Page 27 of Slick Trip

“I fixed it,” I said.

“Good,” he muttered. “I didn’t mean to break it,” he added. “You let me.”

He finally looked at me. I felt an alarming surge of relief, like I was the one in the wrong.

“Was I supposed to know you were going to press random buttons?”

“If you didn’t know that about me, you haven’t done your homework.” He had clearly been crying. “I’m a disaster. It’s the way I’m built.”

Silence stretched. My anger had burned out hours ago, replaced by something far more disturbing.

“You tried to fix it,” I said softly.

“No I didn’t,” he said quickly. “Whatever Jack said—he’s lying.”

Cooper avoided looking at me when he said it, and that told me more than any confession would have. He hated being caught caring, and I understood that better than he realized.

That evening, as I was leaving, he cornered me in the hallway. He shoved a crumpled twenty-dollar bill into my hand.

I frowned. “What’s this?”

“For . . . the thing,” he muttered.

“What thing?”

He glared at me. “Don’t be annoying.”

Realization hit. He was trying to pay for the damage.

“I don’t want your money,” I said.

“You should take it.”

“I’m not taking it.”

“It’s fair.”

“It’s not.”

He huffed. “Well, it’s all that I have.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

I closed my fingers around the bill and pushed it back into his chest.

“Keep it.”

He bristled. “I’m not a charity case.”

“I didn’t say you were.”

“Then take it,” he said, stepping closer until there was barely enough space left for breathing. His voice turned into that soft, needy pitch that always made my knees weak. “I don’t want to owe you.”

Jesus. There were a lot of things I’d survived—foster homes, fists, sleeping in crappy trailers—but Jack’s little brother looking at me like that might actually kill me.

We stood there, tension snapping between us.

“You’re so annoying,” he said after a while.