Spellbound - Cara Lynn Shultz [103]
With his other hand, Brendan touched my cheek and gently tilted my face so it was facing him again. I yearned to look away, but I couldn’t break his gaze.
“Would you do me a favor tonight, Emma? It’s something that means a lot to me,” he said, his mouth warm as it moved against my skin.
I nodded, a little entranced by the way his eyes green eyes burned into mine.
“Remember that nothing else matters to me but you,” Brendan said, very softly. He kissed my wrist again, and with his free hand, picked up the gloves and placed them in the hand he was holding.
The intensity of his emotions overwhelmed me for a moment, and I was glad I was sitting down. I dropped the gloves and put my hands on his face, pulling it closer to mine.
I kissed him softly, and with every movement of his lips against mine, I felt myself fall more deeply in love with him, with this strangely perfect person who for some reason, decided to love me back.
After a few minutes in this embrace, I was dimly aware of a tapping sound on the divider between us and the driver. Brendan looked out the window.
“Dun, dun, duuun,” he boomed in an impression of the horror movie sound effect. “We’re here. Are you ready?”
I gulped and took a deep breath. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”
After we stepped out into the cold night air, Brendan grabbed a thick black case from the trunk—his turntable—in one hand and my gloved palm in the other. The school looked dark and ominous tonight—and for a second I was reminded of my dream, where I stood in front of the burning house.
I shut my eyes and shook my head, trying to push the creepy thoughts out of my head. You’re going to a school dance, big deal. I followed Brendan into the main entranceway and down the long hallway to the left until we reached the gym, housed in the annex of the school. Since everything else at Vince A had been over the top, I was expecting a My Super Sweet 16-level production for the winter dance. But the gym looked a little like it could have been anywhere: silver and gold helium balloons floated from the ceiling, there were a few tables and chairs set up and decorated with tea lights and the refreshments, but the room was mostly just lined with folding chairs. But it looked like the dance committee wasn’t completely done—poor Austin was running around frantically.
“No, I said put the raffle table over there,” Kristin commanded from her perch in the middle of the dance floor, and a tiny redhead—Vanessa, I recognized—dragged a large folding table across the room with a bitter look on her face. I was reminded of one thing, at least, that set this dance apart from those at other schools. The raffle prize was season tickets to the Yankees. At Keansburg, the biggest raffle ever was for an iPod Shuffle.
“I’ve changed my mind, put it back where it was,” Kristin decreed, picking some imaginary lint off her low-cut red dress before turning her back to the girl and us. Poor Vanessa’s updo looked like it was falling apart, and I wondered how many times Kristin had forced her to drag this table back and forth.
If Brendan noticed any of that, he didn’t let on. He didn’t break his stride, keeping a tight hold on my hand as he marched right past Kristin to the deejay’s station in the far left corner to set up his equipment. I just stood there awkwardly, counting down the seconds until Kristin and her legion of lemmings noticed that we had arrived. She left the room shortly after we arrived—to fix her makeup for the billionth time that day, I assumed.
“Emma, do you want me to take that?” I was so preoccupied that I hadn’t realized Brendan was standing directly behind me, talking to me.
“I’m sorry, what?” I asked, holding my clutch to my chest.
“Your wrap,” he explained, placing his hands on my shoulders and hooking his fingers inside