1986: Why Can't This Be Love (Love in the 80s #7) (3 page)

I couldn’t let it go. Not now. Not after he’d helped me.

“He must think I’m a richie, huh? I’m not, you know. I mean, my family’s not poor or anything, but we’re not rich either.”

Dylan paused, his back to me, slumped shoulders full of tension. “You think he’s talking about social class?” He laughed. “Babe, you don’t know anything about me. For all you know, I could have spent the past year in jail.”

“Did you?” I asked.

He stiffened, head high.

I forgot how to blink, my round eyes burning a hole through his back. “Oh my God! You did, didn’t you? You totally did!”

“No,” he grunted, spinning to face me, “but it’s an easy assumption, right?”

Something inside me broke. Maybe it was compassion or maybe it was the way my stomach fluttered when I looked at him, but I suddenly knew I wasn’t going to leave.

Dropping my gaze, I mumbled, “I want to stay.” And then rushed to add, “Just for a little while.” In case he got any ideas.

Gathering up the courage to look at him, I glanced up and found him grinning.

“Really?” he asked. “You want to stay?”

“Yeah.”

His gaze shot up, settling on a large, round wall clock behind the shoe counter. “You got a curfew?”

“Midnight.”

“Like Cinderella,” he murmured, studying the time. It was half past nine. “I still need to fix that photo booth,” he hedged, his gaze lighting up.

The silent implication forced a nervous chuckle out of me, and I redirected with, “Do you bowl?”

Laughter filled his eyes. “My uncle owns a bowling alley. I’m a mad bowler.” Coming toe-to-toe with me, he peered down into my face. “And you’re playing it safe.”

I didn’t deny it, the blood rushing to my face, heart racing.

“Come on.” He winked. “Let's play.”

L
et’s be honest
, I was a terrible bowler. Which sucked, because Dylan hadn’t been lying about his mad skills. For every strike he threw, I threw a gutter ball.

It was a long game because Dylan kept leaving me, getting shoes for people coming in or checking a lane when something got jammed. His uncle stalked the place, his gaze boring into me with each pass.

“He’s really buggin’,” I hissed, my gaze finding Dylan.

Walking a ball to the lane, he lined up the shot, and released. All but two pins went down, and he got those with the second shot. I gave up trying to win.

Dylan’s gaze swept the place, locating his uncle. “He’s just trying to protect me.”

“You?” I asked, surprised. “Get real!”

After what his uncle said to me? The way he’d warned me away?

Dylan glanced at me, amused. “What? You think my heart can’t be broken?”

“He warned
me
away from
you
,” I reminded him.

Shrugging, Dylan straddled the chair in front of the scoreboard. “Doesn’t matter. It was a reminder that chicks like you don’t normally dig punks like me unless you’re looking for a good time. I’m not the kind of guy you bring home to your mama.”

He was wrong.

Without thinking, I blurted, “I’d bring you home.”

He froze.

I faltered. “I mean, if I really knew you and all. If we were, like, a thing.”

He gripped the back of the chair, eyes narrowing, his gaze roaming my face, studying it as if I was a bug he was dissecting under a magnifying glass. “You would, wouldn’t you?” A small, incredulous laugh escaped him. “Damn, you are one legit chick. Sweets, they don’t make girls like you anymore.”

“What? Honest?” I asked. “How would you know? Maybe you just haven’t met any.”

His brows drew together, furrowing. “Maybe.”

Leaving the chair, he sat next to me on the bench, his frame dwarfing mine. Butterflies took flight inside my stomach, filling me with nervous energy. I pressed my knees together.

“Let’s make this game more interesting, huh?” he suggested. “Each time I make a strike, I’ll tell you something about me. You throw a gutter ball, and you have to do the same thing. At the end, you tell me whether or not you’d still take me home to meet your parents.” He raised his voice an octave, mimicking my girlie speech. “If we were, like, a thing.”

“You’re mocking me,” I accused.

Smiling, he nudged me. “Only because I’m a little intimidated by your naiveté.” Nodding at the lane, he added, “Your bowl.”

Cautiously, I stood, took my ball, lined up the shot, and released. It clattered to the floor, rolling into the gutter halfway down the lane.

Dylan clapped, and then held up his hands to snap a picture of me with an imaginary camera, clicking with his tongue. “Give me the 411, babe.”

“This is insulting,” I complained. “You get to give up information if you make a strike. Why the gutter for me?”

He snorted. “Because I actually want to learn something about you.” Gesturing at me, he grinned. “Come on, spill.”

