Maybe he knew, but I hadn’t exactly said it out loud yet. I was going to, though. Whether I planned it or not, it was going to come falling out of me, sooner or later, in a moment of uncensoredbliss.
He squeezed my hand and Isqueezedback.
We were an hour outside the city and I still didn’t know where we were going. We’d turned off the highway onto some kind of service road that seemed to be heading nowhere; there were street lights, but I couldn’t see anything in the dark fields on either side of the road except a bunch of trees. A few minutes after I’d lost sight of the highway in my rearview mirror, we turned off onto a creepy gravel road—creepy because there were no more street lights; nothing but snarls of bush lined the side of the road. The field on the other side might have been farmland, but it was too darktotell.
“Wow. Nice place to bring a girl,” I commented, as we turned off the creepy gravel road onto an even creepier dirt path, barely discernible in a field of weeds, running alongside a rickety barbed wire fence. But I was still grinning. “This where you bury all yourdates?”
Brody shook his head, but smiled back. “Anyone ever tell you you’ve got an incrediblytwistedmind?”
“Yes.” I beamed at him. “You. Manytimes.”
The truth was, I was loving every second of this. Not only had I never been on a date with Brody, but I had no idea what kind of date he’d take me on. All I knew was what he told me, which was, “Don’t bother with high heels” and “Dresswarm.”
I kept expecting something to magically appear just over the horizon in all this darkness. Then suddenly Brody turned us off the “road” into what amounted to a little gravel driveway… leading to absolutely nothing. Well, there was that barbed wirefence.
We pulled up to it and parked. “Hop out,” he said. I grinned, hopping out as he shut down the truck, and we met outside. “Look up,” heordered.
I looked up, but there was nothingtosee.
Thesky?
It was dark, overcast, a deep blue-black with mottled spots that I could tell were clouds. I could barely even see the moon glowingthrough.
“What am Ilookingat?”
He put his arms around me, drawing me against him. “Nothing,” he said. “Because the weather app on my phonefuckinglied.”
I looked at him, giggling abit. “What?”
“Just picture the biggest, darkest sky you’ve ever seen, pricked with a millionstars.”
“Ah.” I wrapped my arms around his neck. “I’mpicturing.”
“It was supposed to clear up. See that glow over there, near the horizon?” I followed the way he pointed, back in the direction we’d come from. “That’s the city. And those dark shapes over there? The mountains. On a clear night, it’s gorgeous out here. Like magical gorgeous.” He kissed my cheek, his lips lingering as his breath warmed me. “Jessa Mayesgorgeous.”
I grinned and gave him a lingering kissforthat.
“Might still clear up,” he whispered as he kissed his way along my jaw, and I sighed happily. “We can wait a while and see. The clouds seem to bemoving.”
They were. As I watched, I could see them shifting around in front of the moon. “How do you know about thisplace?”
“Because I’ve seen it. With all the other girls I bring here, right before Ikillthem.”
“Ew.” I wrinkled my nose. “Not funny when yousayit.”
“It’s Piper’s,” he said, giving my butt a squeeze, then letting me go and heading back toward the truck. “He’s got a place, other end of this field. Moved out here about ayearago.”
“Oh. I didn’t know.” I looked out across the field but all I saw was blackness. The house must’ve been pretty far. “Must be nice. Quiet.” I watched him pull a backpack from the back of the truck. “CanIhelp?”
“Nope.” He hooked his arm through mine and we hopped over the barbed wire, which was about thigh-height, more to keep animals out than humans. Brody started pulling things from his bag. He laid out a big, thick blanket on the grass andordered, “Sit.”
I sat. I watched him arrange a bunch of candles in jars all around the blanket and light them. Then he pulled out a big travel canteen and two mugs. He poured us each a drink and tossed in some mini marshmallows he’d brought inabag.
“Marshmallows,” I mused as he handed me a mug, and his eyescaughtmine.
“Yeah. You like them in your hot chocolate,right?”
“Sure.” I blew on my mug; it wassteaminghot.
