I frowned. “I haven’t picked up sticks in years.”
“A waste, if you ask me.”
I agreed with him, not that I was going to verbalize as much. “Yeah, well, whatever. No band would pick me up anyway. I suck.”
Jake leaned in, patting me on the chest. “Definitely not with that attitude, they won’t.”
“Oh, and Rory?” he said, backing off and heading for the door. “Stay away from my sister.”
I waited until his hand was on the doorknob before testing his allegiance. “Maybe I don’t want to anymore.”
He stopped, his body visibly tensing.
“Maybe I’m tired of hiding. Of worrying what everyone thinks. Maybe I want to take back what was mine. Give that posh prince of hers a run for his money. What do you say about that?”
Jake slowly turned back to face me. Our eyes locked in a showdown, both of us understanding that if I let my pieces fall, part of his wall would be coming down with it.
A slow smile hitched the corner of his lips. “I say bring it on.”
GRACE: MCKALLISTER STEW
THE PAST
Ipeeked around the corner and breathed a sigh of relief. Quinn’s door was shut, and the music was blaring. Just as I’d hoped. I tiptoed past his room, watching for shadows under the door, before sprinting down the hall to the front room. Hudson would be arriving soon, and as long as Quinn stayed put, I’d be out of here before my brother ever knew I was gone. Quinn and I didn’t have a lot of secrets between us, but boys were one of them. Basically, he didn’t want me anywhere near the male species, and I was… well… obsessed with them. It was a delicate balance we struck between him being an uptight prude and me sneaking out the front door with his arch enemy.
That’s right. I was going on a date with Hudson Cowell. Yes,theHudson Cowell. Not to brag or anything but, um… yeah… this was sort of a big deal. Hudson was top shelf. A dream date. Any girl would be lucky to get asked out by the studly all-state defensive tackle on track to a Division II school. That he’d chosen me for this date would open all sorts of doors, making me hopeful that my three years of desperation were finally coming to a close. Really, it couldn’t get much worse. I was a junior in high school and had never been on a date, never held hands with a guy who wasn’t a big brother, and most frustratingly of all, I’d never been kissed.
Quinn insisted he had nothing to do with my loser streak, but I wasn’t so sure. I had a good sense of humor, could perform an ollie off the curb with a skateboard, and I was the baby sister of a rock star. You’d think that would buy me some credit with the boys in school. But no. The closest I ever got to actual interest was if a new boy at school flirted with me before he knew the law of the land or the occasional infidel absently commenting on my ass. But when it came time for promposals or an invite to a once-in-a-lifetime party, I was sitting at home… or rocking it out in the garage with my dude pack.
Correction—Quinn’s dude pack. I’d just sort of inherited them. They’d saved me from a fate worse than death: sitting at the lunch tables alone. I’d started off strong the first day of freshman year, the sheltered private school girl with a major claim to fame arriving at the neighborhood public school to a whirlwind of activity. Everyone wanted to be my friend—until they realized my aversion to discussing the one thing that made them spin. Jake.
Actually, it wasn’t Jake himself I refused to talk about. He was, honestly, my favorite topic ever. I was so proud of him and loved talking about his music and his fame and his good looks. But that wasn’t what most kids at school wanted to discuss. Sure, they’d start out all excited about his music and his fame and his good looks, but then the narrative would inevitably change. They’d adopt that all-knowing concerned presumption on their faces and dive right into discussion about Jake’s famous kidnapping. What did I know? What had I seen? What had Jake said about this or that? Even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell them.
Did no one consider that such a topic might be sensitive to members of my family, akin to bringing up a very recent death? Did they think that because Jake was a public figure who’d become famous for his music only after being the central player in a sensationalized news story that it made him less susceptible to the effects of personal attack and speculation? Did they think those who loved him had also developed that same thick skin, allowing them to freely gossip about his torture and near murder as if it were a made-for-TV movie?
I, for one, had not developed that thick skin. Quite the opposite, really. As a child, even the slightest mention of the kidnapping was enough to provoke instant, cartoonlike tears to burst out of my eyeballs. Even with early childhood therapy, no one had ever been able to explain the terror it induced in me nor why I couldn’t look my brother in the eye during those early years without running away screaming. Maybe it was the trauma of being so young when my life turned upside down that led to this exaggerated response, but all I knew was exposure to details of the kidnapping often set off a post-traumatic stress type reaction in me that took days to recover from. I’d found it easier to walk away from the trigger.
Unfortunately, doing so had given me the reputation in some circles of being a snooty brat, which wasn’t me at all. I was the resilient, self-sufficient baby of my family, known for conflict resolution and my love of animals, romance, and underdogs. Yet nobody at my new school seemed interested in knowing that side of me, which led to my banishment at the lunch tables. It was also what prompted Quinn and his dude pack to swoop in and rescue me from social oblivion. I’d been with them ever since.
I loved my boys, but my god, they were such horndogs. All they did was talk about music, compose music, or try to hook up with girls who thought they were cool because they made music—and not very good music, I might add. The horndogs never hit on me, though. Half the time they seemed to forget I was female at all.
I chose to believe it was Quinn and his not-so-subtle intimidation techniques that kept the boys away. I couldn’t prove my theory, but certainly I preferred it to the alternative—that the problem was me. And, honestly, it very well could be. I just didn’t stand out. It was like I’d been crafted for life on a Monday. Tired after a long weekend, my creator had taken the easy way out, and instead of bestowing on me my own individual uniqueness, he’d simply lifted a hodgepodge of personality traits from the family members who’d come before me. I was a sliver of my father’s kindness. A splash of my mother’s refinement. A dollop of Mitch’s athleticism. A sprinkling of Keith’s quirky charm. A shaving of Emma’s independent spirit. A speck of Jake’s undisputed courage. A morsel of Kyle’s sense of humor. And a smidgen of Quinn’s attractiveness.
That was me. McKallister stew.
My phone pinged, startling me to the point that I nearly fumbled it to the floor. Recovering at the five-yard line—thank you, Mitch, for that tiny bit of athleticism—I took a quick look around for Quinn before clicking on the surveillance app, which brought up a video image of none other than my studly date, Hudson, at the front security gate of our Jake-bought family home.
“How the hell does she expect me to get through this damn fortress?” Hudson’s grumblings reached me through the microphone. Clearly he didn’t know I was listening in, and his tone low-key irritated me. He knew very well how to get through the gates of my “fortress” because I’d given him detailed written instructions in a text. Was it my fault he hadn’t read them?
Hudson let go a string of profanities before pushing random buttons on the security screen. My eyes doubled in size. If he managed to punch in an actual code that was not mine, someone else in my family might get the video image of my unannounced visitor on their phone, and that would not bode well for me, considering none of my next of kin knew I had my very first date with a local legend.
“Hudson,” I said, all chirpy in the delivery. “Hello, I’m here.”
I watched from the small screen on my cell as Hudson looked up, down, and all around.
“Oh, um, no. I’m still in the house. I can see you through the security camera.”
Again he looked up, down, and all around.