I shrugged, suddenly embarrassed. “I’m not that interesting. I don’t know. I’m seventeen. I like to read. I love music, like
really
love it, especially punk rock—”

“The basic stuff is cool and all,” Dylan interrupted, “but I’m talking the deeper shit. What’s it like at home?”

My gaze shot to his. “Home?”

Propping a foot up on the bench, he leaned over, his brows arched, waiting.

“Quiet,” I answered automatically, surprising myself. “My parents are kind of busy a lot. We don’t talk much.”

Dropping his foot, Dylan grabbed a ball and headed for the lane, even though, technically, it was still my turn. One throw, and he knocked down every pin.

“My dad left when I was a kid,” he informed me. “It’s been me and my mom ever since. She works all of the time, and dates a different man every week like it’s a sport. Most of them are losers, real dipshits.” His gaze caught mine. “That’s why I’m really here. I took a bat to her boyfriend’s car. He was shit to her.” He winced. “It was either find a way to pay for the damages or deal with the law.”

I stared.

He offered me my bowling ball and asked, “Would you take me home now?” His eyes shone with vulnerability.

“Because you vandalized some jerk’s property?” I ignored the ball. “We don’t have to bowl for you to tell me this stuff.”

“No,” he agreed, “we don’t.”

“Then why do it?”

Setting the ball down, Dylan approached me slowly, all predator on prey. “Maybe I’m testing the waters. Seeing whether or not I want to try and pick you up.”

I took a step back. “Shut up!” I breathed, disbelieving.

He didn’t laugh. “You don’t want me to hit on you?”

My heart raced, this feeling completely different from what I felt when seeing Corey at the club. With Corey, I’d been overwhelmed by awe and disbelief, by the out-of-reality moment. With Dylan, it was just different. Scary in an exhilarating way because this guy was real, not some daydream I’d worked up in my head.

“You say no, and I walk away. No foul. Simple as that,” he promised. “You can even still use the phone. No hard feelings whatsoever.”

My gaze slid to the clock on the wall. It was eleven-thirty, way too close to midnight, and I never broke the rules.

Images from the past few weeks flitted through my head. My parents and the way they never seemed to notice me because I was nothing except a set of rules to them. The Challenger disaster, and the tears that followed. The talks my parents had at the dinner table about the Cold War and the arms race. The way my closest friends had started to drift away from me, too interested in boys and the parties my parents rarely let me attend. The Reagan speech, and his words about how the future didn’t belong to the fainthearted.

Tonight is my night, my revolution.

My gaze jumped back to Dylan. I really liked this boy and the way I felt standing next to him, safe and wanted.

“I’d like to use your phone,” I said finally.

It wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but Dylan kept his expression even, his shoulders lined with tension as he preceded me to the small office next to the shoe counter.

There was no one inside. It was a simple office. A filing cabinet, a few files sticking up out of an open drawer, sat against the wall beside a cheap desk with a big, box-like IBM computer resting next to a black phone.

Dylan started to leave.

I jolted forward, stopping just short of grabbing him. “You can stay! I mean, if you want to that is.”

He propped his hip against the desk, eyes on the floor, waiting.

Fingers shaking, I picked up the receiver and dialed. Mom answered on the third ring.

“Hey,” I said brightly, fighting to keep my voice steady. “Um … Lisa and some friends want to go bowling tonight. You know, do the whole midnight madness thing. I’m going to stay if that’s okay?”

Dylan’s head shot up.

Mom sighed, the sound loud over the line. “What did we say, Tori? You know how we feel about changing plans last minute. It took a lot for us to let you go tonight.”

I gave Dylan my back. “I know that. Really, I do. Mom … I’m not Stephanie, okay? I just want to stay and bowl. Please. Try trusting me just a little.”

I was going to go to hell for this one day.

“You want to do this now, Tori?” Mom asked, exasperated.

“The bowling alley closes at,” I looked up to find Dylan holding up three fingers, “three.”

Static came over the line, voices arguing in the background, and I knew Mom had covered the receiver to talk to Dad.

Coming back on the line, Mom bit out, “We’ve been waiting up for you.”

I twirled the cord with my fingers. “It’s spring break. Please.”

Silence.

“Okay,” Mom said finally. “You have your key?”

“I do.”

“Don’t disappoint us, Tori.”

“No ma’am.”

She hung up, and I hugged the receiver before replacing it slowly.

