Read Buried (Hiding From Love #3) for Free Online Page B

nearly stops. I close my eyes, a sharp pain stabbing through my chest as I try to take a breath. I slowly return the frog to the dirt beneath the shrub. Then I stand and roll my shoulders before I turn around.
    David was always an inch or two shorter than me, but he’s filled out, not the skinny kid I used to put in a headlock when we were fucking around at soccer practice. He has his hair cut short—a business cut, I think they call it. He’s wearing a short-sleeved polo shirt untucked over a pair of faded jeans. His watch is expensive, and I notice a set of Volvo keys dangling from his fingers.
    My eyes shoot over his shoulder to where Beth stands a few feet away, her hands clasped in front of her chest, a look of hope on her face. She gives me a small, encouraging smile, and I know I have to do this even though it’s nearly enough to put me down for the count.
    I scratch my head, not sure how to begin.
    “Yeah,” David says as he takes a step closer. “I don’t know what the hell to say either.” He puts out his hand and we clasp for a moment. “It’s good to see you, hermano ,” he tells me quietly.
    I release his hand. “I guess I know how you ended up here,” I answer.
    He raises an eyebrow to me then glances behind him. Beth has vanished, leaving us to deal with one another in all our angst and awkwardness.
    “You look real good, bro.”
    “Thanks, man.” He stuffs his car keys in his front pocket. “Beth tells me you’re here for a few weeks, yeah?”
    I nod. “Yeah, just, uh… Just trying to get settled, you know. Find a job, a place to live.”
    Fuck, this is humiliating. I want to either die or crawl into the dirt with the frog. David’s everything I always thought I’d be—professional, clean-cut, smooth. The kind of guy girls like his sister should be with. The kind of guy who lives in a big house in San Antonio.
    “That’s great, man. Any ideas what you might do? Where you’ll live?”
    I glance down at the spot where the frog was and see that he’s disappeared. Lucky bastard.
    “Not too sure, no. They’ve got all kinds of fancy ideas for me, but I imagine I’ll be washing dishes at a restaurant or something.”
    David scrutinizes me. It’s a dumb-ass word, but there’s no other way to describe it.
    “Yeah, you always loved washing up after your mom made enchiladas, so I can see why that’d be a good choice.”
    I can’t help it. I snort. My mom made the cheesiest enchiladas ever seen, and our little apartment didn’t have a dishwasher—well, except for me. Trying to pry all that melted cheese off the plates after enchiladas was sheer torture. I used to pay David all my lawn mowing money to get him to do it for me.
    “Seriously, hermano ,” he says as he walks past me and sits backwards on the bench at the picnic table. “What the hell are you doing? A dishwasher? Why don’t you go back to school, try community college or something? Maybe coach some soccer? You’re good at all kinds of shit, and you know as well as I do that you’re a good damn student. There’s no reason you should be washing dishes at some greasy spoon.”
    I try really hard not to scoff at him as I kneel and start pulling tiny weeds out of the flowerbed I’ve created next to the rosebush.
    “Yeah, well, ain’t no one going to be letting me near their kids to coach soccer, bro. In case you don’t remember, I just spent four years locked up for killing a kid. Not exactly soccer coach material.”
    “You spent four year locked up for the being in the general vicinity when a kid got killed. Beth doesn’t think you did it,” he answers, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees.
    “Beth’s got a good heart, man. But not much knowledge about how the world really works.”
    He nods like he’s thinking about stuff. His lips kind of purse the same way Beth’s do when she’s about to let loose over something.
    “Funny thing is, I don’t think you did it either. I spent my whole fucking