Frostbite (Touch of Frost) (3 page)

More my body changed my mind for me.

His footfalls approached and once again his delicious, spicy, heady scent took command of my senses.

“So now you’re going to come to class with me?” I so needed to get away from this guy.
Like now.

“Speaking of Nimrod, I’m in that class with you.”

In my wigging out, I’d totally forgotten. I glanced at my watch. Crap, we were, like, five minutes late.

“Don’t worry, I have a couple of passes.” He reached into his back pocket and pulled out two slips of blue paper.

“Why didn’t you use one to get out of detention before?”

“Got it for something else.”

Never would have guessed he had such a devious side.

He waved the thin piece of paper in front of me. “I’ll give it to you on one condition.”

“I’m not going into that stupid closet with you.”

His laughter echoed off the cement block walls. “That’s not the condition.”

“What do you want?”

“Java Joe’s. Friday night. Seven o’clock.”

“Is bribery how you get all your dates?” Oh, I was on a roll with this guy. I couldn’t suppress the smile creeping across my face, though. Damn, he was breaking me down.

“You’re being especially difficult.” He waved the only thing keeping me from another round of detention.

I shoved my fingers through my snarly hair. Jeez. I probably looked like a clod. Wait, I shouldn’t care what I looked like. It wasn’t like this would lead to anything. Couldn’t. But
damn
I wanted it to.

“So, is that a yes?” He dangled the coveted pass in front of me.

“Fine.”

FOUR

“O
h my gosh. I can’t believe you have a date with Zach,” Georgia said.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t excited. And that scared the crap out of me, so I opted to say nothing. Georgia would see right through me anyway.

I yanked open the door to Mr. Smoothy’s.

“Hey, ‘bout time, Mandy.” Scott’s sandy-brown locks splayed out from beneath a baseball cap—backward facing cap nonetheless. Attempting to look
in,
just didn’t work for my brother.

“Hi to you, too, Scott
Smith
.” I crossed my eyes at him. What a lame last name he chose for us this time.

“Your brother is so hot,” Georgia whispered.

“Don’t gross me out, G.”

Not one customer in the small, florescent-colored store, so what could be his big rush to see me?

Georgia slipped onto a bench and slapped her book bag on the table. Out came her sketchpad. Nothing new there. She always hung around the store, sketching, helping out when it got busy. Almost like she never wanted to go home. Fine with me, I loved having her around. Felt like I had a sister.

I sauntered behind the bar. It was like a 1950’s nightmare exploded in here. Red countertops, bright colors, ugh.

“What’s up?” I asked Scott and snagged an apron from beneath the counter. From my back pocket, I yanked out a rubber band and tied my hair into a loose bun.

This was what I had to look forward to after graduation. A long life of smoothie-making.

“School’s been out for an hour.”

“No car, remember?” I swiped a cup to make Georgia and myself a smoothie. “Things take, like, ten times longer when you have to Barney Rubble-it.”

“Come here.” He waved me to the food-prep area.

I stood my ground. There was a distinct possibility an argument would be in our near future. I could just sense it.

“Detention?”

“Ah, hell.” I whirled around to work on my smoothies. “Get off me, man.”

“Mandy, do you know how close you are to not graduating?”

“They can’t
not
graduate me. It’s next week.”

“Yes they can. And they’re going to if you don’t shape up, like, now.”

I glanced around. Georgia looked up, her eyes wide, pencil stalled on her paper.

“You have to make it to graduation. If not for me, then do it for Mom and Dad.”

My gut wrenched. How dare he bring them into it? I shook my head dislodging the gruesome image his mention of them triggered.

It didn’t work.

Blood pooled on the tile floor around Mom’s neck and from her wrists. I skidded to her side, glass shredding through the knees of my jeans. “Oh my God. Mom.”

“I can’t ice down. I—”

A layer of frost formed on her right arm, at her bloody wrist. But as quickly as it came it vanished, leaving blood pouring out of her gash.

“Mom? God. Please. Mom.”

“I’m sorry, kiddo.” Her little body rattled as she coughed. “I tried to stop them.” She clutched my hand so hard I thought my bones might shatter. “Too many…darts…got through.

“Mom. I—I don’t know what to do. Please.” Stinging tears streamed from my burning eyes and dribbled onto her arm.

“Get to Scott. Cash in toolbox…garage.” Her blue eyes disappeared behind her lids.

“Mom!” I shook her shoulder, and she jolted awake.

“Get…cash. Don’t let—” she gasped. “Don’t let…them find you.”

“Who? Mom. Who?”

“Coats…”

Bile stung the back of my throat. “What’s happening?”

The sirens got louder. They rang like gongs in my head. Oh good. The cops. They’ll help. They’ll—

“They’re coming.” Her eyes widened.

“The ambulance. Hold on. They’ll help you. Please Mom. I need you. Please—”

“No. No. It’s them.” She coughed. Blood spilled from her mouth, and she let out a sigh.

Tires squealing outside sent the hair on my arms to attention. Mom shoved me off her, and I landed on my butt five feet away.

“Run. Mandy. Run!”

“Mandy!” Scott shook me by the shoulder and nodded behind me.

I whipped around not quite sure what I’d see. Considering the memory that’d just rammed into me like a freight train, I was worried it was something of the icy variety.

A skinny brunette sashayed through the doorway. Georgia glanced at the girl then at me. Good timing. She got me out of an argument with Scott and the brutal memory of Mom.

