by Shari Copell
“I understand,” Nicks said. “I just don’t need any more trouble right now.”
Willow rose to her feet. “I know you don’t, honey. You’d better get started. I’ll help you if I can, but we need to be careful. If Stone shows up, I’m afraid you’ll have to ask him to leave.”
“He was coming to help me.” Nicks fisted her hands in her lap. “I didn’t bring my car to school today. Stone was going to drive me home when we finished shelving. I’ll have to call my mom to come and get me.”
“I’ll take you home. I’m not leaving you here alone. I have to go upstairs right now and make copies, but I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Willow pointed at her feet. “I have heels on today. You know what heels sound like on this kind of flooring.” She stomped her feet a couple of times to make the point. “If you hear footsteps that don’t sound like that, get your ass out of here and up the back stairs.”
“You think Marius will come down if he knows I’m alone?”
Willow lowered her voice to a whisper. “Who knows? I’m not taking any chances.”
Nicks nodded. “Okay.” She hoped the situation wasn’t as dire as Willow made it sound.
The librarian grabbed a stack of folders from her desk and left the library.
Nicks wheeled a cart full of books through the door with a heavy heart. It was going to be a long, boring night if Stone couldn’t help her.
She sat on the floor shelving books for nearly an hour before she heard them. Footsteps on the linoleum, but they weren’t Willow’s trendy four-inch spikes. Nicks pushed to her feet and raced out into the hall.
Jesus Christ! She put a hand to her chest and breathed a sigh of relief. It was Stone.
“Sorry I’m late. I got stuck in traffic.” Frowning, he came to a halt. “What’s wrong?”
Taking a furtive glance up and down the hall, Nicks motioned for Stone to come into the library. “Willow told me Marius is pissed because you guys helped me shelve last Thursday. Apparently, this is supposed to be some soul-shattering punishment for me.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“No, I’m not. Willow said to send you home if you showed up, but she’s upstairs doing some stuff and hasn’t come back yet. I’m scared to death to be down here alone. Please stay with me until she comes back.”
Stone threw his leather jacket onto the nearby table. “I’m staying here until we’re finished. That son-of-a-bitch isn’t going to tell me what to do.”
Nicks leaned out into the hallway and took another look. It was empty. “He can’t tell you what to do, but he can make life difficult for me. Just go shopping or something when Willow comes back. She’s driving me home. You can still come to the house and see my guitars. I’ll call you before we leave.”
“Nicks...”
“Please. I can’t stand any more stress right now. I want to be done with this. I’ll be serving detentions until I’m thirty-five years old if he catches you here.”
“Are you going to let him terrorize you like this? It’s going to be a long year if you are.”
Nicks blinked and took a step back. Stone had just put a name to it. Terrorized. Yes, that was exactly how she felt.
“No. I’m not. Willow thinks I should tell my parents, and I guess that’s probably a good idea. But I can’t plead my case if Marius catches you down here after he gave explicit orders that you weren’t to help me. Please.” She stepped closer to him, put her right hand on his chest, and smiled. “I’ll see you later.”
He leaned forward. “I could kiss you so hard right now. You have no idea how adorable you are, do you?”
She gave him a crooked smile. “And I would let you if I weren’t on the verge of shitting my pants.”
The adrenaline rush of finding Stone in the hall had evidently heightened her sense of hearing. She heard footfalls on the steps, though they were far away. Whoever it was had just started down the staircase.
One, two, three, four, five, six, a second of silence, then tap-tap-tap. They were now on the second landing.
And they weren’t wearing high heels.
Nicks snatched Stone’s jacket from the table and planted it firmly in the center of his chest. He took it with an oof. Grabbing him by the upper arm, she turned him toward the back of the library and gave him a push.
“Someone’s coming, and it’s not Willow. You have to hide!”
“Hide where?”
