The Hearts Series

by L.H. Cosway

  Violet made a huff of annoyance but didn’t respond. I walked over to Lola and put my hand to her forehead, only to find she was burning up.

  “She’s not lying,” I said. “She definitely has a temperature.”

  “Oh, wonderful!” Violet groaned. “It better not be the flu. I can’t afford to get the flu. Get back in your room, Lola, and stay there. We don’t want to catch what you’ve got.”

  Okay, so it was official. Violet had just about the worst bedside manner I’d ever encountered, and I grew up with the ultimate ice queen mother who never gave hugs or cups of cocoa or petted my head when I was ill.

  “Come on, let’s get you back to bed,” I told Lola. “I’ll make you some soup, and you can try and sleep it off.”

  And that’s how I spent the rest of my morning, taking care of Lola and making sure she was comfortable. I was just washing my hands when I saw Jack pass by the window of our camper. He was pulling along a large trunk full of equipment. When he saw me watching him, he raised a questioning eyebrow, as if to ask, Are you riding with me today or not? I got a fizzy sensation in my belly to think he’d been waiting for me to come over.

  “Lola’s all settled. She should be fine until we reach Orléans. I’ll be riding with Jack,” I told Violet, who was sitting in the driver’s seat, drinking a cup of coffee.

  “Cool. Just make sure you don’t let him talk you into a blowjob on the drive. We don’t want him crashing,” she teased, and I gave her a narrowed-eyed but amused glare.

  When I got outside, I practically raced all the way to Jack’s camper. I knocked on the door and heard him call, “It’s open.”

  Stepping inside, I found the place clean and tidy, the same as before. There was something that warmed my heart about how lived in and threadbare everything felt. I’d grown up in a house with expensive carpets and designer couches, where you had to take your shoes off as soon as you stepped in the door. Mum never let me eat in the living room or in my bedroom. It was always so tense. Everything had to be perfect.

  Jack’s camper felt like pure comfort in comparison; it was the kind of place where I could sit back and relax, completely be myself.

  “Hi,” I said, going to take the passenger seat beside him at the front. “What time do we leave?”

  He glanced up to look at me, his eyes moving from my face to my chest and then down. I relished how he completely soaked in my appearance like that. There was something so…excessive about it.

  “Good morning, Lille. Five minutes. I was beginning to wonder if you’d show.”

  I let out a sigh. “Sorry about that. Lola’s fallen sick. I think it’s a cold. Anyway, I had to get her something to eat and tuck her into bed.”

  Jack seemed perplexed by this. “Who are you? Her mother?”

  “Definitely not. In my experience, that isn’t how mothers act.”

  He stared at me for a long moment before looking away again. There was a faraway tone to his voice when he said, “No, nor in mine.”

  “Ah, something we have in common, then? Though I take it your mum never tried to track your location against your wishes using GPS.”

  I winced when I remembered that his mother had died in a house fire when he was little. How fucking tactless could I be sometimes? Christ.

  Jack contemplated my statement for a while. It was probably only seconds, but it felt like forever. “Well, I only have a handful of memories of my birth mother. She was loving, caring, you know, everything a mother should be. Unfortunately, I have more memories of my foster mum. She was the exact opposite.”

  My lips turned down in a frown. “I’m sorry.”

  He glanced at me and seemed genuinely confused as to why I would say that. It was what anyone would say, but I was learning that Jack wasn’t like everyone else. He dealt in blunt statements of fact, not platitudes and empty expressions.

  “Why would you be sorry? You weren’t there,” he said plainly.

  “It’s just something people say.”

  Bea’s father, Aiden, walked in front of the camper then and waved his hand in the air to signal it was time to leave. I watched quietly as Jack started the engine and began to pull out of the campsite behind the truck in front of us. Watching him drive was kind of sexy. He was so big and muscular, and even though his camper was one of the larger ones, it felt small with him in it. The mid-morning sun warmed my face as I sat back and got comfortable. Deciding to make the most of three hours in Jack’s company, I pulled out my sketchpad and began to draw him.

