Where was Mia Jackson when I actually needed her?
When I finally spotted her up ahead walking with a bunch of juniors, adrenaline spilled into my veins. Gone were the baggy PJs and fuzzy slippers from Friday night. Today, she wore a tight pink sweater and jeans that hugged her hips in a way I normally would’ve appreciated on a girl, if I hadn’t been so panicked about what she could spill to the cops about me.
Picking up my pace, I darted through the crowd to catch up. Just as she was about to walk through the gymnasium doors, I put my arm over her shoulders and redirected her out of the stream of students over to a nearby row of lockers.
“Hey, Mia! Mind if we talk for a sec?”
I gave her the most charming, boyish smile I could muster and leaned in, resting my hand on the locker over her head. It was a smile I’d used a hundred times before, all to varying rates of success. Mia pressed her back against the locker and looked up at me with mild shock, her long eyelashes blinking innocently.
A strange sensation went through me as our gazes met. It’d been a long time since I’d been this close to Mia in the daylight. Or even paid her any attention, really. The wide circle I’d given her had blinded me to how much she’d changed in the past few years. It was safe to say she’d grown up since middle school, leaving the metal braces and ratty braids behind.
Now, her blonde curls cascaded down her shoulders in an alluring way that tempted me to run my hands through them. She’d tied a couple of strands back with a ribbon that matched her candy-apple framed glasses. Exactly three freckles dotted each of her cheeks, and the vivid red lip gloss she wore made her look like a model in a magazine. I didn’t dare trail my eyes down the rest of her for a closer look. My teen boy radar could sense enough to tell me that Mia had grown curves in all the right places.
I dropped my hand from the locker, suddenly feeling a bit off-center. How had I missed such a change? I was usually so attuned to these kinds of things. Mia had slipped beneath my radar, just like she had Friday night before everything went wrong.
“What’s up, Jimmy?” Mia crossed her arms over her chest and wrinkled her nose. “Why would you want to talk to me?”
I looked down at her and arched an eyebrow. Surely, she wasn’t going to act like we hadn’t collided this weekend in a cloud of ash and smoke. As much as I would’ve liked for her to forget the whole thing happened, I wasn’t an idiot. Trouble didn’t go away that easily.
“Come on, Mia. We both know you were there. Don’t play me.”
She mimicked my expression with a perfect eyebrow arch of her own. “Where?”
Irritation rose inside me. Glancing around to make sure no one was listening, I leaned in close enough to catch a whiff of her citrusy perfume. “The garden shed. Friday night. Pre-bonfire.”
“Oh, that thing.” She waved her hand and smiled up at me. “You know, I almost forgot about it. That’s what happens when I write my newspaper articles. The thoughts go right from my brain onto the page, and then it’s onto to new things. Can’t keep it all locked up tight, or I’d never find the next breaking story.”
I stared down at her in horror. Newspaper article? Breaking story? She couldn’t be serious. That was the total opposite of cool.
“Mia, you can’t give that article to The Prowler—”
“Can’t?” She tilted her head to one side and pursed her lips. “Honestly, I don’t really like being told what to do. Especially not by someone who committed arson on school property. Maybe you should ask nicely.”
I gritted my teeth and plowed a hand through my hair. Okay, so maybe Mia looked all grown up, but she was no different than the girl that had dropped a stink bomb in my baseball bag in eighth grade. The same overconfident, eager expression in her eyes telling me that she would have her way or none of it.
“Please, Mia.” My voice dipped into a gravelly whisper. I wasn’t used to pleading. It wasn’t my way. But if word got out about this, I was finished. I’d never make anything out of myself. “Don’t rat on me and the guys. I’m asking you nicely.”
“Hmmm.” She scrunched up her nose again and then patted me on the shoulder. “I’ll have to think about it. Stories like these don’t grow on trees, you know? It would be an insult to my journalistic talents to not at least consider publishing it.”
I moved my mouth, but no words came out as I stared at her, horrified.
