Read Online Whisper (Novella) by CRYSTAL GREEN - Free Book Online Page B

tarp-covered bed in back. “Lawn mower is giving her fits, so I have to take it to the fix-it shop.”
    â€œDeacon & Darwin’s?” She paused. “Can’t they just come to your place for a house call?”
    â€œThey charge an extra fee for that, and Mom’s trying to cut every corner these days because of the café. So I volunteered to take it in and pick it up for her.”
    â€œYou know who works at Deacon & Darwin’s, right?”
    â€œPeople who know how to fix things?”
    Evie’s mood changed for some reason, lightening up with a secretive grin. “Just take me with you since it’s on the way, then you can drop me off at home.”
    I didn’t think too hard about it, but that was only because I couldn’t stop torturing myself with the haunted gaze Rex had given me before he’d looked away; I couldn’t stop thinking about the army of friends who’d surrounded him, shooting fire at me with their eyes.
    Evie put the radio back on, and we were quiet as white fences sped by, steer grazing on the grass, oaks dotting the landscape that stretched from here to forever. Everything seemed so open . . . and closed at the same time. Shut away, shut out, just like I’d been back at the lake.
    We pulled onto the fringes of town, past the rusty old gas station and the summer stock playhouse with its gingham-curtained restaurant that always seemed to be closed, and I slowed down as we pulled into the parking lot of the next building.
    Dust scrolled by the windows as I cut the engine. In front of us was what looked to be a warehouse with a painted wood sign announcing “Deacon & Darwin’s,” and no further explanation was needed since everyone knew who the hell-on-wheels twins were and what they did in their repair shop.
    â€œIf only they fixed more than lawn mowers,” I said.
    Evie paused before she opened the door. “There’s something I should tell you before we go in.”
    â€œOh, Lord. Who else cheated on Rex?”
    â€œFunny, but that’s not
quite
what I was going to say.” She smoothed her Picasso T-shirt over her stomach. “That guy who got Jadyn Dandritch to sleep with him? He works here with his cousins now.”
    I blinked. Micah Wyatt, right? It was a name that was hard to forget. “His cousins. As in Deacon and Darwin Wyatt?” I should’ve caught on to that before. The twins were former-glory defensive players for the Aidan Falls Rebels. Of course they’d have a cousin who was like them, sleeping around the whole town.
    But what Evie had said about Micah lingered. A rumor . . . Rex’s insecurities about his girlfriends . . . testing Jadyn with another guy at a party . . .
    No way. The story was too insane, even for a bunch of hormonal people like us.
    Evie nudged me with her elbow. “Aren’t you the slightest bit curious to know what he’s like? The one guy who could lure Jadyn Dandritch from Rex?”
    I stared at the building. Maybe I was curious in a perverse way. Jadyn had been known as a loyal person, the kind of girlfriend Rex had obviously needed after our breakup. What had been so wonderful about Micah Wyatt that Jadyn had broken down and hooked up with him? How’d he been able to seduce her away from a superstar?
    â€œLet’s get in there,” Evie said.
    I wasn’t about to show how curious I was, so I said a vague, “Whatever,” then opened the truck’s door and jumped to the ground, shutting it, striding toward the shop with Evie at my side.
    I might’ve been curious, but with every step, I realized that I was also feeling defensive when it came to Micah. It was that warped side of me that still had feelings for Rex. Excellent.
    When we got inside the shop’s lobby, she casually dinged the service bell on the counter, and I stood by, my arms folded over my chest while an overhead fan tickled