“Mom, calm down. I’m fine. I called the insurance company and a tow truck, and Walker’s driving me home. The car . . . ” She hesitated, seeing the damage in her mind’s eye. “The car’s pretty bad.”
“I don’t care one whit about that old car, as long as you’re not hurt. And who on earth is Walker?” Her mother demanded. “I haven’t heard that name before.”
“He’s just a friend, Mom. From the music store.”
Walker shot her a sly look when she said the word “friend.” The way his lips quirked up at the corners said that he had every intention of making a liar out of her, but then his face darkened. He cracked his neck uncomfortably.
Keira watched him out of the corner of her eye. “We were having coffee before the guy ran into me. Walker stayed to help.”
Her mom made a skeptical noise. She always made little “oh, it’s too bad you’re not going to the dance with all of your friends” comments when homecoming and the winter ball rolled around, but Keira knew that her mom was secretly relieved that she didn’t date. It was one less thing to worry about.
“Well, I’d like to meet him. I need to thank him, anyway. I can’t believe I wasn’t available when you called. The one time I had to take shorthand all week, and this happens. And where is your father? Did you try him at work?”
“I did, but it went straight to voice mail.”
“Oh, nice,” her mom snarked.
Walker pulled into the driveway, and Keira felt a rising flood of embarrassment lapping at her ankles. She saw the faded siding and the wild tangle of untrimmed bushes with fresh eyes. It was all so shabby.
“Mom, we’re here. I’m gonna go, and I’ll see—”
“Wait,” her mother interrupted. “I’m in the car. Have Walker stay for a few minutes. I want to meet him.”
“Mom, we’re just friends. And I’m sure Walker has other stuff to do tonight, besides hanging out until you get home.”
Walker turned off the car. “Nope,” he said, loud enough for her mother to hear. “I’d be happy to stay and say ‘hi’ to your mom. Besides—” He lowered his voice enough that the phone wouldn’t catch it. “If your ‘vision’s funny’ then you shouldn’t really be here alone.” He raised his eyebrow pointedly.
“Good,” her mother chirped in Keira’s ear. “I won’t be more than fifteen minutes. Twenty, tops, if there’s traffic. See you then!”
Keira ended the call and closed her eyes. When she opened them, Walker was staring at her expectantly.
“Well, are you going to invite me in?”
She grabbed her bag off the floor without even bothering to zip it shut. “Fine. Come on in. But when my mother starts with the fake Junior League act and the snippy comments about the mistakes people make when they’re young, don’t expect me to rescue you.”
Walker’s charcoal eyes widened. “Hey. I did save you from having to ride home with Shrimp.”
Keira’s shoulders sagged. He was right. He’d done her a favor and she was being prickly as a thistle. Just because he’d managed to slip through all her hot-guy defenses didn’t make it okay for her to act like a brat.
“Sorry. You’re right. Mostly, I’m embarrassed about what my mother’s going to put you through when she gets here.”
“Mostly?”
Keira paused. “Yeah. The rest of it is that I don’t get exactly what’s going on here.” With her finger, she drew an oval in the air between herself and Walker. “I don’t like that feeling. It makes me grumpy.”
Walker stretched his hand toward her, slow enough that she had time to back away if she wanted to. But she didn’t want to move away from his touch. She stayed where she was and let him brush back a strand of hair that had escaped her ponytail.
“If it makes you feel any better, I don’t know exactly what’s going on here either. You’re not the only one whose plans this”—he drew the same oval in the air that Keira had—“might be messing with.”
Keira cocked her head to the side. “Really? What are your ‘plans,’ anyway?”
“You know, get a degree in music engineering, total domination of the human race—the usual sort of stuff.” With the same devilish smile he gave her every time they shared a joke—the smile Keira was already starting to think of as her smile—Walker swung open his door and stepped out of the car.
Things looked even worse inside the house. Her father’s breakfast dishes were congealing on the kitchen counter, and a pile of laundry was strewn across the dining room table. A pair of her underwear, decorated with hot-pink polka dots, lay draped across the top like the flag at the summit of a mountain. She shoved the pile onto one of the chairs, burying the underwear beneath a couple of T-shirts.
“Sorry—it’s not usually this messy in here. My parents have both been working a lot.” She was babbling.
She hated babbling.
She shut her mouth and turned to Walker. There was a twinkle in his eyes that made her wonder if she hadn’t been fast enough with the laundry.
“So. This is the wonder that is my house,” she said. “We can wait for my mom in the living room, or sit at the kitchen table . . . ”
“I want to hear you play.”