  He was focused on driving mostly, but after about twenty minutes, I saw his attention flicker between me and the road, his head turning every once in a while, craning his neck to see what I was drawing. My lips curved in a smile as I crossed one leg over the other and tilted the sketchpad to obscure it from his view.

  In the end, he huffed out a breath of irritation and asked gruffly, “What are you drawing?”

  “You,” I answered honestly. There really was no point in lying. I was willing to bet he knew I was a tiny bit fascinated by him at this stage.

  “Me? Why are you drawing me?”

  I stewed on that one for a moment, trying to think of the best way to answer. “You’ve got an interesting face. I like interesting.”

  Another huff of irritation. “I can’t see how drawing me driving would be very interesting.”

  “I’m not drawing you driving. I’m drawing you on stage, weaving fire around your body. Having you in front of me for the physical characteristics is helpful. I can use my imagination for the rest.”

  His brows shot up, and he appeared to be taken aback by my answer. He let go of the steering wheel and held a hand out for the sketchpad. “Let me see.”

  I shifted back a little. “Nuh-uh. You don’t get to see it until it’s finished. And maybe not even then.”

  He made a speedy move, grabbing for the sketchpad, but I was quicker and shot out of reach. “Hey, now, that’s a dirty tactic,” I said, laughing nervously.

  In all honesty, I was self-conscious about showing him. I didn’t think I’d ever put such effort and detail into drawing a person before, and it was perfectly evident. It was also perfectly evident by the sheer amount of detail that I was obsessed with him. And, let’s face it, nobody wants the object of their obsession to be aware of it. Then you just end up feeling weird and itchy and a little bit like a creep.

  “Lille, you have five seconds to hand me that sketchpad, or else,” he warned me. My heart stuttered in response to his harsh tone of voice, and my skin prickled in a way that made me wonder if I liked it.

  “Not going to happen,” I said, sticking to my guns.

  “Fine,” he replied a moment before he abruptly turned the steering wheel, bringing the camper over to the side of the road. The vehicles behind us honked their horns in annoyance while Jack casually pulled over and stopped. The rest of the circus party drove on ahead of us, and I saw a few people staring out of their windows curiously. I almost burst into laughter when Violet sped past, casually mimicking a blowjob with one hand as she drove.

  I knew I was in for it when Jack undid his seatbelt and came at me. Quick as a flash, I was out of my seat and running. Though, since we were in the camper, there wasn’t really anywhere for me to run to.

  I dashed inside his bedroom and slammed the door shut, pressing my body against it and holding down the handle to keep him from getting inside. And yeah, it was a futile mission because, let’s face it, my strength was no match for his. I was no dainty little thing, but still, Jack got the door open in record time, and I found myself stumbling backwards, my arse hitting the floor painfully.

  “Ouch, my coccyx,” I whined, rubbing at my lower back.

  Jack stood in the doorway, expressionless, for a moment before he began a slow laugh.

  “What did you just say?”

  “I hurt my coccyx, the lower part of my spine. I think I might have done some serious damage,” I complained, scowling up at him. “I’m glad to know you�
�re finding it so funny, though.”

  He held his hand out to help me up and I took it, my sketchpad long forgotten on the floor. “I’m sure your coccyx is fine, Lille,” said Jack, towering over me. Then his voice dipped low. “But just to be sure, let me check.”

  Slowly, he took a breath and reached around me, encapsulating me in his arms. He found my spine and gently ran his fingers downwards. When he reached the base, he started to rub in slow circles. I drew in a gulp of air, tingling all over from his closeness.

  “How does that feel?” he murmured.

  It felt incredible.

  “G-good,” I managed, and glanced up at him.

  He held my gaze and continued massaging for a full minute. It was perhaps the best minute of my life, all eye contact and gently probing fingers. I was a little disappointed when he drew away. “Better now?”

