All That Jazz (Butler Cove #1)(30)

“Cold?”

“No,” I snapped.

A sniff sounded. “So you two are really together?” Courtney said, looking at me.

“Yes, we are,” said Joey.

“I was asking Jazz.”

Butler Cove High was a fairly small school, it was no surprise she knew my name as her ex-boyfriend’s sister’s best friend. Instead of answering, I shrugged. I’d told one too many lies today, and I didn’t feel like adding to the tally. If she stuck around long enough she’d know it was a crock anyway.

“I have to get home.” I picked up my bike and righted it from where I’d practically thrown it in the azaleas this morning.

“You shouldn’t ride with your ankle like that,” Joey said, laying a hand on the handlebars. “Let me take you in the truck.”

“I’m fine, really.”

He sighed. “See you later then?”

Was he seriously continuing the farce? Ugh. “See you later,” I returned and hid my pained wince as I put my foot down on the peddle.





THE NEXT FEW days at school were uneventful. It was ridiculous that we were even having to show up. If we hadn’t learned it by now, it was never going to happen. It was one more week until the senior exam, and then Memorial Day weekend would hit the island. It would be Chase’s last weekend. It was bad timing really that I still had school every day when we could be hanging out. I hadn’t seen him since I blew him off on Sunday evening. By Thursday, after three full days of distance from my Joe Glow, it seemed like maybe I’d had a hormonal blip. It worked great as long as I didn’t remember his kiss. Anyway remembering the kiss was stupid because obviously, obviously, he’d only done that for Courtney’s benefit. But the look on his face after the kiss. The look that said it had been completely unexpected was what my mind couldn’t let go of. And unexpected because something had happened he hadn’t planned. And God knew, Joseph was a planner. Control the variables as much as possible. Avoid risk.

Smart, really.

I met up with Keri Ann after last period at the bike rack. The afternoon heat had built up to a heaviness that foretold coming thunder.

“You want to come over and hang out?” she asked as she spun the combination lock.

I took a deep breath. Hang out at the Butler house and possibly see Joseph. Inhale intelligent grownup. Exhale hormonal teenager. “Sure,” I said.

Keri Ann pushed her brown wavy hair off her face as it caught her lips. I envied her easy beauty. Maybe it was because my mom worked so hard on her appearance, dyeing her hair and staring at her wrinkles in the mirror every day. I always felt beauty had to be worked at, and since I definitely didn’t, I was always going to be passable. I just didn’t have the need to primp like other girls my age or like my momma thought I should. It was part of why Keri Ann and I were such perfect friends. I think we accepted our normalness, and we were okay with it. She was the exception though. She was very pretty. And her normality made her beautiful.

Faith, who owned the boutique, was always telling me to be unique. Telling me how black pearls were more prized because they were so rare. Be a black pearl, she’d say. Or even better. Be a color no one’s ever seen before. So when I’d show up dressed for work with an outfit put together from my ma’s sixties clothes and several bright color ribbons tied around my wrist or in my hair, she’d just smile approvingly and lend me a new color lip gloss she’d come across.

“So?” Keri Ann asked.

“Yeah. Cool. I can come over. Aren’t you and Nana working on a sea glass project?”

She sighed. “She’s been so tired recently. I think we’ll pass today.”

We wheeled our bikes out of the Butler Cove High parking lot and headed for the bike paths that cut all around our island. The loud sound of a truck engine revving along with catcalls, hoots, and hollers was deafening for a moment. A shiny black truck that had never seen hard work screeched past us and slowed. It was filled with some of the football team hanging out of its windows and piled illegally in the bed of the truck. I rolled my eyes. “Sand Bar tonight, girls!” someone yelled. The voice belonged to a friend of Cooper’s, who was sitting in the back with another guy I recognized from chemistry.

I waved. “When my date with Prince Harry falls through,” I called.

“Aw c’mon.” He clutched his chest. A friend of his moved his hand down to between his legs. They laughed raucously. Then he banged on the cab, and the truck roared off.

I shook my head, but I was chuckling. Keri Ann was smirking. “You’re going to be that girl, you know?”

“That girl?” I asked.

“The one they always remember from high school. The one they were too intimidated by to actually ask out, but the one they always think about.”

“You’re one to talk. I think Jasper’s the only one who had the guts to ask you out, but I know we’ve counted about seven who wanted to.”

“Ugh. They’re all afraid of Joey.”

I put my right foot on the pedal then pushed off the ground and slung my other leg over the saddle. My ankle finally felt better today. “God. That Joseph. Cock-blocking at every turn.”

We whooshed down the path through the trees. “Hey,” I said. “You mind swinging by the marina with me? I want to drop my backpack in my room and check if the mail came.”