hobbit, trying to do the same. “Okay,” he said. Yes, there she was.
“Although youmightwant to smile,” Hobbit suggested.
Jules laughed. “Was I making anI’m concentratingface?”
“Mmm,” Hobbit said. “Little bit. Much better now.”
