Gabriel jerked his eyes away. He wanted to tell her everything he was thinking, how she looked striking right now, beautiful in the darkness. How he wished he’d known she would be at the party. How he would have been dragging Hunter out of the car instead of the other way around.

He brought his cup to his lips. “Nothing.”

She scowled out at the parking lot. “So is this like your place?”

“My place?”

“Where you bring girls.”

“Yes. I bring girls to this run-down parking lot all the time.” He gestured with his cup. “I have a sign-up sheet nailed to that tree. Now that you mention it”—he glanced at his watch—“we should probably wrap this up.”

Her eyes were intense, challenging, fixed on his. “Do you have a five-minute limit before you start getting mean?”

“I don’t know, Layne. Do you have a five-minute limit before you start getting defensive?”

She clamped her mouth shut and turned to face the darkness.

As usual, he didn’t know if he owed her an apology—or deserved one.

He picked at the lid of his cup. “Nicky and I come out here sometimes,” he said. “I’ve never brought a girl here.”

“Never?” Her voice was some combination of skeptical and hopeful.

“What do you think, that I’m some kind of thug player who’ll screw anything in a skirt?”

She didn’t answer, and that was answer enough.

“Wow,” he said. “I can’t believe you think I’d beat the shit out of Ryan Stacey just to drag you to the middle of nowhere so I could—”

“Hey.” Her eyes flashed up to his. “Now who’s defensive?”

“Touché.”

They sat in silence for a while, until the crickets were deafening, and Gabriel began to wonder if he should just offer to drive her home.

“It’s funny,” she said quietly. “You were the first person I talked to this morning, and you’ll probably be the last I talk to tonight.”

This morning. It felt like a lifetime ago. He wondered if she had any idea that Ryan Stacey had been trapping her little brother inside a locker after scrawling insults all over his chest.

I let him kiss me.

No. She couldn’t possibly know.

“Tell me your secrets,” she said.

He looked up. “My secrets?”

Layne drew her legs up to sit cross-legged on the tailgate, her hands in her lap. It put half her face in light, half in shadow, like a challenging angel trying to decide between good and evil. “You said yesterday that any time someone comes close to figuring you out, you pick a fight. You did it this morning in the woods, and you’re doing it now. If you’re not this thug player who can’t pass math, then what are you hiding?”

“What are you hiding?”

“I asked first.”