‘You’re welcome,’ I respond.
‘Would you still have picked him up? If you’d known he was my brother from the outset?’
Without warning, my cheeks flare hot.
‘Don’t answer that,’ he says, when his hand goes to the door handle.
Chapter Six
AJ
Outside Hollie’s apartment, I call Reyes to come get me.
‘Sheriff’s in Rapture,’ he tells me as he brings his ride to a halt in the darkness, four blocks from Hollie Palmer’s apartment, under the shade of a giant oak.
‘Shit,’ I say. ‘At my mom’s place?’
‘Would have thought so, man. How’d it go with Jenny English? Noah all right?’
‘He’s a thieving cocksucker, that’s what.’
‘No way. You leave him there?’
‘What other choice do I have? I gotta go back in the morning. Should turn his ass in.’
‘You’re not serious.’
I look Reyes in the face. He knows I’m not, because like me, and anyone else from Rapture, he’s loyal to the township, and we would never turn on our own.
I put my helmet on and climb on the back of the bike.
It’s a twenty-minute ride back to Rapture. It’s almost midnight. My mom lives in an old house on the east side of town, where the grass don’t grow, and the neighbors’ dogs roam free. Her roof leaks when it rains, and now that the authorities turned the power off at night, she can’t afford to use a generator.
Reyes drops me two blocks away. I climb off the back of the bike and slide off my helmet.
‘You need anything else, man?’ he asks me.
‘Naw, I’m good. Thanks for the ride.’ I should start walking, but I linger for a second. ‘Can I ask you something? You remember that graduation party we went to? At Amber Bradshaw’s house. In the city that one time?’
Reyes removes his helmet. ‘Uh. Sure. Kinda. I guess.’
‘Amber picked out some guys to blindfold and stand in a closet. And she sent in a girl, and I had to guess who I’d kissed. Do you remember that?’
‘I don’t, man. I was really wasted at that party. Why?’
‘Tryna figure out who the girl was. Whether it was Jenny English or not.’
Reyes starts to snicker. ‘I can’t remember shit like that. I remember Amber Bradshaw being all over you like a virus that night though. Why? Did Jenny English say somethin’ to you?’
‘No. Nothin’ like that. I just never did find out for sure is all. Somebody told me Amber sent her in.’
‘Yeah, well, that girl was pretty intent on getting you for herself. I also remember she had a sweet house with a pool. We went skinny dipping before the night was through.’
A smile hits my lips. ‘That, I remember. I’ll catch you later.’
‘You need me, hit me up.’
In the darkness, I walk backward away from him, give him a salute.
