The Deal Breakers (Love Quiz Book 2)

by Maggie Dallen

  Edie, on the other hand… I could feel her gaze on the side of my face, studying me.

  “I knew you’d come around, Jessie May,” Rex said. He nudged my elbow in that way he always did when he was teasing me.

  This time he was trying to tease me to get things back to normal. He wanted me to fall back into our age-old, familiar routine. I knew what he wanted from me. Normally I’d roll my eyes, maybe give him a little shove, and tell him to stop gloating.

  He’d laugh and all would be right with the world.

  I knew what to do to make things go back to normal between us but, for the life of me…I couldn’t do it.

  I tried but the hurt was too strong to ignore. My pain was too acute to pretend.

  It was like all these years of ignoring my feelings for Rex, of pretending they didn’t exist—they piled up on me all at once, and I couldn’t fake it.

  I couldn’t pretend.

  I could barely even breathe.

  Rex’s smile faltered. “Jessica, what’s wrong?”

  “Um, Jessica?” Edie sounded wary beside me as she reached a hand out and touched my elbow.

  I turned to her like she was a lifeline. Maybe that was why she was so beloved by the losers and the loners—she seemed so capable. Like if you looked to her, she’d handle it.

  So I looked to her now, and lo and behold—she handled it.

  “We’ve got to run, Rex,” she said sweetly, already steering me toward the door. “Dane will be talking to you about your date, but for now…” She glanced up at me since I had a solid six inches on her. “Jessica and I have some work to do.”

  She steered me out the door of the gym like I was an invalid and for that I was glad. I was having a hard time not giving in to the myriad of emotions that were making me want to scream and cry and…well, dang, I wanted to punch somebody.

  That somebody? His name was Rex.

  We stopped when we slammed through the double doors that led to the parking lot and I gulped in the fresh air. “Thanks,” I finally managed to say to an unnervingly quiet Edie.

  “My pleasure,” she said with a small smile. “Now, tell me what else I can do to help.”

  I studied her as I thought of all the options. Talk to Rex for me? Knock some sense into him?

  That wouldn’t work.

  I knew now with utmost clarity what I had to do. For the sake of our friendship, I had to move on once and for all.

  I licked my lips and glanced up at the sky, feeling for all the world like I was ripping off a large, Rex-sized Band-Aid when I turned to her. “You can set me up with Tommy Miller.”

  Chapter 4

  Rex

  I tapped my fingers against the steering wheel as I idled in front of Jessica’s house.

  Her bedroom light was still off. Her car was here but I’d seen her climb into Tommy Miller’s car earlier so I knew that didn’t mean anything.

  My youngest brother Jeremy was slouched down in the passenger seat next to me. “Dude, what are we still doing here? Are you stalking Jessica now? That’s lame.” He muttered that last part before turning his attention back to whatever game he was playing on his phone.

  “I’m not stalking, just…” Watching. Staring. Sitting outside her house for an absurd amount of time. I never did finish that sentence.

  Jeremy wasn’t paying attention anymore anyway.

  “We’ve been sitting here forever,” he moaned a couple minutes later.

  I scoffed. “It’s been…” I glanced at the clock. Okay, yeah, we’d been out here for a while now. “You can run on home,” I said, pointing to our house at the end of the block. “I’m not stopping you.”

  He gave me the side-eye that he and my other brothers had learned when I wasn’t watching. “And leave you to stalk your best friend all on your own? What kind of brother would that make me?”

  “I’m not stalking her, I’m just…” Worried. Angry. Confused. Hurt. Take your pick.

  Once again, I didn’t say any of that and Jeremy had already lost interest in our little chat.

  I couldn’t believe Jessica was shutting me out like this. I couldn’t believe she’d gone a full seventy-two hours without talking to me.

  I was worried.

  This wasn’t her.

  It wasn’t us.

  And the worst part was, if she didn’t talk to me I couldn’t make this right. I dropped my head into my hands and took a deep breath.