A booming voice came from the gymnasium doors. It was Principal Gentry, greeting the student body. Mia’s eyes lit up at the sound, and she raised a finger.
“I’d better go. Sounds like the assembly is starting. It’s promising to be a good one. I heard a rumor that even the cops showed up. Hopefully, for your sake, they didn’t bring their lie detectors. See you around, Jimmy.”
Before I could stop her, she slipped around me and back into the stream of students still heading into the gym. I watched her leave with my hands clenched tight at my sides, and my heart hammering in fear.
Yep. I was done. I was going to be stuck living in my dad’s house until I was sixty years old. My future was canceled.
But as she got to the gym door, Mia looked back at me one last time. I expected to see superiority in her brown eyes. That look that said she had me pinned, and there was nothing I could do about it. But to my surprise, all I saw was a mixture of sympathy and doubt cross her face. It was only there for a second, but it was there. And then she walked through the doors and disappeared from view.
That was all it took for me to hatch a new plan. Mia Jackson most definitely had a heart. It would just take a little digging to find it.
The game wasn’t over yet.
5
Mia
My fingers curled tightly around the spine of a how-to book on gardening, frustration boiling up inside me. I slammed the book on the end of the shelf and muttered under my breath.
What does it matter if Jimmy Alston thinks he’s going to get kicked out of school? And more importantly, why do I care?
I sighed and leaned my back against the shelves of Sweet Mountain’s town library. Those were the same two questions that had been bouncing around my head all day. No matter what I tried, I couldn’t get rid of them.
I had bigger things to worry about, including the white lie I’d told Lindsey Beck this morning, but those two questions were the only things I could think about. Seriously, I was this close to considering electrotherapy to get the sad, dejected image of Jimmy Alston out of my head as he’d begged me not to submit the article.
When he’d yanked me out of that crowd this morning and practically pinned me up against the lockers with that charming smile of his, I couldn’t help myself. I’d had the sudden need to see him sweat a little. It was obvious he was used to winning. Guys like that got anything their jock hearts desired.
So I lied about the article.
Smudged the truth a bit.
It wasn’t getting published anytime soon, but Jimmy didn’t need to know that. Seeing him squirm had been fun. Almost. Until I spotted the desperation in his eyes.
If it weren’t for the stupid thing called a conscience inside my head, I would’ve been laughing away in the library stacks during my after school job. Instead, I was feeling as guilty as a reporter who’d given up one of her sources.
It just didn’t make sense. I loathed Jimmy. I should be dancing on air right now, not dreaming of a lobotomy.
“Mia! You won’t believe who was just asking for you at the desk.” Raquel Young poked her head into the aisle and gave me a crazy look.
She was another junior at Sweet Mountain High and my very best friend. Her dirty blonde hair fell straight to her shoulders, and her round cheeks were always flushed. Raquel was a self-described bookworm and musical theater geek. I couldn’t tell you how many times she’d dragged me to see Wicked at the Orpheum. I think she fancied herself a plump version of Glinda, and I was her Elphaba—minus the green skin.
I rolled my eyes at her. “If it’s Mr. O’Henry again, tell him we still
don’t have a copy of Armageddon on DVD.”
Some of the library patrons had the strangest demands.
“No, it’s not Mr. O’Henry.” Raquel sounded out of breath, like she’d been huffing the permanent markers behind the library counter. “It’s Jimmy Alston! And he’s coming this way. I’d better scoot.”
My stomach dropped to the floor. Jimmy was here? Wanting me?
And my best friend had abandoned me! Typical Raquel. She had the courage of a mouse when it came to talking to anyone outside of her family and me.
Not that my reaction was much better in this situation. My first response was to look around for a hiding place. No luck. Unless I suddenly sprouted wings to fly over the stacks, I was stuck. The only way forward now was to make sure Jimmy didn’t know he’d gotten to me. So with that in mind, I leaned my elbow on the bookshelf and tried my best to pose like I didn’t even care he was here.
“Hey, Mia.”
