Praying for Rain (Praying for Rain Trilogy, #1)(15)

Why am I so nervous to talk to this guy? He’s just a guy. Of manly age and stature. Okay, he’s a fucking man and I don’t know him and he has a gun and he’s currently my only source of food that isn’t a condiment.

“You.”

Wait. What?

“Ohhh no. You can’t stay with me. Are you fucking kidding? My parents would—”

“Not in there.” Wes gestures toward my house with a cube of beef pinched between his thumb and index finger. Then, he tosses it into his mouth and points toward the floor. “Out here.”

“Oh.” I relax a teensy, tiny bit. “I guess that’s okay.”

“I wasn’t asking,” Wes mumbles as he chews, plucking a carrot out of his can next.

“Where are your parents?” I ask, still trying to put all the pieces together.

Wes tosses back the wet orange vegetable. “I never met my dad, and my mom’s locked up.”

“Oh, damn. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. She deserves worse.” Wes’s voice is emotionless as he selects a potato.

“Uh … brothers or sisters?”

His annoyed eyes cut to mine but only for a second before he returns to his meal. “No.”

“Then, why—”

Wes’s head snaps up. “I came back because I found a bomb shelter here when I was a kid. Okay? Out in the woods.” He takes a deep breath through his nose and releases it. When he continues, his voice is a little less defensive. “My plan was to find it this afternoon, after I got supplies … but I burned all my daylight looking for your ass instead.”

Wes and I both look out the door at the same time. A dark blue has fallen over the sky, covering our sunset and tucking it in for the night. That’s what Wes’s comment feels like. I know he meant it to be a jab, but it landed on me like a blanket.

Wes chose finding me over finding shelter for the night.

I stare at his profile as his gaze returns to the can he’s holding. I want to reach out and run my finger down the bridge of his perfect nose. I want to trace the edge of his strong jaw and feel the sandpaper scratchiness of his evening stubble against my fingertip. I want to press that finger between his full pink lips and let him bite it off if he wants to.

Because if Wes thinks he needs me, I’m determined to prove him right.

A chill racks my body as the last of the sun’s warmth disappears along with the color from the sky. “I’ll be right back,” I say, chucking the beef jerky and trail mix back into one of the bags and scrambling over to the ladder.

Wes doesn’t question where I’m going, but his gaze is a silent warning. If I try to run again, he’ll find me.

I try not to smile about that until I’m halfway down the ladder.





Wes


Great job, asshole. You made her fucking run again.

Look, there she goes.

I sit up and watch Rain’s hoodie-shrouded silhouette sprint across the backyard and disappear around the side of the house like she can’t get away from me fast enough.

Maybe she just needs to pee.

Well, if she’s not back in sixty fucking seconds, I’m going after her.

About thirty-five seconds later, I hear a loud crash, like the sound of a window breaking. I lurch forward, ready to jump out of that fucking tree house and see what the hell is going on, but before I make it to the ladder, I see a light come on inside the house. Followed by another one, and another one. I shake my head and flop back down in my seat.

That bitch just broke into her own damn house.

I toss a handful of trail mix into my mouth and watch as lights go on and off in various rooms.

What the hell is she doing in there?

It’s pitch-black outside now, so I dig the flashlight out of one of the grocery bags and turn it on, setting it down so that it shines at the opposite wall. It illuminates a pack of cigarettes sticking out of a crack between the floorboard and wall.

Fuck yeah.

I dig them out—Marlboro Reds—and flip open the lid. When I turn the box over to shake one out, nothing but tobacco dust pours into my hand.

Goddamn it.

I throw the box into the corner and hear the sound of a door slamming in the distance. Seconds later, Rain is full-on sprinting across the lawn with her arms full of God knows what. The house is dark again.

Rain grunts as she climbs the ladder with her arms full, but instead of her head emerging first, a bundle of blankets and pillows comes flying over the threshold before her. Then, a tiny hand setting a bottle of whiskey down on the plywood floor with a thud, followed by the face and body of the girl it belongs to.

Rain is wearing a backpack that’s almost as big as she is. She shrugs it off her shoulders and sits cross-legged next to it in the middle of the floor. Tearing it open, Rain begins talking a mile a minute.

“So, I got you some blankets and a towel and a pillow, and I filled up a couple of water bottles in case you get thirsty. Oh, and I got you some toilet paper and an extra toothbrush and all these little travel-sized toiletries from the one time my parents took me to the beach. We stayed at a real hotel that time, not just a friend of my dad’s that he told me to call Uncle This or Uncle That, like all our other ‘vacations.’” She put finger quotes around the word vacations and continues unpacking. “I remember I tried to order fried chicken from the hotel restaurant, and a lady in the back started screaming, ‘Fried chicken? Fried chicken!’ And then she stormed out the front door and threw her apron on the floor next to my booth on her way out. When our waiter came back, he said, ‘Welp, the cook just quit. How ’bout some grilled cheese?’”