Where We Left Off (Phoenix Falls Series Book 1)

“I think that we out-emoed ourselves with this one.”

Kit swirls the ladle through the vat of red fruit punch, scooping up some of the skull-shaped ice cubes and then plopping them back in. A slew of punch droplets splash across the front of her white school shirt, making it look like she just went nuts with a machete, and she nods in approval.

We both stayed back after the final bell to set up the hall for the Halloween dance tonight. Yellow CAUTION tape is pinned around the room and spider’s webs laced with fairy lights are flashing from the walls. We made a DIY pampas grass corn maze in the entry, lined with flickering electronic candles and an army of bed-sheet ghosts, and we tried to carve a couple jack-o-lanterns but that shit is hard. We also listened to Drowning Pool on loop before the dance began, so there is not a single brain cell left in either one of our heads.

I watch our schoolmates under the neon lights as they acclimatise to a party on school grounds. The girls are mainly comparing costumes and dancing together, whilst the guys watch them stalkerishly from afar. When the boys start chasing their crushes around the room, I know that the dance has really begun.

“Sucks that you have to leave me here stranded,” Kit shouts over to me, emphasis on sucks because she’s wearing prosthetic fangs. “We did such a good job tonight.”

I agree. I feel like I’m in an episode of The Vampire Diaries. I kind of want to stay and watch the dance but Mitch is keeping good on his word about incarcerating me for the rest of my life, so I’m due for a pickup in around five minutes.

I sigh sadly and let her feed me an extra-large marshmallow.

We jump down from the appetisers table so that I can grab my coat and satchel from the janitor’s closet and then we circle back to the snack station. There’s a group of juniors milling around in front of us, masks lifted on top of their heads whilst they cluster around the drinks. God knows why they’re taking so long. Once they finally vacate the area Kit scoops me a red cup of punch, heavy on the ice skulls, and screams in my ear, “One for the road!”

I fake-sob as I hug her goodbye and then I make my way to the exit, taking a mouthful of the punch as I go.

It’s a combination of every remotely Halloween-sounding juice available. Blood orange, cranberry, black cherry, apple soda, and… I pinch my brows together. This is a weird mix. I sip it again, trying to remember what else we poured in here. Fizzy grape? I can’t remember. I wonder which flavour was the final straw.

I push out of the double doors and, naturally, it’s chucking it down, so I skirt around the side of the building to stay as dry as possible. I scan the lot for Mitch’s death truck but it’s nowhere to be seen, and the streaks of rain on my glasses aren’t helping visibility-wise. I duck back into the doorway to shield myself and I take another swig. Luckily the punch is kind of warming me up from the inside.

When fifteen minutes go by without Mitch arriving I head back into the building to go to the bathroom. The Halloween punch has gone right through me and I practically fall into the stall in my desperation to relieve myself. Has peeing always felt so orgasmic? I dry and flush and stumble to the sinks to wash my hands. I press the tap but for some reason it won’t work. I press it again and again, until I’m about to try a different tap, but then a freshman girl says to me, “It’s a twisty one.”

I blink at her. She’s sort of vibrating.

“Are you okay?”

I don’t know if I just asked her or if she just asked me, so now we’re both staring at each other in bewilderment.

“The tap,” she repeats, “is a twisty one.”

That makes a lot of sense. I twist the tap and the water gushes out so quickly that I start laughing. After I wash my hands I head back out to wait for Mitch feeling light and euphoric. The rain is hammering against my cheeks and it’s such a lovely feeling that I take off my bag and my jacket, and I roll up my sleeves so that the rain can touch as much of body as possible.

I tip my head back and I feel the drops thrash against my neck. I slightly open up my mouth so that I can catch the streams on my tongue.

My glasses are so water-smeared that when the oncoming headlights beam my way I’m seeing kaleidoscopic refractions. I would recognise that dangerous black Ford truck anywhere, and right now I’m happy to see it. I’m fourteen again and quietly romantic. I’m also really stupid, so I decide to walk straight for the bumper as it approaches.

Tate slams the breaks instantaneously and jumps out of the truck. I can tell that if I started to run away right now he would chase me.

He says something loud, angry, and disappointed, but I can’t hear him over the sounds of the rain, the engine, and the common sense trickling out of my head. His tan skin is dripping with water already and I lean against the front of the car so that I can look at him from a broader angle.

This seems to confuse him and he shoves his hands self-consciously into the pockets of his jeans. I let my eyes wander to where his hands are now stuffed. Very interesting.

“Why is your stuff on the floor?” He’s looking over at my jacket and my bag which I forgot to pick up and, before I even respond, he’s collecting them in his arms and bringing them back to me. Only then does he look down and see that I’m drenched. “Did someone take them from you? Are you okay, River?”

