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over to Maeve’s tight-lipped grimace, then to Carri’s watchful gaze. Slowly, he nodded. “Yes, sir, I do. I’d be happy to take Carri out for the night, if that’s okay with you.”
    Herb nodded, and kept nodding. “Good, good. Young people being young. Go. Go on. Get.”
    â€œMom,” Carri started, but Josh simply stood, kissed his own mother on the cheek and took the keys she handed him. He’d parked at her place and rode over with her. If she wanted to leave before he returned, his mother lived two blocks over. She’d be the first one to tell him she could walk.
    â€œC’mon, Carri, we’re not welcome here anymore.” He hooked an arm around one of hers and dragged her out of the chair. He watched, amused, as she bent down and scooped one more mouthful of potatoes into her mouth before grumbling and leaving the table. “I’ll have her home by curfew,” he promised, giving Maeve a quick, private look. “Call if you need . . . anything.”
    Thank you,
Maeve mouthed.

Chapter Four
    â€œYou fell for it.” Carri waited for Josh to start his mother’s car and pull out of her parents’ driveway. “You totally fell for it. Hook, line, and sucker.”
    â€œSinker,” he corrected automatically, putting the car into drive and heading out of the subdivision.
    â€œNo, sucker. You’re a total sucker. The moms played you, and you know it.”
    â€œMaybe,” he admitted, “but your dad wasn’t playing anyone. It seemed the easiest way to not ruin the evening.”
    Carri crossed her arms over her chest and stayed silent, rather than admitting defeat.
    â€œI’d rather cruise around in silence for a while than feel like the moms are watching us for any little hint of a spark. Wouldn’t you?”
    She nodded.
    He drove for a few minutes, then slowed and pulled into the parking lot of a Taco Bell. Looking at him from the side, she watched while he shrugged and got into the drive-thru line.
    â€œHey, we cut out from dinner early. Don’t tell me you don’t still love this crap.”
    She did. She really, embarrassingly did. “Fine. But you don’t get to throw this back at me later if you don’t feel good.”
    â€œI would never,” he lied unconvincingly.
    They ordered their food—Carri ordering nearly twice as much as Josh—and pulled out again. “Where are we going?” she asked, digging into the bag and taking out a chip.
    â€œSomewhere we can eat without people staring.”
    â€œWhy would someone stare? It’s not like anyone knows who you are.” She grinned at that, but instead of throwing an insult back at her, as the usual course of things, he simply gripped the steering wheel tighter and stretched his neck. “Josh?”
    â€œYou suck.”
    It was an insult, but a weak one. Something was up.
    â€œI am rubber and you are glue?” she asked placidly, watching as he drove back toward the direction of their parents’ neighborhood. When he pulled onto a side road, she grinned. He was heading to their old elementary school.
    He turned his mother’s car into the parking lot, drove over the loose rock that had been kicked out of the playground’s boundary lines, and parked beside the deserted area. A few street lamps shone in the distance, and the moon was out in full force, so it wasn’t totally dark. But a little eerie nonetheless.
    Carri paused while he got out of the car. Looking back in at her, he sneered. “Chicken? Afraid some guy with a hook for a hand is gonna spring out of the trees and get you?”
    â€œThat was in one of those scary children’s books, and it was very realistic to a nine-year-old,” she retorted, leaping out and slamming the door shut behind her. “And shut up, or I’ll throw your taco into the trees.”
    â€œIt’s basically poison anyway,” he said,