I looked up to see Jimmy standing at the end of the aisle, his hands buried in the pocket of his navy hoodie. He wore a pair of faded jeans with holes in the knees and scuffed tennis shoes. It was an effortless look that matched his personality all too well.
“Oh, hey.” My elbow slipped off the bookshelf, and I stumbled, righting myself on the book cart beside me. So much for playing it cool. “What’s up?”
“I thought you and I could talk.” The left side of his mouth curled up into a charming grin. His green eyes twinkled with warmth. “I know you ladies are always busy running the world, but do you have a minute?”
It was alarming how much even that half-grin affected me. It gave me tingles all the way to my toes. He was good. Really good. And when he reached up to rake his hand through his artfully messy black hair, I got an extra punch in the gut. It was no wonder the office ladies fell over themselves to keep Jimmy out of trouble with Principal Gentry. He was a mutant with the superpowers of attraction to the opposite sex. He played us females like a banjo.
“Yeah, I guess I could take a short break.” My knees felt wobbly as I walked toward him. “I know where we can talk.”
Avoiding his gaze, I made a beeline for an empty study room in the back of the library. If we were going to talk about criminal matters, we needed a little privacy. After he followed me into the room, I shut the door behind him and took a seat at the little conference table, keeping one chair separating us.
A safety chair.
“Listen, I think we got off on the wrong foot at the assembly.” Jimmy leaned toward me in his chair, his piercing green eyes gazing into mine. His expression was so earnest that it was hard to remember I’d been raging at him just minutes ago. “There were cops there. I was panicking. I’m sorry for ordering you around. I had no right.”
He was definitely saying all of the right words. I gripped the armrests of my chair, willing myself not to get caught up in the shock of it all.
I had to admit the assembly had been intense. The cops had asked us all to report anything suspicious. Anything at all. I’d felt Jimmy’s gaze on me the entire time as if he were afraid I’d run up to the microphone and spill my guts to the entire school. I didn’t blame him for being scared.
“Thank you for that.” I looked down at my boots and tapped the toes together. “It’s nice when guys apologize and actually mean it.”
“Oh, I mean it.”
I glanced up to see him roll the extra chair out of the way and move closer to me. Gone was my security. Now, he was so close I could study every little speck of brown and gold in his eyes and the impressively hard lines of his jaw.
“Is there any chance…?” He cleared his throat and then swallowed hard. “Any chance at all I can convince you not to release that article? It would mean everything to me, Mia.”
I inhaled sharply, feeling the weight of his pleading gaze. He really did seem sincerely sorry. And when he took my hand in his, sending goosebumps up my arm, everything inside my mind went completely blank—except for a voice at the back that squealed with excitement at a real-life boy touching me.
And not just any boy.
Sexy, bad boy Jimmy Alston.
Shoot! I had to get it together. There was no way Jimmy was working me over today. I was better than that. I was a professional. If Lindsey came to me tomorrow, asking for an article, I’d give it to her. That was how the journalism world worked.
Gently taking my hand out of his, I gave him a tight-lipped smile and leaned back in my chair. “Honestly, I wish I could do something for you, but I have a journalistic code to follow. And that means I can’t sit on the truth. If an opportunity presents itself, I have to publish my article. It’s the right thing to do.”
The sour expression on Jimmy’s face almost made me laugh out loud. He’d gone from ultra-charmer to disgruntled teenage boy in a flash. With a muttered curse under his breath, he mimicked my pose and shot me a grumpy frown.
“Can you at least leave Andy and Taggish out of the article?” he asked. “I promised them I’d take the fall if the story gets out.”
A small jolt of shock went through me. Jimmy Alston was being selfless? I hadn’t seen that one coming. Was it just another trick to charm and disarm me? Or was he being serious? I couldn’t tell, but it was a deal I was willing to make.
“Fine.” I nodded my head. “I will amend all versions to scratch said troublemakers from the record. Happy?”
His jaw flexed. “I’d be happier if you’d just agree to destroy the article altogether.”
“No can do.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.”
