"Good girl. Later!"
Violet left a vapor trail, racing away before Cameron reached Faith. "Why'd she run off?"
"Class." Faith hid a cringe. "She was asking me to help set up for the party."
"Getting the weekend started right!" he crowed, throwing a possessive arm across her shoulders and pulling her against his side. "You'll be ready at eight, right?"
"Yeah." Her heart sank. "I'll be ready."
Chapter Three
Kyle
The ball came hurtling down in a perfect arc toward left field. Tristan yelled that he had it, but Kyle waved him off, running hard and laying himself out flat to catch it. The front of his body slammed into the grass and slid, but he cupped his mitt around the ball. "Got it!"
"Sawyer, save the diving catches for games, okay?" Coach Swanson yelled. "That goes for you, too, Murrell! That ball was Sawyer's, and I don't need any heroes on the practice field!"
Tristan rolled his eyes, grinning as Kyle peeled himself off the turf. "Nice grass stains."
Kyle looked down. The front of his practice jersey was one big swipe of green. Just the way he liked it. "You know me. Not happy unless I'm filthy."
"That's what all the girls tell me!" Tristan called as he drifted back to his spot about sixty yards away.
Kyle pretended to brush dirt off his knees to hide his flush. "What's your mom say?"
"Bastard!" But Tristan's tone was cheerful. "What, you gonna marry that ball, or throw it?"
Kyle stood, noticing their pitcher was waving at him. Kyle wound back and threw it past his cutoff man at shortstop, straight into the pitcher's waiting mitt. The shortstop tossed up his hands. "Dude, I'm right here. Stop throwing past me!"
"Batting practice!" Coach shouted, and the assistants herded them all to the dugout. "Sawyer, you first, since you seem to have some pent-up energy."
Tristan opened his mouth to make some other smart-ass remark, but Kyle grabbed his bat and headed to the batter's box before he could say anything. Sure, he had a rep to protect, but it got old, listening to all of them talk about his "love life" as if it were a legend in the making. It made his insides squirm, knowing how hard they'd laugh if they knew it was just that: an urban legend.
He swung his bat a few times, then stood ready, waiting for the pitch. A slider, a little high. Kyle let it go by. "Ball!"
"Oh, shut up, Sawyer."
When the pitcher wound up again, Kyle knew it would be a fastball, probably low, but not too low to swing at. The ball came flying toward him, and Kyle swung with full power.
Crack! God, how he loved that sound. The ball sailed over the pitcher's head, and it had good distance. It flew over the fence, and the guys on the bench groaned.
"Home run," Coach said. "Dennings, throw him a changeup. That fastball was a grapefruit, kid."
Kyle stepped back into the batter's box, waggling the bat a bit. Knowing it was a changeup didn't help. He had to see it, understand the trajectory, before he could decide to swing.
The guy wound up, then threw. Kyle saw it go wide and turned his body. The ball smacked into his hip, sending a bolt of numbness down his leg.
"Sorry," Dennings said. The sheepish expression on his face was more than enough to let Kyle know it wasn't on purpose.
Coach let Kyle take a seat after that, sending a sacrificial freshman up for a turn. Tristan turned to him as soon as he sat down. "You going to Vi's party tonight?"
Kyle shook his head. "Other plans, man."
"Please tell me it involves a couple of college girls and a pillow fight."
"I don't talk." He raised an eyebrow at Tristan. "I like to give you guys something to wonder about."
"Must be something good." Tristan heaved a sigh. "Wish I could come with."
Kyle snorted. His date was with a lawn mower. He doubted Tristan would find that exciting. "Sorry … this is a one-man job."
And, for as long as he could keep the con running, that's all it would ever be.
The sound of a lawn mower wasn't a song of boring chores. No, it was his future. Kyle smiled as Avenged Sevenfold blared through his earbuds, barely drowning out the Toro's motor. He loved spring … and he loved the work that came with it. He might not get the periodic table, but he could turn someone's lawn into a green carpet of awesome.
His dad called it a gift. Kyle couldn't disagree. He understood plants better than people sometimes, and definitely more than words that rearranged themselves on the page without warning. If anyone at school figured out his love of gardening, though, he'd never hear the end of it. That's why he drove the black Charger his grandpa had given him for his seventeenth birthday to school, and why his beloved Toyota pickup with ninety thousand miles on it stayed hidden inside their six-car garage so their snobby neighbors wouldn't complain.
