“Hey!” Shawn protests. “She’s the one who ate it.”
Adam crooks his finger at me. “Alright, let’s get this over with.” I pass by him to go up the stairs, and he shouts back to the guys, “She told me to make it quick this morning, guys!”
They laugh, and I roll my eyes, not bothering to look back at the stupid grin that I’m sure is plastered on Adam’s face. My backpack is still in the back room, so I grab it off of the floor and then bounce onto the bed, sitting cross-legged. “Alright, so . . . do you even remember how to conjugate verbs?”
“Oui?” Adam says. “Je pense.” I smile widely at his correct pronunciation of ‘I think’.
“Alright, well let’s start with some written stuff. We can work on verbal stuff in the car.”
By the time I exit the bus with him at eleven o’clock, I’m feeling pretty hopeless. I can’t fathom how Adam passed French 101, and he is so easily distracted, always getting off topic one way or another. At one point, I pressed my palms against his cheeks to quiet his yapping. When he stopped talking and just stared at me, I said, “You need to con-cen-trate.”
Adam’s gaze was fixed on me, and it was so intense that I loosened my hold. “If you don’t let go of my face,” he warned, “I’m going to kiss you.” I immediately dropped my hands, blushing beet-red. He chuckled and flipped to the next page, getting back to work. But after that, I was the one who couldn’t concentrate. When eleven o’clock finally rolled around, I was thankful for an excuse to get out of that room.
“Are we going to stop somewhere to eat?” I ask Adam as we walk to his topless black Camaro.
“I think so. If not, you and I can stop and just meet them there.” I throw my backpack into the back and climb into the passenger seat. Adam frowns at the backpack and then at the textbook in my lap. “You’re not going to make me study the whole way, are you?”
I shake my head. “No, I think I need a break.”
He laughs and slides behind the wheel. “Is there any hope for me?”
I stare over at him, at his gorgeous eyes, his untamed rocker hair, and that heartbreaker smile that could make a smart girl stupid. “I guess we’ll see.”
Chapter Fourteen
“WHERE ARE WE?” I ask Adam as I stretch in his front seat, using my hand to block the blinding sun. I didn’t mean to fall asleep, but I guess the sleep deprivation of last night finally caught up with me. I woke a minute ago to soft fingers rubbing gently over my arm, and I groggily opened my eyes.
“We’re stopping for lunch,” he says, nodding toward the tour bus parked at the back of the parking lot we’re in. We’re at a diner along the highway. A big red sign facing the road names it Rosy’s.
I reach for my phone, which Adam connected to his car charger earlier in the trip, and turn it on to look at the time. We’ve been on the road for almost two hours, and I have tons of missed texts and calls—from my mom, Dee, Leti, and Brady. I ignore them and tuck the phone into my purse, and then I slide out of the car and stretch my legs, rolling my neck from side to side.
I walk into the diner with a literal mob of boys. In addition to the five guys from the band, there are five roadies, including Driver. I feel kind of awkward . . . and kind of really freaking awesome. Inside, there’s no sign that tells people to wait to be seated, so everyone seats themselves. I slide into a booth seat, and Adam slides in next to me. Shawn and Joel sit across from us, and Mike, Cody, and Driver sit at a table next to us. The other four roadies sit in a booth farther down.
A middle-aged waitress comes by to take our orders, making pleasant conversation by asking about the band since she saw the tour bus out front. The weird look she gives me when she takes my order doesn’t escape my notice, but I let it slide—I can only imagine what she’s thinking, and I’d probably be wondering the same things if I were in her shoes. Still exhausted from my short nap in the car, I bury my face in my elbow while we wait for the food to arrive.
“Hey,” Shawn says, lifting my blonde pony tail and letting it plop back down. I tilt my head back far enough to stare up at him. “How did studying go?”
I groan and bury my face again, and all three guys laugh.
“I thought I did awesome!” Adam says.
I sit up and rub my eyes. “You did alright. But we really need to get some studying done in the car.”
Shawn is twisting his straw paper into knots when he asks, “Didn’t you do that on the way here?”
“No, I fell asleep.” I stare pointedly at Joel, who is busy sipping on his Coke. “Because someone kept me up all night.”
Adam chuckles, and Joel looks from side to side with the straw still in his mouth, noticing we’re all staring at him. “Who, me?”
“I think you need to see a doctor,” I say. “Seriously. I swear you died at least thirty times last night.”