He has that angry-concerned look in his eyes, like he’s ready for a round with Caulder 2.0. I feel dizzy but I muster enough strength to claw my jacket out of his arms, even though I’m too warm to put it on.

“River?” he says slowly, like something’s dawning on him.

Something’s dawning on me too. Tate is hot as fuck and I can’t remember why I started hating him.

“River, have you been drinking?”

My eyes scale up his torso and I drink in the breadth of his shoulders. He’s wearing a black long-sleeve shirt, covering up those tattoos that I want to trace over with my nails.

What did he say again?

I find some words. “I’m waiting for Mitch,” I breathe out, whilst simultaneously pulling my sweater vest over my head.

Tate’s eyebrows shoot up and then he quickly starts steering me into the back. His warm hands are encasing my hips from behind as he asks me, “Who got you drunk, River? Tell me his name please.”

His forearm wraps around my stomach as he uses his other arm to open the door for me. I don’t want his touch to leave me just yet so I subtly arch into him, enjoying the hard masculine press of his abs and groin. He sucks in a breath and for a moment I swear that the arm around my belly tightens, but after a few seconds I’m being pushed into the backseat and the door thuds closed behind me.

I assess the area as I pull myself from my hands and knees into an upright sitting position. There’s a large metal handsaw on the floor in front of me, which would be concerning if Tate wasn’t a joiner. He has a jacket on the passenger seat and I snatch it up before he enters the driver’s side. I shrink down in the back and take a deep inhalation of the fabric. I think my eyes are rolling into the back of my head.

As soon as Tate gets behind the wheel and exits the lot I sit up on my knees and lean over his seat. His lips are rolled between his teeth.

“How come you never wanted to go to college or pursue those sports you were always doing?” I ask, sitting back again. “I guess you knew that you were always going to be a joiner like your daddy.” I pause and eye him deviously. “Our daddy.”

He breathes hard and flashes me a look in the rear-view mirror. Then he says, quiet and sober, “It was either that or the priesthood.”

I swing his dangly Christian fish hanging above my window and test the words in my mouth. “Father Coleson. That’s how I like to think of you anyway,” I admit. “You would look so good in one of those little church prisons, on your knees. What do you call them again?”

“Confessionals,” he replies patiently. He smells so good, like fresh rain and testosterone. I lean around further so that I can look at his little silver cross.

“Forgive me Father for I have sinned.”

I smile as his hands tighten their grip on the wheel and he readjusts his lower body against the seat.

“Go on,” I whisper teasingly, “say the bit that comes next.”

He inhales slowly and his chest swells. His voice is low when he looks at me again. “What would you like to confess.”

A thrill jolts through me. My eyes are burning a hole into his mirror and molten caramel is pooling in my belly. Why shouldn’t a God-fearing motorbike-racing jock have a thing for the little librarian emo? I want to grab a handful of his soft chocolate hair and make him beg for me to forgive him. I want him to utilise every muscle on his body for the sole purpose of my pleasure. I think I’m accidentally telepathically transmitting these thoughts to him because he’s running his hand down his face and swallowing like we’re in the Sahara.

Where is my confidence coming from? I know better than to fight it, so I lean into it instead.

Bending forward again, my hands hesitate momentarily in front of his heaving shoulders and then I carefully wrap them around his throat. It’s so hot and thick, and his sharp stubble scratches at the skin of my fingers. I’m so much colder than him that I cause his whole body to shudder, and a rumble sounds deep in his chest as he indicates to Mitch’s street.

“It’s your fault, you know,” I whisper quietly, rocking when we hit a speed bump because, feeling que cera cera, I didn’t strap myself in. “I thought you were my best friend, and you ruined it. And now I have to sleep in your bed and I can’t get this itch off of me. I want this feeling to stop, but there’s only one thing I can think of to solve it, and we… we can’t do that.”

We’re parked up outside Mitch’s house now and the warm porch light is on, but I don’t think that anyone is home. I assume Tate is thinking the same thing because, whilst one hand is still on the wheel, the other is pressing firmly against the tent in his jeans.

“Why can’t we do that?” he pleads, eyes imploring, veins cording.

I throw myself back against the seat and smack my skull against the rock-hard headrest. I rub the ache and a distant déjà vu flashes through me. I shake it away and narrow my eyes on him in a dare.

“Because priests are celibate,” I conclude.

Suddenly he throws open the driver’s door, slams it shut, and then I’m being yanked into the storm outside. His hands grip my waist and his eyes are aflame.

His voice is nothing more than a growl when he finally says, “Then it’s a good thing I’m not a priest.”

He tosses me over his shoulder and thunders into the house.