The corner of her mouth turns up. “Not many people bother to try to read me.”

Outside, it’s relatively quiet, and with our windows down, we can hear the ocean lapping at the shore during the pauses in our conversation. The peaceful rhythmic interlude makes it less glaring that it takes me a minute to figure out how to respond.

“I don’t know about that. We just left a whole house of people sick of losing to you at poker.”

She laughs. “Touché. But none of them like to work for it.”

“Have you ever considered not making people work for it?”

“Literally never.”

“Well, at least you’re self-aware.”

My phone beeps, and I know before I look down that it’s gonna be my mom, asking where we are. I quickly tap out that we’ll be home in two minutes, and Jasmine says, “I didn’t really make you work for it, did I?”

I think of how quickly she invited me to the pool, to meet her friends, to join in on her photo shoots. I press send on my reply and say, “No, you didn’t, I suppose.” Although all of that was superficial; there’s still so much I don’t know. But I like the idea that I’m a standout. What can I say? I’m vain. “Am I just special?”

Her lips twitch. “I guess you are.”

“I feel special,” I say seriously. It’s meant to sound like teasing, but I do. I’m grateful for how much she’s helped me love it here, for how generous she’s been with her time, with her life. Hell, I’m even grateful that she listened to me tonight about not wanting to be spotted and found another way to make it work. “To what do I owe the honor?”

“You really wanna know?”

“Obviously.”

She pulls us into the driveway and shuts off the car. “You cut through bullshit really, really fast. I cannot even tell you how refreshing that is.”

I definitely owe that to a combination of my mom, who has zero time for bullshit, and Shannon, who taught me not to bother since she’ll see right through me anyway. But I don’t feel like giving anyone else credit. I’m enjoying feeling special—unnervingly so. I’m not gonna say that either, so instead I deflect like the wind. “Well, as long as I’m doing that: I thought you’d want to stay longer tonight. Hang out with Carter.” I let the rest go unsaid.

She glances at me, her usually golden eyes impenetrably dark. “Can I tell you something, only because I think you’ll get it and not think I’m extremely weird?”

I have no idea what’s coming, but there’s only one right answer to that question. “Of course.”