“You gonna throw in?” She gives a lopsided grin. “You know you can’t keep up with them boys, right? Just talking facts.” She gives her grunty laugh. “Like to see ’em last through a thirty-hour labor, though, huh?” She seems to remember that I’ve never been through labor, either, except as the one being pushed out, and gets moody again, chewing her lip. Never thought about her and Bob having kids. They must be all grown up, probably living as far away from Sasanoa as possible.
I step back, glancing toward the woods where Rhiannon’s car was found. I feel like we’ve all been trying not to look there today, like it’s an open grave or something, but everybody’s whispering about it. I want to say something to Mrs. Wardwell, like maybe that it sucks, them getting pulled into this again, all because Rhiannon decided she wanted to prove something by working in the fields one summer, but the words won’t come, so I step away.
“Prentiss.” I turn back and she’s studying me. “No. A girl’s never made it.”
We stop to gas up at the Irving station after work, along with half the other rakers from town. While people pile out to make Gatorade and jerky runs, I see a black pickup pull into the lot behind us, bass cranked so high I can feel it through my sneakers. I grab Mags’s shoulder before she opens her door. “I’ll pump.”
“Go for it. You’re paying.”
I round the bumper, looking straight into Jesse’s windshield as he pulls up to the pump behind me, revving the engine twice before cutting it.
He gets out, hooking his shades into his collar. “Hey.”
I feed a twenty into the machine and pull the nozzle free, glancing back at his truck. “Where’s the wolf pack?”
“Riding with Duke.” He locks the nozzle, letting it fill while he turns to face me. “You got plans?”
“Not really.”
“Want some?”
I bite my lip so he won’t see the smile creeping across my face. “I thought you meant this weekend.”
He grins. “I can’t wait that long.”
His pump shuts itself off; he couldn’t have been more than a couple gallons low. I focus on the digits scrolling by in front of me, then screw the gas cap on tight, making him wait. “Hold on.” I poke my head in Mags’s window. “I’m going with Jesse.”
“Uh, aren’t you grounded?”
“Mom never said I was. Just tell her I’ll be home by ten. She won’t care.”
“Yes, she will,” Nell says quietly.
“Not if you guys sell it.” I hold up my hands, backing away from the window. “Counting on you.”
Without another word, Mags guns out of the lot while Nell watches me through the back window, never looking away as long as I can see them down Main Street. Meeting Jesse’s gaze, I open the passenger door of his truck and climb in.
He looks in at me. “They mad?”
“Nah.” We stare at each other for a second. “Are we going or what?”
He thumps his hand on the frame and climbs in beside me, smelling like sweat and heat and boy and making my whole body wake up and say yes, please. I hang my arm out the window as we take off, raking my fingers through the wind.
Jesse drives too fast down back roads, passing on curves, trying to get a rise out of me. I just smile. I’ve played this game before.
I sit with my knee bent, heel propped on the dash, never reaching for the oh-shit bar. He jerks the wheel, stomps the brake. I twirl the end of my ponytail around my finger. He works up a sweat. I wish I’d brought lip gloss.
The next thing I know, we’re hanging a left onto a long dirt driveway that stretches arrow-straight to a farmhouse in the distance. Dust billows on both sides of us. Faster, faster. At the last second, when it seems like we’re either going to spin out or crash straight through into the living room, I lurch forward for the door handle—
Jesse whips us to the right and we bump down a potholed drive you’d never know was there, hidden by the low branches of an oak. There’s a corrugated steel barn up ahead, a chicken house, and fields of blossoming potato plants on all sides as far as I can see.
Jesse parks in a bald patch by the barn and cuts the engine, looking at me. A smile like that should be against the law. “Doing all right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Looking a little peaked over there.”
I give in and laugh, punching his arm. “Ass.”
Knowing he won this round, he surprises me by opening my door for me. I step out, pushing my hat back and looking around. “Whose place is this?”
“My uncle Caleb’s.”
“Nice.”
“You want to see nice.” He goes through the open barn doors. A couple minutes later, he rides out on a dappled gray horse, bareback, no bridle or reins or anything. I step back fast. I went on pony rides at the Bay Festival when I was a kid, but never on an animal as big as this one. Jesse holds a handful of the horse’s mane as he leans down and thumps her side. “Climb on.”
“Um . . .” I step forward, then back. “How?”
“Not a horse person?”
“I like them. I’ve just never . . .” If this is another test, I’m going to ace it. I set my shoulders. “What do I do?”
I end up standing on a stump so I can grab her mane, swing my leg over her back, and sit in front of Jesse. His arms are snug around me as he nudges her ribs with his heels to get her moving down a rutted tractor path. We’re up high and swaying, and I’m glad that we take this ride slow.
Jesse guides us out into the acreage, beyond the crops to the hay field. Giant bales are spaced evenly across the clearing. It’s quiet out here, no sound but insects buzzing, and the breeze moves the grasses in the distance like a wave. Pretty as hell. He gives me a hand as we slide down. The horse wanders off to graze. I brush her hair off my shorts and thighs, saying, “I heard you were haying for your uncle.”
“Earning my keep and a little extra. I live with him.”
“Yeah?”
“My parents gave me the boot junior year. Couldn’t make it work.” I start to say I’m sorry, but he shrugs to show that it didn’t touch him. “Caleb’s okay. Pushes pretty hard, but he’s trying to make a living from this place. I come out here till sundown most days after we get done raking.”
I turn, closing the space between with a slow lean. “You didn’t bring me all the way out here to work, did you?”
I kiss him on his smile. He kisses back, hard, stealing my breath. We sink down onto the grass together, and everything goes out of focus except the feeling of his skin on mine, his hands running up and down my back, under my shirt. We taste each other’s salt and grit. I pull the elastic from my hair, shake it out, and roll over to straddle him, reaching for the button on his shorts.
I’ve got his fly open and my fingertips on the fabric of his jockey shorts—knew it—when he makes a sound and pushes me back, laughing, wiping his mouth. “Damn, slow down. You got somewhere to be?”
I stare. Shock makes me flush dark red. I get up, spin around, not sure which direction to go, only knowing that I have to get away from him. He says my name. I ignore him.
“Darcy? What’re you doing?”
“Stop laughing at me.” My voice sounds awful, croaky, like I’m going to cry when I’m not, never would.
“I’m not laughing”—he’s laughing when he says it—“I’m not laughing at you. I just didn’t think . . .” He catches my arm and turns me around. I whistle and snap my fingers at the horse, as if I could get up on her by myself and gallop away. She ignores me.