  “Jeez, you need to chill, man.” That was Jeremy’s helpful advice.

  He was right. I knew he was right. I was freaking out over nothing.

  Right?

  I looked in my rearview mirror to see if I could catch sight of headlights.

  Nope.

  Man, where had he taken her that he’d keep her out so late? “It’s a school night, for crying out loud.”

  The silence that followed that particular gem was shockingly loud. I looked over to see Jeremy staring at me in horror. “Okay, Old Man Rexman, we really need to get you home.”

  I glared at my brother. “You don’t understand, Jessica doesn’t like to stay out late on school nights.” I was not making myself look any cooler right now, and I knew it.

  “Uh huh.”

  “She hates getting up early,” I mumbled, turning my attention back to the rearview mirror to search for headlights. “She’ll be totally off schedule in the morning.”

  I heard Jeremy turning back to his game and saw him shaking his head in disgust out of the corner of my eye. “You should probably text Tommy Miller to tell him that,” Jeremy said in a bored voice. “Maybe tell him that she needs to eat more fiber while you’re at it.”

  I huffed with irritation. Okay, fine, so maybe I did sound a little…old. But Jeremy didn’t get it.

  I wasn’t myself right now.

  Truth be told, I hadn’t felt even remotely close to normal for seventy-two hours. Everything was off.

  Everything was wrong.

  And it was all because Jessica had stopped speaking to me. I went back to tapping out a beat on my steering wheel just to give my hands something to do.

  After a few minutes of silence, Jeremy sighed loudly and set his phone down. “What exactly do you hope to accomplish here?”

  I didn’t look over at him. I was too busy watching for headlights, and getting more annoyed with each passing car that wasn’t Tommy’s. “What do you mean? I’m not here to accomplish anything, just…”

  I trailed off with a shrug because…I had no idea how to finish that statement.

  “Exactly,” Jeremy said, his tone annoyingly smug, especially considering he was in the eighth grade. The kid didn’t know anything about anything.

  But that didn’t stop him from doling out advice. “If I were you, I’d get out of here before she sees you and you make this whole situation worse.”

  That had me tearing my gaze away to glare over at him. “What situation? There’s no situation.”

  He met my glare evenly.

  I huffed. “Fine. Maybe we’re having…issues.” I grimaced as the word came out. Issues. That was so not us. Jessica and I were easy. We were cool. We didn’t do drama and we sure as heck didn’t have issues.

  Issues were for relationships. They only came up when things got complicated.

  But that was the beauty of me and Jessica. We were simple.

  Or…we had been.

  I rubbed a hand over my face. “I don’t know what’s going on with her.”

  Jeremy sighed and I experienced a moment of absolute horror when I realized I was actually talking to my little brother about this. What was the world coming to when I went to a hormonally-challenged, pre-pubescent junior high kid for girl advice?

  “You don’t know?” He sounded so amused that I dropped my hands so I could glower at him again.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Jeremy studied me with an expression I’d never seen from him before. It was alarmingly close to…pity. “Dude, if you can’t figure it out,
I don’t know that I should tell you.”

  I turned to face him head-on. “Tell me what?”

  He crossed his arms and shifted so he was leaning back against the door, like he was trying to get a better look at me. “Why are you here right now?”

  I sighed loudly. “I told you, I just want to make sure—”

  “Right, right,” Jeremy said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You just want to make sure she gets home safe.” He arched a brow. “Because Tommy Miller, who she’s known her whole life, is such a bad guy.”

  I pressed my lips together to keep from telling him to shove it. Of course Tommy wasn’t a bad guy. He was nice, I supposed. If you liked football players who thought they were God’s gift. But I got his gist. The guy wasn’t exactly a bad seed, and I had no reason to believe that Jessica was in danger.

  I tapped my fingers on the steering wheel again to keep from throttling my little brother. “Okay, fine,” I finally said. “So what’s your point?”

  Jeremy rolled his eyes. “My point is you should take us home. Get out of here before you can make things worse.”

