Dare You To (Pushing the Limits #2)(64)

“No!” I shout, then remind myself to rein it in. I created her doubt when I accepted the dare. “No. What happened between us last night wasn’t about any dare. I didn’t plan it and I would never tell anyone.”

“So, I’m a secret. We’ll date in private, but not in public. No thanks.”

Damn. I can’t win. I rub my hand over my head. “I want to be with you. Here. At school. Wherever. I didn’t play you. Just trust me.”

Beth angles her body away from me. Trust must be the ugliest word in her vocabulary.

Desperate to make everything right, I blurt out, “Ask me for anything and I’ll do it. Trust me with something. I’ll prove to you I’m worth trusting.”

She assesses me: Nikes first, blue jeans, Reds T-shirt, then my face. “Will you take me into Louisville again?”

The nausea I fought all afternoon returns.

Anything but that. “Beth…”

“I won’t disappear again. I need you to drop me off someplace and I swear I’ll be at the same exact spot you left me at the exact time you tell me to show. You’re asking me to trust you, well…you’re going to have to trust me first.”

It doesn’t seem fair, but fair went out the window the moment I touched her last night. It possibly went out the window the moment I accepted the dare at Taco Bell. “I did trust you.” My mouth shuts and everything inside me hardens. The words taste bitter on my tongue. “I told you about my brother.”

Beth bites her lower lip. “It’s a secret?”

I nod. I really don’t want to discuss Mark.

Worry lines clutter her forehead. “Drunken admissions don’t equate to trust.”

I sigh heavily. She’s right. “Fine. I have a game two weeks from Saturday in Louisville, but you’re sitting through it. I’m not budging on that requirement. Take it or leave it.”

Beth’s face explodes into this radiant smile and her blue eyes shine like the sun. My insides melt. This moment is special and I don’t want to let it go. I’m the one that put that look there. “Really?” she asks.

Do I want her to come to my game? Do I want the opportunity for her to see that I’m more than some stupid jock? “Yes. Don’t play me, Beth.” Because I’m falling for you, more than I should, and if you betray me again, it will hurt like hell.

The smile fades and she solemnly answers, “I won’t. When we go into Louisville, I just need an hour to myself.”

An hour. To do what? See Isaiah? I guess she could. I only asked her to date me. She’d probably bolt if I said the word relationship, even though I have no interest in seeing anyone else. I went too fast with her last night.

This time, I’ll go slow. “I’ll give you an hour alone in Louisville. Then we’re going on a real date, even if it kills us.”

Beth rejoins me on the steps. Her knee rests against mine and we lapse into silence.

Typically, silence with girls makes me uncomfortable, but this one doesn’t bother me.

She doesn’t have anything to say. Neither do I.

I’m not ready to leave and it appears she’s not ready for me to go. Beth, out of anybody, would tell me what she really wanted or thought.

She finally breaks the silence. “How do I take my name off the homecoming list? Does it require a two-thirds vote of the student population or do I have to ask someone in the front office?”

Panic flickers through me. “Stay on the court.”

“No. Way.”

“Do it with me. I’ll be right by your side the entire time.” Putting her on the court was my way of pissing her off, but now I want her on it—with me.

“That’s your world. Not mine.”

But it could be her world if she tried.

“Nothing will happen with homecoming for another month. How about this—if I can find a way to completely wow you by then, you agree to stay on the court and if I can’t, then I’ll help you remove your name.”

Silence as she contemplates. “Are you asking me to dare you to wow me?”

Even I see the irony. “Guess I am.”

“Should I remind you that you have a lousy track record with me in regards to dares?”

I sit up straighter. “I don’t lose.”

Scott knocks on the door and points at his eyes then points at me. He leaves again.

Hell. “Did you come home drunk last night?”

The last time Scott and I talked, we were on good terms. Something’s changed.

“No, but you did leave this.” Beth flips her hair over her shoulder and reveals a red-and-blue spot on her neck. Everything within me wants to disintegrate and hide beneath the porch. I gave her a hickey. I haven’t done that to a girl since middle school.

“He hates me,” I say.

Beth laughs. “Something like that.”

Beth

I PUMP MY HANDS HARDER INTO HIS CHEST and ignore the world around me. My wrists hurt, but I must keep the heart going. I must.

Twenty-seven, twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty.

“Breathe!” I yell.

Lacy tilts the head back and blows into the mouth. The chest moves up, then back down.

Lacy begins to pull away.

“No, Lacy, check the vitals.” She puts her ear near the mouth and nose. I wait. She places her fingers against the artery in the neck. I wait again. Lacy shakes her head. Nothing.