When We Collided(27)

“Are you guys coming to the bonfire next week? I’d love to meet her.” Ellie slips into the office, setting down the inventory list.

The bonfire is an annual tradition for Verona Cove locals and the two tiny towns nearest us, right after the Fourth of July. “I think so. Silas drew the short straw, so he has to stay home with the littles. But I’ll be there and probably Naomi, too.”

Ellie looks back at me, frowning. “Is your mom out of town?”

Stupid, stupid, stupid. I let it slip that my mom can’t watch three kids. “No. Yes. Well, kind of. Just for that night, she’s driving down the coast to meet up with an old friend. Or something. I think.”

“Oh. Okay.” She slides out of the office and past me, smiling hesitantly. “Well, see you guys there, then.”

I can’t believe I lied to Ellie. When I was eleven, I split my knee open trying to keep up with Silas and Diego, Ellie’s brother. Ellie, even though she was only ten at the time, dabbed ointment on the cut with a cotton swab and smoothed a Band-Aid over it. She’s good to her core.

I step into the office, stooping down to the safe. I sift through to a little plastic bag with my name on it. As I’m squeezing out of the office, I shake my head, smiling. As usual, there are papers strewn all over the desk and even taped up on the wall. Felix, like my dad, takes the “it’s not messy if I know where everything is” approach.

But my eye catches on something. A red stamp on an envelope, blaring PAST DUE. It’s half-hidden behind another envelope, but I lift it up. There are a few more below it, all stamped in bright reds. Addressed to my dad. So much for the oatmeal and the running. I’m about to have a heart attack.

The sound of knocking at the door nearly does me in. I grip my chest in surprise, and it takes me a moment to recover. I slide the envelopes back under the papers.

I figure it’s Ellie, back because she forgot something. Instead, I open the back door to Vivi. “Um . . . hey.”

“I’m on my way to work, and I saw your car parked here.” But she doesn’t look happy to see me. She looks wounded. “Who was the girl I saw leave?”

“Oh. Just Ellie. Felix’s daughter.”

I swear I see her lip tremble. “You were here, alone, with her?”

Aw, crap. I am in a situation. “I wasn’t with her. I stopped in to get my tip money, and she was doing freezer inventory.”

She watches me still, judging every movement. “She’s pretty.”

I’ve never seen Vivi be anything but . . . joyful, and I can’t tell if she’s teasing me. She could actually be jealous or mad. I’m pretty sure I didn’t do anything wrong, but there’s no handbook. “I’ve known her my whole life, Viv.”

She considers this. “Almost like she’s a sister to you?”

No, not exactly. “Yeah.”

“That was not convincing, Jonah.” She crosses her arms, waiting for me to plead my case.

Okay. Switching tactical approach away from defense. I’ll play flattery on the offense. It’s easy because I mean it. “Viv?”

“What.”

“You are the only girl I ever think about.” It’s true.

This makes her smile, almost shyly, which is not a typical Vivi adjective. The smile spreads—bright red and scheming.

Without giving me even a moment to prepare, she leaps onto me, locking her arms around my neck. She kisses me like someone with failing lungs, like her only source of oxygen is me.

If someone had asked me before I met Vivi, Hey, Jonah, would you like a girlfriend who is all over you?, the answer would have been yes. But, of all the quirks about life with Vivi, her ready-or-not approach to kissing me is the most disorienting. She goes from zero to pouncing in less than three seconds. I never see it coming. She’ll be barely paying attention one second and then, in the next second, grab my face like she’s been marooned on an island, and I’m the first guy she’s seen in years.

I’m not complaining. But I can’t do this here, not in my dad’s kitchen. Not with those envelopes tormenting me. My mind can’t shut off enough to kiss her back. I expect my dad to walk in any moment and ground me until the apocalypse. He won’t, of course, and that thought makes everything worse. Really, the place where your dead dad feels most alive is probably the least sexy location ever.

“Viv,” I say, setting her down on the prep table. She keeps her legs hooked around my waist. “I can’t, okay? Not here. Where my dad . . . I just. Sorry.” I wince preemptively. There’s a good chance she’ll storm off.

Instead, she releases her legs and wipes her lipstick smudges from my mouth. “Of course. Rain check. I just couldn’t resist, you handsome devil.”

We stay there together for a moment, eye-to-eye. She slides her fingers into my hair as if she can actually get ahold of my brain. Then she gives me that look, her blue eyes trying to cut right through me. She searches. “All right. What’s going on in there?”

I shake my head, and she moves her hands down to my neck. The way they’re wrapped, her thumbs could get an easy read on my pulse. “The restaurant . . . I don’t think it’s doing as well as I thought it was. I think there might be some money problems.”

“Oh.” Her lips twitch downward for a split second. Then she hops off the table. “Then you should fix it.”