Of course that was all he was giving me. “Yes,” I told him, disappointed.
He smirked.
I didn’t trust it.
“Ready to go?” he asked, holding the coffee out.
I nodded and took it as I got up, picking up my own bag from where I’d stashed it between my legs because I didn’t trust someone to not run up and steal my things. Stopping beside him, I peeked at his bag, and he definitely pulled it even closer to his side.
“Nosy,” he said, his fingers brushing mine as he plucked the strap out of my hand.
I tried to take it back. “I can carry it.”
“You need to work out those puny arms,” he said, tugging it out of my hand again. “But you still smell sick. Let me carry it.”
He was right on that part. Walking through the mall had worn me out. “Okay,” I said, letting go. “But question.”
I was pretty sure his mouth twitched.
That was my cue to keep going. I dropped my voice. “Does that even feel like anything to you? You know, because you’re so strong?”
Those eyes that weren’t as dark blue as they’d been half an hour ago flicked toward me as we walked back the same way I’d come. He made a thoughtful sound. “It’s more work for me to carry this because I have to think about not overdoing it, than it is for me to…”
“Pick up an eighteen-wheeler?” I asked, referring to a video of him carrying a semi that had driven off a bridge a few years ago. He’d just happened to be at the right place and time, on the way back from an incident off the coast of California that I couldn’t remember.
Alex nodded. “Yeah. That’s nothing too.”
I whistled. “And I think I’m a bad shit when I finally open a jar that’s a pain in the ass.” I raised my arm and flexed, even though he couldn’t see anything under the big jacket.
He flicked that strange but beautiful gaze over to me. “I break jars as much as I open them,” he admitted quietly.
I bet. “What’s the heaviest thing you’ve ever lifted?”
That smooth forehead furrowed, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a couple of girls coming toward us, tilting their heads in our direction, their eyes glued to Alex.
He didn’t notice, or if he did, he ignored it.
“A fully loaded cargo ship.”
“Was it hard?”
He looked at me and raised an eyebrow.
So it was like that? I reached over and squeezed his forearm.
The muscles beneath my fingers flexed, and I whistled again, pleased with him for playing along, before I let go.
I guess now that I wasn’t on his shit list, and maybe since he understood I wasn’t trying to kidnap or take advantage of him, he’d decided he could be friendlier. I’d take it. Gladly.
We caught up to a family walking in front of us, four people across. A teenage boy wearing a shirt with the symbol of the Trinity on it was holding his arm out, letting his grandma use him as a cane. It was so sweet.
“How do you stay in shape? It’s not like you can go to the gym,” I asked as soon as we passed them. I took the final sip of our drink and threw the plastic into the nearest recycling bin.
“It’s natural.”
I groaned. Superior genes, my fucking ass. “Incredible, beautiful, rich, and a naturally fit. The world is so unfair.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him glance at me, and his voice was a little funny as he asked, “You think that about me?”
“I was talking about your sister.”
I was pretty sure he wasn’t even expecting the chuckle that snuck out of him.
I tipped my head and grinned at him.
The slight smile he’d made while he laughed slowly fell off, and I looked away.
We finished going through the mall and out the electronics store, heading to the parking lot where he put our things in the back seat. We got inside, and I purposely kept my mouth closed as he pulled out of the lot and drove in the same direction we’d come from. He drove and he drove. My mind must have been too busy originally to notice just how far away we’d been from his house.
But all of a sudden, the Ferris wheel I’d been eyeballing on the way to the mall got bigger and bigger. The next thing I knew, he was pulling into the dirt lot for the fair.
We were at the carnival.
I slowly swiveled in the seat to look at him. “Really?”
He put the car into park and turned it off before turning toward me too. “Yes, really.”
I shouldn’t have been so excited. I knew it. It was just a carnival, like all the others I’d driven by countless times. There were plenty of things I was used to doing alone. The movies? No problem. Out to eat? Every once in a while, but only because I was cheap and ate at home. Since my grandma had passed, I’d gone to two concerts, even though I’d been paranoid the whole time for no good reason.
But that was it.
It was stupid how excited I was, I thought, as I took in the Ferris wheel some more, and the rides that looked kind of sketchy but fun with all their multicolored lights on. There were booths with games and a couple cart-looking things with signs that claimed they had funnel cakes, corn dogs, and popcorn.
“You ever been to one of these before?” I asked, lifting my hands toward my mouth and blowing into them. The temperature was getting a little cooler. How fucking lucky had we been that it hadn’t been this cold while we’d been trying to get away?
“Nope.” He put his hands into the pockets of his jacket but not because he was cold.
He didn’t ask if I had, and I had a feeling he knew the answer. “We don’t have to stay for long. I’d be happy just getting a funnel cake, if you’ll let me borrow money. I only have four dollars left.”
He nodded.
Putting my own hands into the pockets of the jacket I had on, I hustled faster to catch up with his long stride. It was just barely starting to get dark, and there weren’t a ton of people around, but there were some. Little kids clinging to their parents. Couples holding hands. Groups of teenagers clustered together, sharing cotton candy and pointing at different attractions, like they were trying to decide what to do. I watched Alex keeping an eye on an older man pushing a wheelchair with a woman about the same age in it.
“Let’s get tickets first,” Alex said suddenly, putting his hand on the back of my neck and steering me toward a cart with a short line in front of it.
I guess he’d been serious about being okay with the touching thing. It wasn’t like I minded it. I liked the way he made my skin kind of tingle.
“Really?” I asked him, peering up at his profile. Part of me still couldn’t believe it.
His hand tightened a little as his gaze dropped to mine briefly before he looked around. “Yes, really.”
“We can leave whenever you want. I’m just happy to be here.” I thought about it. “But could we get a funnel cake for sure? Please?”
He snickered, but the corner of his mouth hitched up a little as he gave my neck another little squeeze. “You got it, Cookie.”
“It’s rigged,” I whispered right before shoving a handful of cotton candy into my mouth as we stood in front of a booth with figures lined up in rows that you were supposed to knock down with softballs.