2:29 AM

Chapter Nineteen

"What's for dinner?" I ask him.

"I dunno. But the more important question is what movie do you want to watch next?" he asks me.

"Maybe The Belko Experiment or Saw," I say. We've watched too many movies.

"Why do you like gory movies so much?" Colton asks me.

"Because I'm trying to see if you'll shit your pants," I say.

"Huh, I thought I was the only one." Well, shit. I guess I have more in common with him than I thought. We walk into the kitchen and I take a seat at the island and watch as he digs through the cupboards."Well, what do you wanna eat? There's cereal, or leftover Chinese, or a frozen pizza...or-" he starts as he digs through the fridge.

"Don't feed her that shit!" his mom yells. He jumps.

"Shit, Ma! You scared me," he tells her as she walks in.

"Don't swear in front of me! I'll wash your mouth with my perfume! You know how bad that shit is," she says. He smiles.

"Yes, ma'am," Colton says. I smirk.

"I don't see why you should cook her dinner. You always cook for me," she says. She digs in her bag and pulls out a mirror and lipstick.

"Come on, Ma, I thought we were going to keep that to ourselves," he says. She puts on the lipstick and snaps the mirror shut.

"That was before you forgot to wake me up. Thanks for that, by the way. Well, I have to get to work. You kids have fun and Colton, if you go into my liquor cabinet again, I'll send you to a military boot camp! And I can taste when it's watered down. I'll be home in the morning," she says and kisses his cheek leaving a dark red mark.

"Bye," he says. He frowns and rubs off the lipstick.

"Bye. Nice to meet you Andy," she says and then shuts the door.

"Your Mom's...um, different," I say. He nods.

"You want a beer?" he asks.

"Please, what do you take me for? You got any tequila?" I say. He raises his eyebrows.

"Yeah," he says. He grabs two beers from the fridge and hands me one. "How about we break into the tequila after we eat?"

"Whatever," I say. "So, what are you cooking me?" I ask him.

"I'm not cooking you anything," he says.

"I'll snitch to your mom and she'll beat your ass up," I say. He rolls his eyes.

"I'll cook for you some other time, but it's almost nine, so we're having...pop tarts, cold pizza and beef jerky," he says. I take a long swig of my beer.

"Sounds good," I say. He gathers all of the things and lays them out in front of me and then plops down, invading my space, his leg pressing against mine. "Hand me the beef jerky," I say.

"Please. Hand the beef jerky, please," Colton says. I roll my eyes and reach over him to grab it with my right arm. He grabs my arm and my shoulder and tugs me, so that the side of my face is pressed into his chest. "You're supposed to say please," he says.

"Fuck off. I just want the damn beef jerky," I say. I probably sound ridiculous.

"Come on, Ace, just say please," he says.

"You smell disgusting." I'm lying. He smells really good.

"You smell, well, you smell pretty damn sexy. Like intoxicating perfume and your hair smells...floral and musky and dark and..." he trails off. He whispers in my ear, "And seductive." My breath catches in my throat. I cough.