I'm Not Charlotte Lucas(6)

The kid looked at me like I’d asked him to perform a magic trick. His floppy, dark hair fell over his forehead, obstructing the view of his eyebrows, but I could easily imagine them rising in judgment. “I don’t know phone numbers.”

I stared at him like he was about to break out in a magic trick, but he was serious. “Okay, do you have your phone on you? I’d like to explain what happened.”

He slid a phone from his back pocket, wincing as he reached for it. Dollar signs rang in front of my eyes like we were in a cartoon, and I swallowed. I hoped he wasn’t faking an injury just to empty my savings account.

No, that wasn’t right. I wished he wasn’t actually injured, since I’d hit the kid with my car.

He handed me his phone, and I took it from him, putting it up to my ear when I saw the time on the clock going and realized his mom had already answered. “Hello? Hi. Yes,” I stammered, looking from Beth’s puzzled face to the kid. Moving the phone away from my ear I asked, “What’s your name?”

“Spike.”

I swallowed my irritation. “What’s your real name?”

“Spike.”

“Hello?” a deep male voice said into my ear.

“Hi, yes. Sorry. I’m here with S-Spike, and I’m looking for his mom.”

The man sounded unamused. “What did he do?”

“Is this Spike’s dad?” I asked. For all I knew, the kid dialed one of his friends.

“No. What did he do? And why are you calling from his phone?”

Clearing my throat, I spun away from the angsty teenager and scanned the magazine rack on the wall. “It’s more like something I did, not him. I need to speak with one of his parents.” This guy did not sound old enough to be a teenager’s dad.

“Listen,” he said into the phone, “I don’t have a lot of time right now to deal with this. Can you just tell me what’s going on so I can get back to work?”

“Spike was hit by a car. My car, actually. He looks fine but—”

“Seriously?”

“Yes.” I tried not to sound as irritated as I was beginning to feel. “Seriously. I was backing out and I—”

“Where are you?” he asked.

“Bella Diva Salon on—”

“I know where it is. I’ll be there in five.”

Three low beeps sounded in my ear, and I moved the phone away from my face to see that he’d hung up. I sucked in a breath for strength, then blew it out slowly.

When I turned around to give the phone back, the kid was gone.





Chapter Three


Panic seized my throat. I’d lost the kid.

“What is going on?” Beth asked. She stepped away from the salon chair, a bowl of brown goop in one of her gloved hands, a color brush perched in her other.

“That boy,” I said, gesturing to his empty seat. “Did you see where he went?”

She shook her head, her shoulders rising in a shrug.

Just what I needed. Now I really didn’t have time to get my nails done. I crossed the lobby, shoving the door open and nearly colliding with the tall, lanky teen. Relief flowed through me.

Sighing, I opened the door wider while he slipped past me. “You can’t just leave. Your person is on his way.”

“You mean my brother.” He scowled at me, reclaiming his seat and holding his skateboard on his lap. “I needed my board.”

Had no one taught him any manners?

Beth lifted her hands, the coloring implements rising in the air. Her client watched me with confusion while another stylist sent me puzzled glances over her shoulder. “You’ll fill me in later?” Beth asked.

I waved her away. “Yeah. Don’t mind us.”

Beth raised her eyebrows, but an explanation would have to wait. I wasn’t about to announce to the salon that I’d hit the kid with my car.

She returned to her client, and I plopped down on the chair beside Spike . . . if that really was his name. But the guy on the phone had known whom I referred to, hadn’t he?

“Hey, lady, can I have my phone back?”

Lady, again? Ugh. I glanced down, flustered. A lime-green phone with an ugly skull and a brand written across the back in illegible font sat in my hands. I handed it to Spike.

“Do you hurt anywhere?” I asked, casting him a sideways glance.

Gaze trained on the phone in his hands, Spike shook his head. His elbows rested on the skateboard across his lap, and I consoled myself with his apathy. If he was hurt, he wouldn’t look so bored. Or so I hoped. He looked more like he was waiting for a school principal than for a hospital x-ray.

The bell rang over the door, and a man stepped inside, casting his gaze about until it landed on Spike and then me. Cold flushed through my system from the heat of his stare.

Whoa. There were different levels of handsome, and this guy hit the charts somewhere between Bradley Cooper and the guy who starred in The Hunger Games—one of the Hemsworth brothers, but I didn’t know which one.

This man clearly was not Spike’s dad. He couldn’t be more than a few years older than I was.

He rubbed his unshaven jaw, then parked himself in front of us. “Explain, please,” he said with all the weariness of a college student during finals.

“It wasn’t my fault,” Spike replied, sinking lower in his chair.