  I swallowed and nodded. “Mm-hmm, much better.”

  “Good,” he said, and before I could react, he dove for my sketchpad, picking it up and flipping through the pages, trying to find my most recent drawing. I swiped for it, but he held it above his head, and yeah, there was no way I was going to reach it. I briefly considered hopping on his bed for the extra height, but I had shoes on, so I thought that might be rude, even though he was being epically rude by nosing at my pictures without my permission.

  I accepted defeat and stood back, folding my arms and leaning against the door while he examined my drawings as though they were curious artefacts. I got a little dry-throated just watching him. There were a lot of half-finished works in there, and I really did have a fear of my incomplete drawings being seen. I wasn’t sure why, but his opinion was important to me. I didn’t want him to dismiss my work as airy-fairy and pointless like Shay Cosgrove would have.

  “You see a lot of light in the world,” Jack said finally, his face drawn into a perturbed expression. He flipped to the next page, and I knew he’d come to the drawing of him because he paused, dark eyes taking it in. I bit on my fingernails, waiting.

  He tilted his head to the side and held the sketchpad out to look at the picture from a different angle. Then he glanced at me and back to the sketchpad before cocking a brow.

  “This is how I look to you?” he asked.

  “Uh, yeah,” I croaked.

  He was staring at the picture again, and almost in slow motion, I saw his lips curve into a smile. It was the most goose-bump-inducing, belly-tingling, heart-fluttering smile I’d ever witnessed. He closed the sketchpad and handed it back to me, then placed a kiss on the top of my head.

  “You’re a great artist, Lille,” he said, and then made his way to the front of the camper without another word. I was still standing there when the engine started running and we were on the road again. I stumbled a little and steadied myself on the bed before sitting down. What he said had been so simple, and yet it felt like just a few words from him, telling me that I didn’t actually suck, had legitimised me. For the first time in my life, I felt real.

  I could officially tick number nine off my list. Wow.

  I didn’t know how long I’d been sitting there when I finally managed to draw myself out of my thoughts. Looking around Jack’s room, I saw a tall, narrow wardrobe, some drawers, and a couple of shelves built into the wall. On the shelves was an array of books. I leaned closer to read the spines and found that they were all books for kids and teenagers. Adventure novels. Fantasy. Science Fiction. The only book that wasn’t a novel was a big, hardback, well-worn Oxford English dictionary. Randomly, I pulled out a paperback and flipped through the pages. It was curious that there wasn’t a single adult book in his entire collection.

  I noticed that certain words had been underlined with a pencil. Words like “abolish,” “eschew,” “contrite,” and “gregarious.” They were the kind of words you wouldn’t really consider using until you were older and more learned, but still, any fully grown adult would at least have a decent idea of what they meant. It struck me that Jack must have been underlining them so he could go and look them up later.

  Then, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted another book on his bedside dresser. It was a brand-new copy of Great Expectations, and I immediately remembered how I’d told Jack it was my favourite work of Dickens. I picked it up and found that a receipt had been tucked into the inside cover. It was for a shop back in Caen, the date showing he’d bought it just a few days ago. The bookmark told me he was just over a hundred pages in. Had he bought this because I’d mentioned it? The thought made my chest feel too full.

  Slotting the book back onto the dresser, I went and joined him, sitting down in the passenger seat.

  “You took your time,” he noted, glancing at me sideways.

  “Yeah, well, I’m a little put out by you bulldozing your way into my artwork,” I said with humour.

  The shape of his lips told me he was almost smiling. “You’re very talented, Lille. You don’t need to be self-conscious about it.”

  “Hmm, that doesn’t make me feel much better about the invasion of privacy,” I sniffed, heavy on the dramatics, while on the inside I was delighted. I had a feeling that compliments from Jack McCabe were few and far between. And what was seldom was wonderful in my book.

  “Stop being moody,” he chastised me playfully, and then went quiet for a second. “What are you going to do with the picture of me when you’re done with it?”

