Toy Soldiers (Helford #1)

(13) Trust

“Caitie,” Parker drawled, smiling widely as he settled down at the library desk beside me, leaning forward and peering at me. “Fancy running into you here!”

I didn’t point out that it was after school hours and a good majority of our senior class was occupying the library—our mutual science teacher had issued a report earlier in the day, and we were all scrambling for a head start on it before the beginning of the weekend—but I certainly wasn’t surprised to find Parker here. I knew that he would come to find me and corner me somewhere from the moment I caught him shooting me cautious looks at the lunch table in between jabs at his best friend, not mentioning the date aloud but hinting at it enough that I was expected to realize that Parker knew about it. It would only be a matter of time before this scene played out.

So I gave him a little bit of assistance. I couldn’t help but to be curious.

To give Parker the credit, he looked anything but nervous or uneasy. He still looked the same, a playful grin on his face and his hair unkempt. His eyes sparkled with mischief and something else—cautiousness. His stance was casual and he didn’t seem to be worried or concerned, but I could tell by a sixth sense that I had developed over time that he was anxious about something.

I smiled and put a book mark into the page I had been scanning, closing the book. “Hey, Parker; what’s up?”

“Oh, the usual,” he said, but his smile turned fake. “Actually, I really wanted to talk to you. About Jonathon.”

I scrunched my face up curiously and tilted my head. “What about?”

“Here goes nothing,” Parker muttered to himself before he breathed out deeply and angled himself on the stool until he was properly facing me, his hands folded in front of him. He leaned forward a little bit, looking distressed. “So I’ve known Jonathon for a long time now—give or take two years—and I know him better than I know my own brother. I know Jonathon so well that I can tell you that I don’t think I have ever seen him looking at someone the way that he looks at you, and I’ve never seen him so nervous and excited for a date like he is now. I’m not trying to talk him up to you, Caitie—believe me, it sounds like it, but I’m really getting at something here—but, needless to say, I’ve seen Jonathon through a lot of ups and downs even in the last couple of years. I know him.”

I sat there patiently, silently. He took that as a cue to continue.

“The problem is with all of this—no matter how smitten he is over you and how much that he trusts you—I have to be the one with the clear head in this one, Caitie. Jonathon likes you enough to jump head-first into anything you would want to do without question. I’m here to be the one that thinks about it logically and asks all the right questions and what have you. I’m really only doing this to look out for him.”

Again, I waited.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” he told me slowly, cautiously, something dark brewing behind his eyes, “but what are your intentions, Caitie?”

I must have looked properly shocked because he sighed and hiked the corners of his mouth up into a halfhearted smile. He shook his head at me but it didn’t stop me from speaking.