  “Worse…” I shook my head. “I didn’t do anything wrong in the first place.”

  Jeremy arched a brow in disbelief.

  “What do you know about it?” I asked.

  “Only what I’ve overheard when you were whining to Brian about it this morning,” he said.

  Brian was the second oldest and one grade below me.

  “I wasn’t whining,” I said. Okay, maybe I had been whining. But I honestly had no idea what I’d done wrong. Sure, pushing her to take part in this dating experiment might have been a little uncomfortable, but she should have been over it by now. Instead she was doing the unthinkable…she was shutting me out. Me! I’d spent years watching her keep everyone else at arm’s length except for me, her mom, and maybe my family. But she’d never once done it to me.

  I took in a deep breath because for the millionth time over the past few days, I felt like the ground was shifting beneath me. Like the world was tilting and I didn’t know up from down.

  “Look, dude,” Jeremy said with a tone that was way more grown up than I was used to. If he’d stop calling everyone dude all the time, I might even say he sounded mature. “I think you need to get a little perspective.”

  I stared at him. “What does that mean?”

  Jeremy scratched the back of his neck as he considered me. “I can’t tell if you’re intentionally blind or just really, really dumb.”

  I leaned over and smacked him upside the head. “Careful, little bro. I can still kick your butt.”

  He laughed as he swatted my hand away. “I’m serious, dude. You are the only one who doesn’t see it.”

  I stared at him. See what? I couldn’t quite bring myself to say it and I couldn’t tell you why. There was a weird sensation going on in my gut. It was churning like I’d just eaten those disgusting fish tacos Jessica liked to order at the taqueria downtown. I found myself gripping the steering wheel even tighter.

  Jeremy was watching me and now there was no doubting it—his look was filled with pity. He wasn’t even trying to hide it, the little twerp. “Let’s just get out of here, man. Trust me when I say you shouldn’t talk to Jessica right now. And you definitely shouldn’t ruin her date.”

  Her date. Ugh. I craned my neck to look behind me, no longer content with the rearview mirror. Where the heck were they? The guy was vanilla ice cream. He was boring and predictable and had no sense of humor. She couldn’t possibly be having fun with him right now.

  “Seriously, man. If she finds you here…”

  I whipped my head around to stare at him. “Why would she be upset to find me here?”

  He sighed. “You are such an idiot.”

  I leaned forward, my heart pounding in my chest. “Why would she be upset?”

  He arched his brows. “Because you’d be crashing her date?” His expression said duh loud and clear. “Because they probably want to, like, make out or whatever…”

  That roiling sensation in my gut grew a million times worse. “She’s never even kissed a guy,” I said. “She’s not going to let him make out with her on their first date.”

  Right?

  I just barely stopped myself from asking for my little brother’s opinion on the matter. What would he know about it? He hadn’t even started dating yet. And while he knew Jessica well as a sort of pseudo-sister, he didn’t know the first thing about her as a girl.

  Not like I did.

  I stared at my knuckles, which were turning white under my death grip. I had this horrible urge to ask Jeremy for confirmation. She wouldn’t kiss Tommy Miller, would she? Not on her first date ever, right?

  I stopped myself in the nick of time. Of course she wouldn’t.

  I saw headlights coming, slowing down as they approached Jessica’s house. I started to open my door, and Jeremy reached out, grabbing me by the sleeve. “Don’t do this, man.”

  I was a little shocked by his level of intensity, but that was nothing compared to this feeling of helplessness and panic and…ah crap, I didn’t know what this was. But it was making me shake him off and had my feet swinging to exit the car.

  “You don’t get it, dude,” Jeremy said behind me. “You pushed her into this. You can’t ruin it for her.”

  He sounded so defensive. So protective of Jessica. I mean, I got it. She was like a big sister to him. But she was mine to protect. I turned to glare at him. “You don’t know the first thing about it, Jeremy. You’re just a kid.”

