Josh & Hannah (Redwood Falls 1)

Were they friends? Hannah hoped so. Maybe they would be someday. “I don’t know. Pretty recently, I guess.”

“How?”

Her brother was the typical male, too few words and too much opinion. “Well, you know Ava has a brother, Ty.”

“Yeah?”

“Ty is good friends with Josh, Katie’s cousin. So we’ve all been hanging out some lately.” She breathed a quiet sigh. That was the partial truth and would ease Zach into knowing she was close to Josh, as well as Katie.

“Those kids are older than you though, aren’t they?”

“Ava’s my age, of course. But yeah, Ty and Josh and Katie are all seniors.”

“Mom and Dad know this is going on?”

“Nothing is going on, Zach. We’re just friends, that’s all.”

“You need to get some younger friends, kids who are more appropriate.”

“There’s nothing inappropriate about them. And don’t you think I’ve tried? I know you haven’t lived here in a long time, but you can’t have missed that everyone hates me?”

A frown came between his brows and his eyes narrowed. “Hates you? Why do you think that?”

Hannah’s shoulders slumped. “I don’t know. I guess they’re jealous.”

“Well, I can see that, sure. You’re a beautiful little girl.”

Hannah looked up at her brother. “I’m not, either. Don’t lie to me to make me feel better, Zach. I’m talking about them being jealous of all this stinking money around here.” Her eyes narrowed on him. “And I’m not a little girl.”

Zach let out a rough laugh. “Stinking money? You want me to push Dad into some bad investments? Help him to go broke?” Zach teased.

“No.” Hannah grinned back.

“You want me to put a hit out on a few kids who’re making your life miserable?”

“It’s not funny! But no, even if you were serious, no. Rebecca will graduate before me and hopefully leave town. I’m hoping things will be better after that.”

Zach became serious. “I hope so, too. But if it gets too bad, you tell me. You shouldn’t have to go through this. If you want me to, I’ll talk to Dad and you can come stay with me in Dallas. I’ll have your little butt in a private school quicker than you can blink. I don’t want you to be miserable, squirt.”

As Hannah looked at her brother, she knew he was feeling for her deeply and was dead serious about his offer. This is what made their bond so strong. Even though there were twelve years between them and no shared DNA, Zach would always be her brother and she would always be his sister. “Thanks.”

He stood up and ruffled her hair. “No problem. I gotta head back to town.”

“Okay.”

He walked over and paused in the doorway and then turned to her. “But you need to start realizing something, Hannah. You are beautiful. Seriously. I don’t know if mom doesn’t tell you, or if you haven’t looked at yourself if the mirror lately. But trust me when I say that the girls at school aren’t just jealous of our money. It’s you. And you need to take care because those damn teenage boys are going to be all over you, if they aren’t already.”

Hannah was rendered speechless. She’d never heard Zach string so many words together in her entire life. He usually spoke in grunts of approval or disapproval. Of course, she didn’t believe what he was saying for a second. Maybe he was trying to give her some self-confidence. And maybe she had turned out passably pretty, but beautiful? Geez. Her brother could lie like the best of them. “That’s sweet.”

“It’s the truth.”

Hannah thought about how gorgeous Josh was. His looks were entirely awesome, and she only hoped she had what it would take to catch him and then to hold onto him. And Katie looked just like Josh, except just the opposite, in a softly feminine way. Hannah opened her mouth and before she could stop them the words spilled out, “Katie’s the beautiful one. She’s so tall and has those green eyes and dark hair. I wish I had hair like hers.”

Hannah could have kicked herself. At just the mention of one of the Turners, Zach stiffened and an air of imposing anger seemed to seize him. His light mood disappeared and icy contempt laced his voice. “She’s got nothing special. None of the Turners do. Remember that, Hannah.”

And he slammed the door on his way out.

****

On Monday afternoon, Hannah stood next to Ava’s locker as her friend spilled the beans about Ethan. As Ava whispered, Hannah stood and listened in rapt silence while she clutched her science book to her chest. “I don’t know. I was eating those french fries, you know? And I looked down and there was salt on my thigh and I began knocking it off. And then—” Ava took a deep breath. “And then Ethan’s hand was on my thigh. First he just sort of knocked off the salt. And then he left his hand there and—” Ava swallowed and stopped speaking.

“And what?”

Ava looked around to see if they were alone in the conversation they were having. “And then his fingers spread out over my knee and he ran his hand all the way up my thigh to the hem of my shorts.”

“Uh-uh.” Hannah’s mouth was open and she shook her head back and forth.

“Uh-huh.”

“And he just left it there?”

“Yeah, pretty much. He just sort of kept running his hand up and down my thigh from the hem of my shorts to my knee and then back again.”

“Y’all were both staring down under the table, do you know that?”

“We were? No, not really, I don?

??t think I noticed anything else in that moment. I’m dying here, Hannah. I want to kiss him so bad, it’s literally killing me.”

“I bet. What’d Ty say to you when he pulled you out of the restaurant?”

Ava rolled her eyes. “Oh, you can imagine. He yelled and told me that Ethan was a rat bastard and all he wanted to do was get in my pants and he and Josh would beat the shit out of him if he tried. And then he threatened to tell my parents so they would ground me and keep me in the house.” She inhaled deeply as she’d said all of that on one breath. “But he won’t, you know. Ty won’t say anything to our parents because I’ve got too much crap on him and I could seriously make his life miserable, and he knows it.”

“Have you spoken to Ethan?”

“No. What would I say to him, anyway?”

“I don’t know. I just wondered if he—” Hannah’s voice got clogged in her throat as she looked up and her gaze fastened on someone walking toward them.

Ava’s eyes grew big as she saw the expression on Hannah’s face. “What are you looking at?”

Hannah reached out and put her hand on Ava’s arm. “Do not turn around.” Hannah sank her fingernails into Ava’s skin. “You better think about what you’re going to say to him, because he’s coming up behind you.”

Ava’s face turned white and then flooded with color. “No way.”

Hannah pasted a fake smile on her face and released Ava’s wrist. She knew that anything she said at this point would be overheard by Ethan. “Okay then. I’ll see you after fifth period.” Hannah looked past Ava and smiled at Ethan who was hovering behind Ava. “Hi.”

“Hey.”

As Ava turned around to face Ethan, Hannah had only a moment to see the pained expression on Ethan’s face before she had no choice but to leave them alone.

As she walked down the hallway, she mentally crossed her fingers for Ava. She really hoped Ethan would come through and man-up.

****

Hannah spent the week wondering where Josh was but he was either really busy or he was evading her. She had two tests that week, and spent a lot of time studying for them. When she wasn’t completely busy with homework, her mind turned back to Josh even though she tried her best not to think about him.