“The supply closet!” She pushed him along frantically. “Lock the door from inside when you go in. Hide behind the broken copy machine in the corner. Go!” With one last shove, she turned and ran back to where she’d been working earlier.
She dropped to the floor and took a couple of deep breaths. Channeling the actress inside her, she picked up several books and placed them in her lap. It needed to appear as though she were intent on getting them into their proper places on the shelf.
The footsteps stopped outside the door. She closed her eyes and gave silent thanks when she heard the supply closet door lock.
Was it Marius? It had to be. Even his footfalls sounded menacing.
The steps continued into the library, quieter now. No longer in a hurry. Tap, tap, tap, stop. End of the first row of cherry shelves, probably looking down the aisle.
Tap, tap, tap, stop. End of the second row. She was in the fourth row. Nicks swallowed the bile that rose up in her throat. Thank God Stone was nearby.
Tap, tap, tap, stop. Third row. Nearly upon her. She propped a book up on the shelf in front of her, but the letters and numbers on the spine ceased to mean anything. Her sole focus was counting the taps of those shoes.
Tap, tap, tap, stop. She caught him in her peripheral vision at the end of the row, a threatening black blob.
I knew it! It is Marius! Being right didn’t make her feel any better.
“Miss Sorenson.”
Heart racing, she turned her head to look at him. “Mr. Marius?”
Smugly satisfied at her acknowledgment, he swung his hands behind his back. “That was some very interesting language you used onstage last Friday night.”
Chills rolled over her in waves. Jesus Christ! Was he at Tapestries? I didn’t see him!
“I don’t approve of such language, Miss Sorenson. I find it offensive. Your parents certainly don’t approve of you talking like that, do they?”
She was tempted to tell him it was none of his business. Her parents had been there at the bar. That would go over about as well as a fart in church with him though. Keeping quiet was the wiser choice, at least until she could find out where he was going with this line of questioning.
“Ah, yes. The silence of the guilty. I understand. Well, that was a rhetorical question anyway. I am aware that your parents were in attendance during that shameful display. Disgusting.”
His pale eyes glittered like diamonds in the fluorescent light as he watched her. She caught her breath.
Only zombies and vampires are capable of tilting their head at a weird angle like that.
“I’m afraid I have no choice in this matter. If your parents are going to abdicate all responsibility for molding you into a morally decent human being, then I am going to have to assume the mantle of obligation.”
“Wh-what?” She had the urge to throw the books off her lap and stand up. She was too vulnerable on the floor, nearly at his feet.
“Obviously, shelving books has failed to make a suitable impression on you. I am going to get through to you, one way or the other, my lovely Nicole. You are a slut, a whore. I cannot let it stand. To that end, you will serve three detentions a week until the end of the year. You will serve them in my office. You will bring every book you have in your locker with you during those detentions. You will study those books.”
She stared at him. What the hell was going on in this man’s mind? Why was he doing this to her? She was reasonably sure he couldn’t punish her for something she’d done during the weekend. She was also sure it wouldn’t go well for her if she tried to argue tha
t point with him.
“Do you understand me, Miss Sorenson?”
“Yes,” she whispered. Just leave me alone, you bastard!
“Excellent. I like a nice, compliant student. I promise, by the time you leave this school in the spring—if you manage to graduate at all—you will be a model of civic excellence.”
He turned and tap-tap-tapped his way out of the library. Nicks dropped her face into her hands.
The door to the supply closet opened then closed quietly. “Holy fucking hell,” she heard Stone say.
She jumped to her feet and ran into his arms. He caught her, held her tightly, and buried his face in her hair. She was sick to her stomach, unable to stop shaking.
Stone forced her back a step and bent to catch her gaze. “This has gone far enough. If you don’t tell your parents about this man, I’m going to.”
“And if he doesn’t, I will.” Nicks turned at the sound of Willow’s voice. The librarian was pasty white, high heels in her hand. “I saw him head for the basement. I knew why he was coming down here, so I slipped my shoes off and followed him. I agree with Stone. This has gone far enough. He can’t punish you for something you did off school property.”