  “I hadn’t planned that far ahead yet.”

  A frisky gleam came into his eye. “I think you should hang it over your bed. For inspiration.”

  He said this with such a straight tone that I didn’t get his meaning at first. When I did, I blushed like crazy and focused my attention out the window. “You know what, Jack McCabe, you’re a sneaky little flirt sometimes.”

  He seemed to enjoy my assessment, because he was smiling full-on now, never taking his eyes off the road. A little while passed in quiet before I spoke again.

  “I saw all your books in your room. You must really love reading.”

  His face grew wary, and he shifted in his seat, hands flexing on the steering wheel. “Reading helps to kill time when I’m on the road.”

  I nodded. “You also underline the words to look them up later, right? That’s a really good idea. I hate it when I come across a word I don’t know but forget to look it up.”

  Jack let out a long breath. “That’s not really it.”

  “No?”

  He shook his head. “I have gaps in my education. Well, not so much gaps as one big gap. My schooling basically stopped after my parents died. I only really began reading again a couple of years ago, so I look up the words I haven’t come across before.”

  I furrowed my brow. “But how can that be? You went to live with a foster family. Didn’t they send you to school?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What does that mean?” I shifted closer in my seat, giving him my full attention now. I felt like I was being nosy, asking all these questions, but I couldn’t seem to hold back my curiosity.

  “I went to school some days, but Frances never really enforced it, and if you tell a teenage boy he doesn’t have to go to school, more often than not he isn’t going to go. Other days, Frances kept me at home for other reasons.” He trailed off, staring dead ahead. I got the feeling he was somewhere else for a moment.

  My face must have shown my incredulity, because I seriously couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “That’s completely fucked up. I don’t understand how she got away with that.”

  What I really wanted to do was ask about those “other reasons,” but I had a feeling he’d evade answering me. Plus, there was something in the way he said it that gave me a sick sensation in my belly.

  “Frances got away with a lot of things. Until she didn’t anymore.”

  There was a chilling tone to his voice that put me on edge. I opened my mouth to ask another question, but no words came. Somehow, I felt like I didn’t want to know the rest of the story. I went quiet and was surpris
ed when Jack spoke.

  “I read those books to improve my writing and grammar, but also because they’re an escape. They’re not like real life. In the stories I read, the bad people get what’s coming to them. In the real world, that’s not always the case.”

  I stared at him, a lump in my throat, and my heart broke a little. He was a small boy again, the one I caught glimpses of every now and again before the strong, impenetrable man returned.

  “That’s true. You know, I can read The Witches by Roald Dahl over and over again, and it never gets old. It’s like the perfect comfort read, a hug in a book.”

  He shook his head in amusement at my use of “hug in a book” and kept on driving.

  “I also saw you’re reading Great Expectations. I feel like I should warn you that there isn’t exactly a happy ending to that one. It’s a little bit tragic, actually.”

  His body tensed for a moment, but all he said was, “Yeah, okay.”

  I wondered if he was embarrassed for me to know he’d bought it because I’d said it was my favourite. He had no need to be, but still, I let the subject drop all the same. We were a little bit behind the others due to our unexpected stop, but I could see the long string of campers and trucks in the distance, so I knew we were almost caught up to them.

  When we reached Orléans, I stared out the window in fascination at the buildings and the old stone bridge with arches beneath that crossed over the river. The view made my heart excited. It was just so French. Right then I wished I hadn’t destroyed my phone because I wanted to look up the city, read about what there was to see here. I guessed Jack knew just as little as I did about the place, even though I suspected he’d been there before, because when I asked him the name of the river we were crossing, he only shrugged.

  Everywhere was just another place to him. It made me a little bit sad.

  In a complete contrast to the last site we’d been camped in, which was on a country road, we were now smack bang in the middle of civilisation in what appeared to be a large empty car park.

  “Can I use your phone for a minute?” I asked Jack as he pulled in behind Marina’s camper.