  His brows drew down as he returned my glare. “Fine,” he said, turning to open his own door. “Make a fool of yourself, see if I care.”

  “I’m not going to make a fool of myself, I’m just going to—” What? What was I going to do?

  I had no idea.

  Panic was back, along with a roaring in my ears. We were both out of the car now, standing on either side of it. We both watched as the car that slowed down picked up speed again and kept going, the cop in the passenger’s seat giving us a curious look as he went by.

  I let out a long exhale. It wasn’t her. She wasn’t back yet.

  My heart was racing like I’d just gone for a run. She couldn’t shut me out like this. It was going to kill me. Like, physically kill me dead. Literally.

  “If you’re not going to listen to reason, you can hang out here without me,” Jeremy said, walking toward our house. He turned back and started walking backwards. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  He turned back and kept walking. I was not going to ask. I wasn’t going to give the little brat the satisfaction. I wasn’t going to— “Warn me about what?”

  He stopped walking, his head dropping back in exaggerated impatience. He turned slowly and gave me a condescending look. “Stop toying with her, dude. If you don’t want to be with her, then let her go.”

  I stared at him in shock. “We’re friends,” I said. “We’re just friends.”

  Jeremy’s expression shifted and I thought I saw disappointment there. “Yeah, whatever, man. Keep telling yourself that.” He turned around, and I found myself going after him.

  “Hey, you can’t just walk away.”

  He turned back with a smirk. “Watch me. There’s no way I’m going to stand around and watch this train wreck.”

  “I’m just trying to be a good friend.”

  He shook his head. “Yeah, dude? Really? Is that why you’ve been sitting here looking like you’re gonna puke at the thought of her out with another guy?”

  I opened my mouth and nothing came out.

  I did feel like puking. But not because she was out with someone else.

  Right?

  “You can’t have it both ways, man,” Jeremy said before turning around. “It’s not fair to Jessica.”

  I stared after him. Talk about cryptic. What wasn’t fair? I wasn’t being unfair. I wanted her to have a love life. I did. Just…not with Tommy Miller.

  The flash of
headlights behind me had me spinning around. She was back.

  Relief swept over me so quickly it made my legs feel weak.

  I wasn’t jealous that she’d been out on a date—her first date—with another guy.

  Was I?

  What Jeremy said was still ringing in my ears, rattling in my chest. This was a date. If Tommy Miller had eyes and a pulse he’d try to make a move.

  Oh crap.

  I really was going to puke.

  Chapter 5

  Jessica

  So. This was dating.

  I tapped a hand against my knee as we headed down my street.

  “I had a good time tonight,” Tommy said. Tom. He’d been telling me all night that I should call him Tom but I couldn’t seem to remember.

  “Me too,” I said. That wasn’t a total lie. Considering the emotional turmoil I’d been suffering these past few days, my first date had gone as well as I could have hoped.

  The smile he gave me now was nice. He’d matured a lot over the years and it had been nice getting to know him again as an adult. He’d had interesting stories to tell over dinner, explaining why he’d taken off the rest of the semester, and the party he took me to was mellow and nice.

  He’d been nice.

  The whole thing had been…nice.

  And if my heart was still aching at the giant Rex-sized hole in its middle, well…I’d done my best to ignore it. Just like I’d ignored Rex these past few days.

  I did feel bad about that. Guilt had been keeping me up at night and it had taken an epic amount of concealer tonight to cover up the dark circles beneath my eyes.

  But the thing was, while I felt guilty about ignoring Rex, I didn’t know what else to do.

  For the sake of our friendship—for the sake of my sanity—I had to get over my feelings for him, and I couldn’t do that when we were attached at the hip. If we stood any chance of keeping our friendship, I had to get some distance from—

  “Rex?” Tommy’s voice had me snapping my head to look at him.

  “What?”

  He peered ahead. “Is that the Rexman kid in your driveway?”

  I followed his gaze and my eyes widened in shock to see my best friend staring at us from where he stood in the middle of my driveway. “Umm…”