Don't Look Behind You (Don't Look Series Book 1) by Emily Kazmierski (summer reads .txt) 📗

Opening my private messages, I send her one before I can think better of it. Who are you really? I know your name isn’t Ashlee.

Then I go to my own feed and find the first photo I posted After. Ashlee’s comment was the very first.

My chest constricts when I see there’s a location under my post: Valley High School. My legs nearly give out, but I catch myself on the slick edge of the sink. Gulp in air before my vision tunnels. I hit so many wrong buttons in my panic to delete it that it takes me a couple minutes, but I get it done.

Even so, I know it’s too late.

Because the Mayday Killer has been moving north for the past two months. Ever since I accidentally posted a photo with my location tagged.

I meet my own gaze in the mirror. My eyes are red from heaving, my cheeks are blotchy, my hair a mess around my shoulders. I didn’t know it at the time, but the minute I posted that stupid photo, I re-lit the giant, flashing neon target sign that Aunt Karen had tried to extinguish.

It’s my doing that he knows where I am.

Chapter 26

Day 142, Tuesday

Esau is standing at the base of the front porch when I crouch to jump off the roof. His hair is up in a dark bun at the back of his head, and he’s bundled in a thick shearling coat. He looks so country I almost laugh. He steps right up to the roofline. “Here, give me your hands.”

His fingers are warm and firm around mine as he helps me jump down. “Don’t want you to land on your ass this time.”

I start to shush him, but he slides an arm around my waist and pulls me against him. All of the air leaves my lungs as his eyes find mine in the glow of the moon. When I start to smile, he lowers his mouth to mine in a quick brush. Then he pulls back, just a touch. Our breaths mingle in a haze between us. His hand flinches against my waist, but before he can unhand me, I tuck my fingers into the warmth under the collar of his jacket and kiss him again. One of us groans, I’m not sure which, but it spurs Esau on. In two steps he backs me up against one of the wooden support beams under the patio cover. Esau’s free hand lands on the painted wood over my head as he leans into me, sheltering me from sight with his broad body.

His nose nuzzles my throat as he places a feather-light kiss there.

We’re both breathing heavy.

“This isn’t… When I texted you...” I start, but it’s hard to focus on words with Esau’s thumb drawing circles on my side. Maybe it’s exactly what I intended. To find a way to forget the repugnance of today, even for a few hours.

“Course not,” he whispers, his hair tickling my nose as he caresses the shell of my ear. The pad of his thumb is coarse over my bottom lip, and then he’s leaning in again. My eyes flutter shut. I don’t want to merely see this moment; I want to focus on how it feels like warm elixir pouring through me.

“Not that I want to stop,” I manage to say when he lifts his head long enough to take a breath. Esau could definitely help me forget.

He sighs against my mouth.

A sound from inside the old house makes us freeze.

“Go,” I whisper-yell, pushing at Esau’s chest. We run down the lawn and duck behind Aunt Karen’s car. We sit hunched in the silence. Any second that front door is going to open and my guardian is going to be yelling at me for sneaking out again. The only reason she found out the first time was because of that box of photos from the basement. I shiver at the thought of Justin following Esau and I to the orchard. Fear raises goosebumps along my skin as I look up and down the street. No sign of who could be lurking in the shadows.

This is stupid. I’m making dangerous choices. I should go marching back into that house and lock the door behind me. But I don’t.

“I think the coast is clear,” Esau whispers. “Let’s go.” He opens the truck door for me and closes it once I’m inside. He steers out of the neighborhood easily, and once again we’re coasting through town as if we’re the only two people awake in all the world. It’s one thing I love about this place. Unlike at home, when there are always people out no matter how late, here everything slows down after dark. Stores close. People return to their homes. One by one the lights go out. I never thought I’d prefer the quiet of night to the bustle of day, but I do.

I never considered a lot of things Before.

“That was so close,” I say, relieved as the tension rolls off my shoulders. “I just knew Aunt Karen was going to throw the door open and start yelling.”

“Me too.” He glances at me, the corner of his mouth upturned.

“So…”

“So?”

“That kiss back there.”

Esau adjusts the gear shifter as he turns out of town toward the country. “Wanted to make sure it happened this time. Didn’t know you’d be so into it though.” His cocky smirk sends a warm current through my veins.

“Just to be clear, that was not why I texted you.”

He snorts. “Didn’t think it was.”

“Okay, good.” Now that that’s settled.

“Got to say, kissing you is way more fun than arguing, though I don’t mind that either. You’re so… aggravating.”

“You’re no piece of cake either.”

“My abuela says I’m sweet as candy.” Esau’s confident grin makes me smirk.

“Has your abuela met you?”

Esau chuckles. “I haven’t seen her in years. Maybe if she saw me now…”

“She’d still think you were sweet. Grandparents are supposed to be