“So both of you heard what he said to me?”
“Every word,” Stone assured her.
“Me too,” said Willow. “I snuck in behind him and hid along the wall.”
Nicks nodded. Thank God she had witnesses.
“We’re done here. I’ve had just about all the bullshit I can stand for one day,” Willow said. “You two get your things together. I’m taking you home, Nicks.”
“Can she ride with me?” Stone looked down at her. “If you want to, that is.”
“I’ll go with Stone, if you don’t mind. Are you coming to talk to my parents too, Willow?”
“You bet your ass I am, little girl.” Willow spun in her nylon stockings and walked toward the front of the library.
CHAPTER NINE
“He called you a what?”
Nicks had never seen her father this mad. His face was flushed, red against his straw-yellow hair. He looked like a steam whistle about to blow. His knuckles were pressed against the dark wood of the Sorenson dining table, the muscles of his arms bulging like a gorilla’s.
“A slut. And a whore. He was at Tapestries last Friday night. I’ve seen him there before, but I didn’t see him Friday.” The heat of her father’s gaze made her uncomfortable. He’d once asked her to tone down her language onstage, saying it gave people the wrong impression about her. She was grudgingly prepared to admit he might’ve been right. She enjoyed playing the naughty rock star up there, but it really wasn’t her when she was offstage.
Tage inhaled, his nostrils going wide. “So let me get this straight. Albert Marius is punishing you for something you did on your own time, out of school, and in an establishment I own?”
“That’s about the size of it,” said Willow.
“And he more or less accused us of being bad parents,” Chelsea said, wrapping her arms around herself as if to ward off a chill.
“It wasn’t even what he said, it was the way he looked at her,” Stone said. “I watched him through the vent at the bottom of the supply closet door. It seemed like he wanted to...like he was waiting for her to mouth off so he could hit her.”
That seemed to push Tage to the edge of a precipice. “Nicks may be in her last year of high school, but she’s legally an adult.” He trained a laser-sharp gaze on her. “While I don’t necessarily approve of the things you say up there, little girl, I will defend to the death your right to say them. Especially when he came onto my property to see you.”
Inhaling again, Tage pulled out one of the high-backed dining room chairs and sat down. “Here’s what we’re going to do, people. He can’t punish you for something you did off school property. That’s a given. Nicks, I forbid you to serve any more detentions. I am still your father, and my word trumps his. And if he happens to disagree with that and gets too high-handed with you, I want you to go find Willow and call me immediately. In the meantime, I am going to get two restraining orders: one for you and one for the bar. I don’t want Marius within fifty feet of either.”
“Okay.” Nicks was agreeable and relieved, though she couldn’t help thinking this was going to open a can of worms for all of them.
“When I have those two things in hand, I’m going to have a friendly chat with Albert Marius. I want to fix his face in my memory. This is harassment and smacks of bullying. It’s bad enough when a student does it. To see a school official doing this makes me sick.”
“His brother-in-law is Ronald Martin, the superintendent of the school. I think you’ll get some stiff resistance,” said Willow.
“Good. I have an excellent attorney. Trust me, they’ll run out of money before I do.” The muscle in her father’s jaw jumped. “What kind of asshole goes to see an eighteen-year-old girl play in a band then calls her a slut and punishes her for it? I know the editor of every newspaper within a fifty-mile radius of Pittsburgh. They’ll have a field day with this.”
“You probably don’t feel much like showing me your guitars now, do you?” There was a trace of disappointment in Stone’s voice.
The discussion around the dining room table had ended. Willow, Tage, and Chelsea were now having margaritas at the kitchen island.
“Of course I do. I’ve been looking forward to it all weekend.”
Stone tilted his head and gave her a look.