As Jimmy tore his gaze away to stare angrily at the seventies deco wallpaper, I allowed myself to observe him silently. It was easy to get distracted by those dark lashes rimming his green eyes and the muscular tone of his athletic arms. But if I looked past that, I could spot the slight bend in his nose where he’d broken it some time ago and the faint white scar that zig-zagged near his right ear. Of course, they did nothing to take away from his good looks. But the fact that Jimmy wasn’t some Greek marble statue come to life was almost more attractive.
It really was too bad that it had been him and his friends who’d burned down that shed, but I had other things to worry about. Including my new relationship column and my utter lack of a pesky little thing called a boyfriend.
Suddenly, I got that twinge in my belly again. It set the pistons running in my brain. I sat up straight in the chair and gripped the armrests, my eyes wide. I had a plan. A brilliant plan. A plan that would benefit both of us.
“Jimmy, what would you say to a little quid pro quo?”
He grimaced, the left side of his lips curling in a scowl. “I have no idea what that means. Speak English.”
“It means, I scratch your back, you scratch mine.” I leaned forward, feeling the excitement shoot from my eyes. “If you agree to pretend to be my boyfriend so I can run the relationship column for The Prowler, then I’ll hold back the article that could get you kicked out of school. It pains me to sit on the truth, but I think in this case, it might be the nobler thing to do.”
His mouth fell open in shock, his eyes blinking rapidly. I was pretty sure he was replaying my proposal over and over in his head, wondering if he’d just imagined it. I was kind of shocked myself.
Shocked that I didn’t think of this sooner.
“You need me to be your boyfriend? Why can’t you find someone for real?”
“Need is a strong word.” I winced at the thought. Did Beyoncé need Jay-Z? Probably not, but he did help her career in certain ways. “If I wanted to, I could find a real boyfriend in a second, but I’m just not interested in carrying around that kind of emotional baggage right now.”
The way his left eyebrow arched as he looked at me with disbelief made me flush with embarrassment. Of course, I could get a boyfriend. So what if no one had asked me out before? That was trivial. And so not the point.
“Listen,” I said, crossing my legs and giving him my best no-nonsense stare. “I
t’s the only way I’m going to get to do any consistent writing for the newspaper. It’s just until the end of the year. Or until a current events spot opens at the newspaper, and I can move out of the relationship column. It wouldn’t be hard. We’d just have to pretend in public. Maybe do a little handholding. Put your arm around me. Go to the Snow Ball together. Dumb stuff like that. The only requirement is that Lindsey Beck has to believe it’s real.”
He shook his head, his hair falling into his forehead. “No. No way. That’s blackmail. I’m not doing it.”
I stood and pulled a card from my back pocket. It was made from white card stock and had my name and phone number printed in shiny black ink. I’d ordered them my freshman year from one of the magazines my dad threw in the recycling bin. I figured that if I was going to be a real journalist, I needed to get some business cards to start building a collection of sources.
“Think about it,” I said, handing him the card. “Then give me a text. You know, we could both benefit from this.”
He looked at the card and then enclosed it tightly in his hand. “Right. Quid pro quo. So much for your journalistic code.”
I felt a twinge of guilt go through me again. Jimmy seemed to bring that out in me. Yeah, this probably wasn’t part of a journalistic code. It could even be called blackmail. But it wasn’t like anything had really changed for him. Lindsey had already refused to print my article. He wasn’t going to get in trouble for burning down the shed. This was just my way of helping him make restitution for his crimes. A little community service, and he could go on with his life.
We would both win.
“Think about it,” I said again, walking toward the exit. “And let me know what you decide as soon as possible.”
As I walked out the door, I couldn’t help but give Jimmy one last glance. He was staring at me from his seat, eyes narrowed in frustration. I expected him to hate me. To forever curse my name. But when we made eye contact, his frown dissolved and, in its place, formed a disbelieving grin. He shook his head as if he were impressed with the fact that a girl like me had the guts to stand up to him. Leaning back in the chair with his arms behind his head, a smile stretched across his face.
My Fake Boyfriend Page 3