No Place Like Homecoming, Dallen, Maggie [beach read book .TXT] 📗

to my locker, ready to shove some books in there before I drove home. I wasn’t sure why I was rushing. Since my mom had flown to New Jersey with my brothers, it was just me at the house. Packing up an entire house alone was depressing, but it kept me busy.

But even so, I wasn’t in a rush to go home to a nearly empty house and a mailbox full of bills. Not to mention the Sold sign out front. All of it screamed ticking time bomb. I wasn’t even sure why I was going through this farce of going to school when I’d be quitting in a few weeks’ time.

I guess because it gave me something to do, right? Plus, it had made my mom happy. It’d be that much easier to get my GED when I left this place. So, win-win, right?

Yeah. Sure.

I took my time at my locker, waiting for the first wave to leave. The parking lot was always a mess right after the bell rang. The hallways were starting to clear when I passed by the new girl’s locker. Isla.

The girl had been in two more of my classes today, and she’d been just as standoffish and snotty in every one. Not just to me. I mean, I couldn’t have cared less that she didn’t want to be pals. But I didn’t miss the way the others stared. At the way they whispered when she refused to smile and make nice.

It was kinda funny to watch. Clearly my fellow seniors had no idea what to make of this girl from the big city.

I’d almost passed her when the sound of her voice hit me like a brick. It wasn’t what she was saying, it was the way she was saying it. She was practically hissing, her voice quiet but desperate. “What do you mean he restricted access? He can’t do that to me.”

She held the phone to her ear with one hand and pinched the bridge of her nose with the other. Her eyes were squeezed shut and...crap.

Was she—

Was she crying?

I looked around in alarm, hoping to spot Callie or Willow. Heck, even Savannah would be a better option than me.

A, she clearly didn’t like me. B, the feeling was mutual. And C, I had absolutely no clue what to do in the face of tears.

I started to walk away, but her sudden and loud inhale made me freeze. I glanced over to see her shaking her head. “No, you said you’d talk to him. You said you’d handle it.”

I looked from the new girl to the door and back again. To walk away or to help?

Ah crap. Who was I fooling? It was like this weekend’s wedding reception all over again. Sure she was hot, and yeah she’d walked these halls like some fearless warrior all day today, but right now, all I could see was somebody vulnerable.

Not terrifying. Not a brat—not at this particular moment, at least. She was just...sad. Upset. And I found myself walking over to her before I could stop to think. She hung up the phone with a sigh just before I reached her. “You okay?”

She tensed at the sound of my voice, but a heartbeat later she was turning to face me, her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Were you eavesdropping?”

I gave a laugh of disbelief. “No. I was walking past and you seemed upset, and so—”

“And so...what? You wanted to rub it in?” she snapped.

I flinched at the sharpness in her tone. Even more at the suspicion. “Wow. That was completely uncalled for.”

Her defensive posture eased a bit, but there was still a wariness about her.

I held my hands up and backed up a step. “I was just making sure you were all right, that’s all.”

Her eyes narrowed further. “Do I look like a damsel in distress?”

“No. You look...” I eyed her from her long wavy brown hair to her black flats. She looked gorgeous. But the look in her eyes was still wariness and anger. Like an alley cat backed into a corner, ready to hiss. “You look feral.”

Her brows came down in a scowl that was so fierce it bordered on comical.

There it was again. That urge to laugh. Honestly, I wasn’t much of a joker, and I hadn’t found much to laugh about since my dad left. Stepping up and filling shoes that were never meant to be mine wasn’t exactly a laugh riot. But this girl? She cracked me up.

Unintentionally, of course.

“Okay, well, since you clearly don’t need my help…” I started to walk away.

“I definitely don’t need your help. I don’t need anyone’s help.” She was muttering to herself now, and even though she was kind of the most atrocious human I’d ever met, I felt a kick of sympathy at the bitterness in her voice.

Whatever was going on with her, she was in a rough spot.

But—I pushed open the doors to the parking lot and ducked my head as a late afternoon storm dumped rain on me. Then again, so was I.

I had my own problems to worry about, and my family deserved my focus. They needed it.

I told myself that as I headed to the car. I told myself that as I turned on the windshield wipers. I told myself that as I tried my best not to think about the pained expression she’d worn before she’d realized I’d spotted her.

I even tried to tell myself that as I pulled out of the parking lot and saw her huddled in on herself. She was walking home. In the rain.

Crap.

I was more annoyed than anyone when I pulled my car over to the side of the road beside her.

She glanced over with that suspicious glare as I rolled down my window. “Get in.”

Her lower lip jutted out, and the term spoiled brat didn’t begin to do this girl justice. She stood there getting drenched for a full thirty seconds before finally reaching for the car door and sliding in.

Her T-shirt and