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family visit,” she tells me. “I think Mr.
Carter is a nice man, and I know he just wants his son to grow up
and get it together. I know he’s a teenage boy, and some of them do
grow out of it, but I don’t want you excluding your other options
before you even have chance to explore them.”
    I stare at her, a bit unsure what in the
world I’m supposed to say to that. Rooks and I aren’t talking
marriage…or dating for that matter.
    “I know it’s early, and you’re still working
on your coffee, but I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I
admit.
    She takes another sip, like it’s for good
measure, and tries again. “You’re going to meet a lot of new people
at school this fall, and Rooks will be back at his mom’s house,”
she says. “I don’t want you investing too much of your time or
attention in a cute boy with a bad reputation who won’t even be
here in a few months. You have too much ahead of you, and I don’t
think he’s cute enough to risk your feelings. That’s all.”
    Obviously, she hasn’t taken a good enough
look at the boy because, aside from that gorgeous guy on Pretty
Little Liars, I think he pretty much wins at hotness. And Rooks is
a civilian without Hollywood glam, so really, he’s a step
ahead.
    “Okay,” I say, wishing I had a better
comeback. I’m sure in about fifteen years, I’ll be all ‘oh, my mom
was right about everything,’ but that day is definitely not today.
    Mom doesn’t have a chance to argue with me
between her coffee-sipping and the ring of the doorbell. She greets
the Carters with a high-pitched ‘good morning’ and asks if they’d
like any coffee. Mr. Carter, of course, would love some. Rooks
declines, giving Mom another reason to dislike him because coffee
is the drink of gods.
    After giving Mr. Carter the rundown on what
time the flooring guys will be here and which rooms they’re working
on today, she turns to Rooks and me.
    “So, what’s on the agenda for today?” she
asks, looking at him more than me.
    Rooks clears his throat. “Breakfast at
Waterfront Café and then I’d planned on showing Piper around. You
know, just the basics of Coral Sands. See where everything is,” he
says.
    Mom stares at him for a second, like she’s
not sure if she believes him. “Well, I hope there’s more to see
than when I used to live here,” she says. “Please just be safe
today. Stay out of trouble. And don’t come back until after six
tonight.”
    I’ll never quite understand my mom. She
thinks Rooks is a bad influence and nothing but trouble for me, yet
she sends me out of the house for the entire day alone with him.
All for new floors. Is throwing your daughter to the wolf the price
for hardwood these days?
    Then again, the daughter doesn’t really mind
being thrown to this wolf.
    Rooks says that he’s going to crank his truck
to get the air flowing. I grab the beach bag from inside Mom’s
office and rush out behind him. I barely have the passenger door
shut before he backs out of my driveway.
    “Alright, Davenport,” he says. “Spill it.
What’s in the papers?”
    “Letters,” I tell him. “But I only made it
through the first one.”
    He exhales harshly, like he’s shocked. “One
letter? Are you kidding me? After all that excitement and secrecy,
you only read one letter?” he asks.
    “I was exhausted,” I say in my defense. “I
would’ve read every last one of them if I could have, but I had to
sleep. My mom’s on a crazy schedule. I sleep when I can.”
    “Fair enough,” Rooks says to his windshield.
“So, what’s the story?”
    I tell him about Seth’s letter and how I
think it’s a series of love letters between him and Hanna. I may
not have read the other letters because my eyelids were like a
landslide, but skimming through the stack, it was obvious that not
every letter was Seth’s chicken scratch. I chose sleep over Hanna
Calloway. I don’t think she could’ve held my interest last
night.
    “So you think