“Throwing away this empty cup.”
He laughs. He does that a lot. “I mean, today. Let me show you around. I am a living Google Map when it comes to the best restau
rants in San Diego.”
“So is that what’s in the notebook? Restaurant reviews and maps?”
He laughs again. He tips his head back and his throat moves in this interesting way. I’ll bet he practices in front of the mirror. “Nope. Maybe the next notebook. But have you been to the harbor yet? There’s a genuinely terrifying sculpture that you have to see to believe.”
“Thanks, but I have my bike. Gotta get it back.”
“Not a problem!” He points to the parking lot, where a truck sits. Not just any truck. A fully restored truck straight out of the 1950s, painted sky blue with a white stripe, bursting with personality that modern trucks only wish they had. It is twenty different kinds of awesome.
“Floods,” I whisper under my breath.
“What?”
I shake my head. “Sorry, I’m just crushing on your truck.” He beams and I inwardly cringe. Why did I admit that?
“She’s pretty great, isn’t she?”
I pick up my bike. This has gotten off track. I don’t know why he’s so eager to hang out with me today. And I don’t care. I have no interest in boys, now or ever. I can’t help but notice him, and—oh, idiot gods, I am definitely attracted to him. This is how it starts. This is how I set myself up for pain and tragedy and endings where I want eternities.
I refuse. I refuse it all. I will never attach myself to someone else. I can end everything before it starts and be free and alone and perfectly happy.
“Maybe another time. My brother’s waiting for me.”
“Can I give you a ride home?”
“Sorry, my mother told me never to accept rides from strangers.” Not true; it was never an issue. I was never far enough away from her as a child for her to worry. But it was something she would say to me. Hmm . . . actually, I’m glad she never said it to me, because if she had, I’d be forced to ride with him just to go against her.
“I’ll have to work on being less strange, then. It was good to finally see you.” That secret smile again. I want to smoosh his cheeks together to get rid of it.
I wave, climbing onto my bike and peddling away. At the corner light I risk a glance back to see if he’s watching me. He’s sitting, scribbling madly in his notebook. Good. I didn’t want him to be watching me.
Boys suck.
Even when they have perfect blue eyes and ridiculously cool trucks. Maybe especially then.
I punch in the code to the garage, dumping my bike against the wall. Blue, blue, blue. I need to get that color out of my system. I’ll figure out where to—
I pause, halfway through the door from the garage to the laundry room.
Something is wrong.
The now-bare skin at the back of my neck prickles as I stare into the empty house. Sirus is on an LA drive today. Deena is still at work.
I breathe in deeply, and there, again—something is wrong. Their house always smells vaguely of Tide detergent and the cold salt of the sea, but there’s too much salt now. Salt and . . . chlorine?
Maybe they had someone here cleaning the pool today and didn’t tell me.
I walk forward, silently, cautiously. Through the kitchen and into the dining room, where something crunches underfoot. Glass—hundreds of shards of glass. A breeze cuts across me and I look up to see that the sliding glass door to the patio and pool is smashed out, gaping and jagged and open.
Every sense on alert, I slowly retreat into the kitchen and slide a long, serrated knife out of the block on the counter. Keeping my back to the wall, I creep past the dining room, into the family room. Everything seems in order. TV and electronics still where they ought to be—even Deena’s sleek laptop, just sitting there on the couch.
I keep going, the only noise wind chimes drifting in from the patio, their cheerful notes at odds with the electric atmosphere inside. I stop dead when I come to the entry.
The front door is wide open.