Primal Threat - Earl Emerson [35]
“I bet you get straight A’s.”
“You know I do. Actually, I never even got dirty as a little girl. It’s embarrassing to admit. Even Nana urged me to do something wrong once in a while. The worst thing I ever did was once I wore a T-shirt to school that said, OBJECTS UNDER THIS SHIRT APPEAR LARGER IN REAL LIFE.”
He was afraid to laugh for fear of offending her, but not laughing might offend her, too, so he settled for a smile and chuckle, making a point of not glancing at her nearly flat chest.
“I bought it on a whim, then one of my friends dared me to wear it to school, so I wore a sweater over it till I left the house and then I took the sweater off at school. In second period I got invited to the principal’s office. I never did anything like that again.”
At that point Zak couldn’t help laughing. Nadine was so timid but wanted so badly to be bold. “You’ve got a good heart, Nadine. Don’t ever lose it.”
“I wish I could say that was true, but it’s not. I was good because I was scared of getting in trouble. Now I toe the line with our Lord and Savior, but I’m really not sure if I’m toeing the line because I want to, or because I don’t want to end up in a hot place.”
“You believe there’s a physical hell?”
“There can’t be a kingdom of heaven without a hell. It doesn’t make sense.”
“Right.”
Zak turned off Twenty-third Avenue onto Marion, much earlier than he’d planned, and began driving residential streets, making what appeared to be random turns. “What are you doing?” Nadine asked.
“You know a guy drives a BMW Three Series? Black.”
Nadine swiveled around in her seat and peered out the rear window. “Oh, my…gosh. It’s Scooter.”
“Your ex?”
“He keeps pestering me. He says we’re going to get married someday, and I’m just delaying the inevitable.”
“You’re sure you broke up?”
“I told him we were finished ten days ago. Since then he’s been following me and calling and coming over to the house whenever he feels like it. Kasey was there the other day, Saturday, and Scooter came over, supposedly to see him, and stayed all day. He kept coming to the door of my room trying to get in. You don’t know how creepy it is having him in the house.”
“You tell your parents?”
“They’re on his side. They think we should get back together. They’ve never seen his dark side and think I’m blowing it all out of proportion.”
“Just how dark is his dark side? Is he going to pull alongside and fill my door with bullets?”
“Of course not. He’s just kind of unpredictable right now.”
“That’s not very reassuring.” Zak hadn’t liked Scooter from the beginning, hadn’t liked him any more than he’d liked Nadine’s brother, and he knew jilted suitors, ex-boyfriends, and former husbands could be trouble. In this case he wasn’t worried personally—he could take care of himself—he was worried about Nadine.
Zak drove around a block, then around another block, and still Scooter trailed them. It wasn’t possible to slip away from a BMW in his underpowered van, so Zak picked up his cell phone. “What are you doing?”
“Calling the cops.”
“Don’t. Please?” She touched his arm lightly. “Please?”
“Why not?”
“Just…I don’t want any trouble. He’s a friend of the family, and his father and my father are friends. I don’t want any of this getting out. It would be humiliating for all of us. Besides, he won’t get into Broadmoor. We can tell the guard and they won’t let him through.”
“What he’s doing is criminal harassment. Stalking.”
“You would be doing me a big favor it you didn’t call the police. I’ll see him again today. Kasey’s home for a few days, so he’ll be over at the house. I’ll tell him to stop it. I’ll tell him you were going to call the police. That