Page 50 of Worth the Wait

CHAPTER 19

DESI

“What the heck?” I say through a laugh as we pull into the empty lot in Melville—the next town over. The area has been transformed with a makeshift structure taking up the most of it. Black Visqueen lines the exterior walls with caution tape as its accent. A strobe light can be seen at the entrance, as can a person dressed in a clown costume taking tickets of mostly high school-aged kids. “Reznor?” I ask as he pulls into a parking spot.

“Trust me.”

I don’t even get a chance to respond before he’s out of his truck and circling the hood to open the door for me.

“A haunted house?”

“Just trust me.”

I eye him, finding this completely bizarre, but I’m away from my house and it’s definitely something to distract me from the embarrassment of earlier. “C’mon, Desi Whitman. You know you’re curious about why I took you to a haunted house out of the blue.”

He looks adorable—the playful look in his eye, the off-kilter smile, the hand he has extended to me—and I know I won’t resist him.

“Are you hoping that I get scared and jump into your arms?” I ask as I take his hand and exit the truck. “Because if that’s the case, you’re no better than Jared Ingram, who dared me to go to one in ninth grade so he could try and make out with me.”

“Was he successful?” Reznor asks. The funny thing is, when he pulls his hand from mine as we fall into step next to each other, a part of me sags inside. The part that is rebelling against my typical policy of no contact, no semblance of dating, nothing romance-y...because who likes that gooey shit anyway?

But I sag.

Shit. First flutters. Then swooning. And now sagging.

“Des?”

“Oh. Sorry. I was thinking about sagging.”

“What?” He barks out a laugh and mine isn’t far behind. “Sagging? Do I even want to know?”

“It’s—never mind.” I wave a hand. What else can I do tonight to make a fool of myself? But I am laughing. He’s making me laugh. That’s always a good sign. “Jared Ingram. Man, he tried, but the boy was a terrible kisser.”

“Nothing worse than that,” he says, placing a hand on my lower back as we step into the line to buy tickets.

“It’s the kiss of death,” I joke.

“Good thing you’re here with me. That’s a sign I’m not going to die the fate of poor Jared.” Reznor flashes a killer smile at me and winks before stepping up to the booth to buy our tickets.

The scent of kettle corn fills the air and the chatter of teenagers and their laughter echoes in the air around us. Muted screams of fright can be heard from the depths of the open-doored haunted house. People mill about in groups with caramel apples in hand.

But my attention turns to Reznor. To his easy charm with the woman selling tickets. To the sincerity in his smile. To the strong lines of his profile.

What are you doing here, Des? This looks like a date. It feels like a date.

But I know.

I don’t want to admit it to myself, but the man has my attention in more ways than one.

“What?” he asks when he catches me staring at him.

“I’m curious why we’re here.”

“You’ll find out soon enough,” he says cryptically as the person running the haunted house lets the next group of people enter. “We’re next.”

I take a deep breath and anticipation begins to stir to life in my veins as the group that just entered screams at something inside. I’m not a scaredy-cat by any means, but haunted houses aren’t exactly something I’d choose to go do on my own.

Don’t be a chicken.