He laughed as he made a turn around the Denkhoffs' lawn. They had great grass, and a big-ass yard surrounding their big-ass house. He could charge thirty bucks to mow it and Mrs. Denkhoff didn't even bat an eyelash. None of his customers did, not when they found out he could work a form of alchemy that resulted in "best lawn in the neighborhood" awards and the envy of their neighbors.
The air had a little bite to it, but he could tell it would warm up fast this week. March was always like that in North Texas. Some years it was fifty degrees and raining. Some years it was ninety degrees and humid as hell. From the blue sky above, Kyle knew the weekend would be gorgeous, probably low eighties and sunny.
He had pushed the mower around the bend at the side of the house when the lady next door waved at him. She looked vaguely familiar … wait-she was the woman in those TV ads about the children's cancer center. That's right-she ran the Gladwell Foundation. Dad was a fan and donated money to it every year.
He powered down the mower and took out his earbuds. "Did you call me, ma'am?"
"Are you Kyle?" she asked, breathless.
She stood atop the retaining wall between the yards, making him crane his neck to look up at her. God, he hadn't broken one of their sprinkler heads or something, had he? "Yes, ma'am?"
"Thank goodness. Sherry tells me you're good with yards. I'm having a benefit tea in my backyard in a month, and we have some serious problems with our grass back there. Well, that's not true. We have serious problems with everything back there." She smiled. "I'm Michelle Gladwell, by the way. I think you go to school with my daughter? Faith?"
If he did, he didn't know her. There were seven hundred students in his senior class. Kyle shrugged. "Yeah, I guess we do."
"So, would you have time to take a look? At the grass I mean?"
He barely choked back a laugh. What, was she worried he thought she meant Faith? Sorry, lady, your daughter's virtue is safe with me. "Is tomorrow morning okay? It's already getting dark, but I have plenty of time to get started this weekend."
"That's perfect."
After letting her know he'd be by around ten to give her an estimate, he cranked up his music and started the mower again. He usually avoided customers with kids who went to Suttonville with him, but it probably didn't matter. It wasn't like he'd see much of Faith anyway, and so what if she told people he mowed lawns? You could still be a badass and have a job, right?
Maybe he should've taken up auto repair. Dad had insisted he get a job that required manual labor. The piles of homework, the long hours of baseball practice, and the trust fund didn't matter. His father believed in hard work.
"Son, I don't care if you don't have to work for a living … ever," he'd said when Kyle turned thirteen. "There's value in seeing how everyone else lives-and everyone else has a job. So figure out what you like to do, and do it."
The very next day, he'd offered to mow Mrs. Perkins's lawn. She was eighty, stone deaf, and the richest widow in the neighborhood. It had taken him four hours to learn how to work the mower and edger and finish the job. When he was done, she'd given him five bucks and a pat on the head. He'd stared down at the five-dollar bill like it was a Franklin, and even now pride rose in his chest at the memory. He'd finished the job, on his own, and had proof he could do something right.
He started mowing for her every week after that. Soon he was mowing her friends' lawns, and branching out into full landscaping work.
Now he owned a pickup truck with one of those magnetic decals on the side: Hard Rock Landscaping. He even had a business cell phone.
If anyone at school figured out just how seriously he took his work, it would ruin his image. Better to let them think it was community service for a misdemeanor, because Kyle Sawyer, the trust-fund gardener, sounded much less cool than Kyle Sawyer, the delinquent.
And he needed to hold on to that image. He wasn't going back to being that weedy, picked-on eighth grader. Not ever again.
Chapter Four
Faith
The doorbell rang five minutes early. Cameron was never, ever early.
That wasn't a good sign.
Faith rushed to finish her mascara as Mom called, "Honey! Cameron's here!"
Her palms grew damp with sweat, and her stomach turned over. The party was going to be great, sure, but how could she go with him knowing she wanted to end it? Could she tell Cameron she was ready to move on? That she was tired of hearing about football, tired of how his hands always drifted toward her ass when he put an arm around her waist?