“I knew I should have waited to take my break.” Emma slid three tickets and a receipt beneath the glass to her next customer, glancing at Doug every chance she got.
“Em, what do you see in him? I mean, other than the obvious.” Because for a short-term, nontoxic, casual good time, the obvious would have been plenty.
She shrugged and slid two more tickets under the glass. “I don’t know. He’s hot and he’s fun. Why does it have to be deeper than that? We’re not all looking for a lifetime commitment at sixteen, Kay.”
“I’m not…” I started to argue, then gave up. I wasn’t sure what I was looking for from Nash, but it definitely wasn’t short-term fun. “Em, I don’t think you should—”
“Shhhh!” she hissed as Doug stepped up to the counter, his lopsided grin showing off just one dimple, and I knew I’d lost her. She smiled and leaned forward on the counter, and somehow her uniform clung to her curves, where mine only hung from my angles. “Hey.”
“Hey. So, you wanna come over after you close?” he said, and the people in line behind him started grumbling.
I slid a debit card beneath the glass on my side of the counter and tried not to groan out loud.
Reason number eighteen that Kaylee should not lie: she never gets away with it.
Em frowned. “I’m not closing—it’s a school night. I get off in two hours.”
“But Kaylee said…” Doug glanced at me, and I stared at the counter, relieved when the customer behind him moved into my line, giving me something to do.
“She was wrong.” Em was mad. Of course she was mad.
“Meet me at five?”
“Uh, I gotta do something first.” His hand jerked on the counter, and my stomach pitched. “I’ll pick you up at seven.”
“Okay.” Emma smiled for him, but didn’t even look at me until he’d stepped out of line, already heading down the steps toward the parking lot. She served her next customer in silence while I handed back change, then both lines were empty for the moment.
Emma turned on me while Doug veered toward the rental I’d seen in his driveway, now double-parked in two handicapped spots on the front row. “What the hell, Kaylee?”
I twisted on my stool, brainstorming damage control that would not come. “I’m sorry. I just… I don’t think he’s good for you.”
“Because he hit your car? That was an accident, and I’m sure he’ll pay for it.”
“Yeah. He already got me a loaner.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
I sighed, grasping for some way to explain without…well…explaining. My urge to protect her from all things Netherworld was overwhelming, and my gut was all I had to go on at the moment. “He’s not safe, Emma.”
She rolled her eyes. “I don’t want safe. I want fun, and Doug is fun.”
“Yeah, he’s so fun he tried to haul you off while you were drunk. What do you think would have happened next, Em?”
“Nothing I didn’t want to do.” She crossed her arms beneath her breasts. “What? You think Nash is perfect?”
My pulse spiked and I thought about him Influencing his way up my shirt that morning. But Em didn’t know about that. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing.” Emma sighed and leaned with both elbows on the counter, watching through the glass as Doug unlocked his car. “I’m just saying guys only come in a couple of models, and Nash didn’t exactly break the mold. So lay off my boyfriend until you’re ready to take a closer look at yours.”
I had no idea what to say to that. So Nash was getting a little pushy. That was nothing compared to Doug breathing toxic fumes all over her.
In the lot, Doug’s arm twitched as he pulled open his car door. Emma didn’t even notice, but I knew what those twitches meant, and I was pretty sure I knew what he had to do before he picked her up. I had to tell her something—had to at least warn her, if I couldn’t keep her away from him.
I took a deep breath and twisted on my stool to face her as Doug pulled out of the lot. “Emma, Doug’s into something new. Something really bad. It’s called frost.”
She frowned, ignoring the customer who stepped up to her window. “What are you talking about?”
“Just listen. Please. It comes in a black balloon, and it will kill him. And if you inhale any of it, it could kill you, too. Or drive you insane. For real.”
Emma’s frown deepened. “You’re serious?”
“So serious.” I looked straight into her brown eyes, wishing she could see the sincerity surely swirling in mine. “Nash and I saved your life once and I’m trying to do it again. If you see Doug with a black balloon or even if he just starts acting weird, go home. Okay? Whatever you’re doing, just stop and go home.”
The man in front of the glass knocked on the window, but we both ignored him.
Emma’s eyes widened and she clutched the counter. “Kaylee, you’re kind of creeping me out.”
“I know.” I took both of her hands when she started to turn toward the window. “But you have to promise you’ll go home if he starts acting weird. Swear.”
“Fine, I swear,” she said as the man knocked harder and a second customer appeared in front of my window. “But I gotta tell ya, you’re the one acting weird right now, Kay.”
I knew that, too. But at least my brand of weird probably wasn’t going to get anybody killed. No one other than me, anyway.
“YOU WANT THE GOOD news, or the bad?” Nash asked as soon as I opened the front door. I took the pizza from him and he pulled the door shut as he stepped inside.
“Bad first.” Because I was a “get it out of the way” kind of gal. I set the pizza box on the coffee table and headed into the kitchen for a couple of sodas. He tossed his jacket over one of the chairs around the table in our eat-in kitchen.
“Okay, Carter has tried the balloon, and I think he was still flying pretty high when I got there this afternoon. He was talking fast and leaping from one subject to the next. I could hardly keep up with him.”
“But Doug didn’t act anything like that. He was slurring and reacting kind of sluggish. And seeing things.”
“I know.” Nash flipped open the pizza box and sank onto the couch. “It seems to be affecting them both differently. But the good news is that Sophie’s at the Winter Carnival committee fundraiser, so the chances of her inhaling anything from him tonight are pretty slim. If that’s even possible. She’s probably safe until tomorrow.”
“This good news isn’t sounding so good.” I set a Coke can on the end table nearest him.
“Okay, then how ’bout this…” He pulled me onto his lap, and my unopened soda fell from my hand to roll under the coffee table. “I talked him into bringing the balloon to school tomorrow, so I can ‘try’ it.”
My smile reflected his own. “And we’re gonna get rid of it before he has a chance to share, right?”
Nash’s grin widened, and he kissed me before lowering me to the couch next to him. “That’s the plan.”
“Okay, I like that part. So, how are we going to get the balloon? Ask Tod to pop in and snatch it for us?”
“Even better.” He leaned to one side and dug in his hip pocket, then pulled out a single key with an electronic lock on a plain silver ring.
I frowned. “You stole Scott’s car key?” Yes, it was convenient, and meant we wouldn’t have to actually break into the car, which was equally illegal. Still…
Nash shook his head. “I just borrowed it from the kitchen junk drawer. He won’t notice it’s gone until he locks himself out of his car again, and with any luck, I’ll have it back way before then. How else are we supposed to get into his car?”
“Tod can do it without stealing a key.”
He raised a brow in challenge, pulling one slice of pizza free from the others. “Does that make it morally acceptable?”
“No, that makes it easier and safer. Tod won’t get caught, and we won’t be connected to a B and E on school grounds.”
“Tod got in trouble for missing too much work,” Nash said around a mouthful of pepperoni. “So he’s working for the next forty-eight hours straight, with no breaks. Evidently some poor old lady lingered on the wrong side of a second heart attack when the first should have done the job.”