Hands suddenly gripped my arms, and I glanced up to find Dylan in front of me, his intent gaze locked on my face.

“Why’d you do it?” he asked. “Why did you lie to them?”

I swallowed hard. “Because maybe I wanted you to hit on me.”

He stared into my eyes, the look so deep it cut me to my soul. We said a thousand words with our gazes. Mine said I trusted him, that I was the kind of girl who would take him home to meet her parents if I was interested enough, the world and their opinion be damned. His said I wouldn’t regret staying.

“Who’s Stephanie?” he asked.

The question made my stomach hurt. “My sister,” I admitted. “My older sister. My parents are strict to the max, and Stephanie’s part of the reason why. She … she got pregnant her sophomore year.”

I left the rest unsaid, the part about how difficult it was for her to have the baby, how the delivery had almost killed them both. He didn’t need to know my entire family history.

His hold on me tightened. “You didn’t have to stay.”

“I wanted to.” It was the truth.

Suddenly, he swooped in, his warm hands abandoning my arms to frame my face, his lips slanting over mine, claiming me. The world fell away, completely disappearing, my existence narrowed down to him, me, and the way his lips moved. The way they explored mine, the kiss saying things that made my blood sing.

My fingers clutched at him, curling into his T-shirt.

His tongue ran over my lips, seeking entry, and my mouth parted, allowing him in. His tongue stroked my tongue, the feel of it so intimate and sensual, I arched. One of us moaned, or maybe we both did.

Beyond the office, a group of bowlers cheered, and we broke apart, gasping.

“I hadn’t planned on doing that,” Dylan breathed, his hands still framing my face.

“No?”

“You’re getting better at it though,” he teased.

I punched him playfully in the stomach, but he didn’t move or smile. He simply stared, mesmerized, his gaze tracing over my hair, my face, and my lips. “If I’d known about your sister—” he began.

“Look, forget it. You couldn’t have known, and I’m not her.”

I had one of those weird déjà vu moments. It wasn’t that I felt like I’d been here before. It was more like I suddenly knew this moment was a pivotal one, that even if I never saw Dylan again after tonight, this would be one of those memories I’d hold close forever.

Stomach churning over my miniature rebellion, I smiled. “So, what does picking me up mean exactly?”

Dylan stepped back, chuckling at the nervous tremble in my voice. “I’m not going to ravish you. Not without permission anyway.” Leaving me, he lifted a black bomber jacket from a peg on the wall, and then stuck his head out the door. After a moment, he glanced back in, grinning. “I’m done for the night. Come on.”

He offered me his hand. I accepted it, his fingers curling around mine.

He led me through the bowling alley. His uncle passed, and Dylan pulled me behind him, blocking me from view.

“I'm out,” Dylan told him.

Philip barely spared him a glance. “Don’t stay out too late. We’ve got an early day tomorrow.”

At my house, I would have gotten the full inquisition.

“I’ll try not to.” Pushing open the door, Dylan stepped outside, holding it for me so I could pass. The neon-lit darkness hugged us.

People spilled out into the parking lot from the closing club next door, laughter rising into the sky, cigarettes flaring, teens who’d been unable to light up in the club puffing on butts.

We avoided the crowd, taking a dirt path to the back of the bowling alley. Three cars and a Honda superbike sat parked at the rear.

Dylan went straight for the bike. Pulling a helmet off of the handle, he offered it to me. “She’s a 1983 model and pretty banged up, but I got her cheap, so I make it work.”

I froze. “We’re riding on that?”

“Only if you want to.” He made the words sound like a challenge.

“Where?”

“Just for a ride,” he answered.

Straddling the motorcycle, he patted the seat behind him.

I climbed on, taking the helmet he offered.

“I’ve only got the one, but I’m more worried about you than I am about me,” he said, tapping the helmet. He helped me pull it down over my teased hair before handing me his jacket. “This, too. The ride can get cold.”

The jacket was too big, but it was warm and smelled like him, leather mixed with cologne.

“Now, don’t kirk out on me, okay? Just wrap your arms around me and hold on. I promise not to drive crazy.”

Reassured by his patience and generosity, I threw him a smile, my arms sliding around his waist, squeezing. “Let’s jet!”

The motorcycle roared to life, and I squeaked, my knees and arms holding on for dear life as he maneuvered the bike into the street. Anticipation shot through me, making me giddy. Inside the jacket, Dylan Black’s smell and warmth surrounded me, the wind rushing into my face.

He sped up, turning the bike down two roads before hitting a long stretch.