“Oh, c’mon. Marius didn’t hurt me. He just thinks he’s the king of Oakland High School or something. Daddy will take care of it.” She took him by the hand and pulled him to the stairs. “It’s guitar time, dude.”
They were nearly at the top landing when T.J. came out of his room, hair tousled, socks half off. He planted his hands on his hips and glowered at Nicks. “Does mom know you’re bringing a boy up here?”
Nicks grinned. “No. And you won’t tell her, will you?”
“Of course not. You don’t tell her when I pee outside in the summer, do you?” T.J. clapped his hands together. “Is he going to kiss you?”
Nicks stopped short. “Stone, this is my baby brother T.J. I used to like him.”
“I’m not a baby! Your name is really Stone?”
“It’s really Stone.” His eyes lit with amusement as he studied the boy.
“You better be careful of Nicks. She can be a real bitch.”
“Okay, enough. Truth or Dare is over, little boy.” Nicks reached out and ran her fingers up T.J.’s ribcage, making him squeal like a fire siren.
Laughing, he slipped from her grasp, ran into his room, and slammed the door.
Lindsay emerged from another door farther down the hall. “Can you please shut up out here? Some of us are doing homework!”
“Sorry.” Nicks smiled sheepishly. Lindsay did a perfect diva eye roll and slammed her door too.
“Noisy house,” Stone murmured.
“You have no idea. There are four of the little snots.” Taking him by two fingers, she pulled him to the end of the hall and into her room.
“Nice,” Stone said. “Love the colors.”
“You’re about the only one then. Besides me.” Nicks closed the door behind them. If they were going to get the guitars out and play them, it might get loud. She truly didn’t want to disturb her siblings if they were doing homework.
Stone turned to look at the closed door. “You’re not planning on taking advantage of me, are you?”
“Nah, not yet.” She dropped to the floor and reached under her bed, searching for the handle of the guitar case that held the white Les Paul. She patted the black carpet in invitation. He sat down next to her.
She slid it out and poised her fingers over the latches. “Ready?” A slight pause for effect. “Dun dun duh!” She flipped them up with a sharp snap.
Nicks made a haunted house creaking noise as she slowly opened the case.
An air of reverence crossed his fac
e as he examined the white Les Paul guitar with a critical eye. Nicks couldn’t imagine showing it to anyone else who would care the way Stone Jensen did. Only another guitarist would understand.
“Man, that’s beautiful. Not a mark on it either.” He gestured toward the guitar. “May I?”
“Sure. You can get it out. I do sometimes.”
He stood up, sat on the edge of her bed, and placed the guitar across his lap. “You got a pick?”
She pulled a pick out of the supply compartment of the case and handed it to him. He started in on a flaming rendition of Van Halen’s Eruption.
He was as good as it gets, but Nicks knew she was his equal. She glanced up at him from her position on the floor, his head bent, absorbed in his task as his fingers flew over the fretboard.
It seemed inevitable that they would’ve collided at first with all the fury of twin tornados. He was inordinately proud of his abilities. So was she. Bonding over guitars was a perfect way for them to get to know each other.
He finished with an exultant laugh. “Sweet!”
“Do you want to see the others?”
“Yes, please.” His eyes were alight like a child in a toy store. Or a guitarist in a music store.
She reached under the bed to retrieve the tobacco-sunburst Les Paul. He nestled the vintage guitar in its case as though he were placing a sleeping infant in a crib, then sat down on the floor beside her again.
“This one makes my heart beat faster,” she said, as she flipped the latches and opened the case. She knew it wasn’t as impressive as the white, but it was the one she had an intimate relationship with. She felt safe in believing no man would ever give her orgasms the way this guitar did.
“Nice.” He leaned across her, and ran his fingers over the strings. He was close—too close. The shining waves of his dark hair were barely three inches from her face. She breathed him in. Sandalwood, cinnamon, and lemongrass. Too late, she realized she’d whimpered aloud. He turned to face her.