“Hi, there,” the woman said with a sugary voice. Her massive, jade eyes flickered beneath the lights dangling from the ceiling.

“What can I get you?” I stomped away from Scott, sending him one last evil glare.

“I don’t know. What’s good?”

I grabbed a mixing tin and put on my best smile for the coined response to that question. “Well, everything, of course,” I said in the girliest voice I could muster, considering I was still reeling from that memory. Damn things came up at the worst times.

At least I hadn’t frozen anything because of it.

Yet.

“I’ll try a mango smoothie with a shot of protein.” She strolled to the end of the counter and looked around the corner to the back of the restaurant. On her return to the register, she glanced at the ceilings and behind her. “This is a sweet little place. It’s new, right?”

This chick must not live in town. The first time we even
thought
about buying the place, half the town showed up to check out the “Smith” family.

“It’s been a few months since I’ve been through town. This is nice.”

“Thanks. Well, I’ll get this made for you.”

I turned around and squeezed the cup. It instantly froze. So maybe I hadn’t calmed down very well yet.

The chick mumbled on as I fixed her drink, but I couldn’t remember much of what she said. But what I did remember was Scott glancing at her more than once through the prep-room window. Yeah, not cool. The flicker in his eye meant trouble. He was scoping her out.

After I mixed everything I poured the smoothie into a take-out cup, snapped on a lid, and stepped in front of the register. “Four-fifty, please.”

She handed me the money. Her long, neon nails reflected the overhead lights. Not a thing out of place on her perfect, little body.

I wondered if I would
ever
be able to look anything other than completely plain and boring?

“Thanks. See y’all later.”

I nodded at her, slammed the drawer shut, and threw the receipt in the basket next to the register.

“Whoa, she was so pretty.” Georgia ambled to the counter and leaned over it, resting on her elbows.

I sucked in a deep breath through my nose. She smelled good, too. That subtle hint of rose reminded me of Mom. She’d always worn that scent.

That was why I never wore perfume. Too many memories.

“Sooo, am I going to get a smoothie, or what?”

“Sorry. Got distracted. My bro is ragging on me again.” I turned and started cooling down another glass. “Someone from the school called him and tattled about my detention.”

“Hey, I’m curious.” Georgia picked her dark, chipped nail polish and cleared her throat.

“Spit it out, girl. I’m not going to bite you.”

“Why do you always get into trouble, anyway? I mean, you’re, like, a week from graduating. Why mess it up?”

The muscle in my arm tensed. My teeth gritted until my jaw hurt. I didn’t know why I did that crap. Maybe because it was a distraction from my ugly, confusing, screwed-up life. Plus, most everyone stayed away from me when I wore a scowl, which was safer. For me
and
for them.

What person could freeze things by touching them? Or bench press a motor home? Totally not normal. Then, having to hide it when I couldn’t even control it all that well. Oh, and not to mention having to worry if the
Coats
were going to show up and cart me away to some lab.

Again
.

“Whoa, what just happened there?” Georgia’s panicked voice yanked me out of my mental bantering.

Shards of thick glass glistened on the tile floor by my shoes.

Scott zoomed around the corner, eyes wide. They darted from me to Georgia.

She pointed to the floor. “Holy crap, Mandy. You totally crushed that glass!”

A nervous laugh slipped through my clenched teeth. “Oh, yeah. Um…”

“Must have been defective.” Scott swooped in and saved the day. “That’s happened before.”

My brother, the hero. Despite the fact that he’d ragged on me about detention and brought up Mom and Dad earlier, I knew he’d always have my back.

It’d been just us for so long. Maybe it was time to consider staying. All I needed was an incident where someone saw something they shouldn’t to ruin that.

Again.

FIVE

“Y
ou never get to pick the walking route home again, Mandy.”

“I must have missed a turn on that last path. Where the hell are we?” I glanced at the trees surrounding us. No more paved trail ahead or behind us. Not even a packed trail that I could tell.

Getting ticked off was
not
such a good thing for me. The whole controlling my fun little powers didn’t go so well when I was mad or scared. Plus, tonight was date night with Zach, so I was already on edge.

Majorly on edge.

“You’ve lived here forever, don’t you know where we are?” I punched my fist into a tree trunk. It splintered, speckling the ground with shards of bark. “The town’s so small you’d think we could walk through any patch of trees and end up on Main Street.” All I’d wanted to do was check out a wicked-cool field I thought I’d seen driving around a few weeks ago.

“Calm down. You’re gonna break your hand, and what if Zach wants to hold it later tonight?”

Hell, I’d offer him more than my hand if we ever got out of this forest. He’d asked me out three days ago, but I’d not seen him much since, let alone talked to him.

I should cancel anyway. Wasn’t smart getting involved. Not that we were getting involved. I shook my head. He was consuming way too much of my brain power lately.

Including dreamtime. And they were sinfully delicious, too.

“I thought this was a desert. Why are there trees around? Shouldn’t it just be shrubs and cactus?”

“Hey. This was
your
idea.”

“I know. I saw this cool field once while I was out driving around, and I thought it was this way.”

A branch cracked behind us.

“What was that?” Georgia dug her nails into my forearm.

“How would I know?” Every strand of hair on my arm stood straight up. Fear cinched my insides until I could hardly breathe. What if it was the
Coats?

I didn’t hear anything else, but my nerves ignited as if someone stood nearby. Or who knows, maybe I’d inherited some super-senses and didn’t know it yet.

Oh, great. Did I?

Another branch snapped.