“Slinking?”
“—the store. I knew you had it in you. Are you finally going to ask me now?”
The boy made no sense. She gave her head a shake. “Ask you what? What are you even talking about?”
He smirked. That steady gaze seemed to penetrate through her irises and into the neurons of her brain where all her secrets resided. “If the rumors are true.”
She dragged her gaze back to the road and couldn’t even pretend she didn’t know what he was referring to. “If you really did all those things, you could just lie about it.”
He shrugged. “Guess you’ll just have to believe whatever you want then.”
“Guess I will.” She slowed for the light but it turned green so she continued on.
“I live on Juniper, down near Timber Bay.”
“I know where you live.” She could practically feel the arrogance rippling off him and resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “I know whereMiss Dorothylives. She and my grandma have been friends for, like, fifty years, you know. I couldn’t care less where you live.”
He chuckled.
The low rumble ran right up her spine. “What? What is so funny?”
He stared at her for a long minute. Not that she even glanced his way, but his laser-like attention made her skin prickle. Just when she thought she couldn’t take it another second, he spoke.
“Little Miss Sunshine’s all riled up. Why do you suppose that is?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Because you’re condescending and boorish?”
“Boorish?”
She notched her chin up. “It means ill-mannered.”
“I know what it means, Sunshine. I’m just not sure what I’ve done to deserve such an insult.”
She spared him a withering look. “Stop calling me that.”
“Most people consider sunshine a positive thing. It provides light and warmth. Life on planet Earth wouldn’t exist without it, you know.”
“It’s quite obvious you have nothing but disdain for me.”
“Oh, you think it’s disdain, do you?” Amusement laced his voice.
Shelby huffed. The boy was maddening. Why had she offered him a ride? Sometimes she was just too darn nice! She should’ve left him there, broken down in the heat. Should’ve let him walk home. She justwouldn’t engage him. A few more minutes and she’d be dropping him off and she wouldn’t have to speak to him ever again.
“Got no answer for me?”
Nope. Wasn’t going to do it. She clamped her lips shut.
“Just going to sit there in silence for the rest of the ride, huh? It’ll be a long few minutes...”
He sure wasn’t kidding about that. The speed limit around the lake was fifteen miles per hour, and with all the turns in the road, she couldn’t exactly speed.
She raised the front windows.
Gray jerked his arm out of the way.
Her lips twitched as she kicked the air on high. She slowed for a kid who ambled across the street in a pair of neon-green trunks, heading toward the lake with an inner tube twice his size.
“Still not talking to me then?”
