One he immediately recognized as the sound of the Colt Detective Special revolver being cocked.
As if to confirm his guess, cold metal pressed into his temple.
He opened his eyes to find Persy kneeling over him, beautiful and once again wearing the pink dress. She was the one holding the gun.
His entire chest cracked open at the sight of her.
Merde….Last night…the deal…it had all been a setup.
“Persy, don’t—” he began to say.
Too late.
She squeezed the trigger before he could finish asking her not to shoot.
CHAPTER 17
TESS
Benjamin was waiting outside the mission director’s office. At the early hour of six in the morning. Again.
It had only been a five-minute walk from what her mom referred to as the “sleep trailer” to differentiate it from the “work trailer.” But suddenly, Tess was out of breath. Her heart raced at the sight of him leaned up against the tree she often sat under for lunch.
Geez, he was gorgeous. Dark raven-black hair, light blue eyes, and a jaw so square, his face basically looked like a rectangle with a rounded triangle at the bottom.
He was also tall. At least six feet. But not gawky, like most of the tall boys at Rhodes Senior High. She’d only started going to her first American high school in February, more than halfway through her sophomore year. But it had been plenty of time to assess the boys.
None of the guys at her Athens County High School looked like Benjamin. Not even the senior varsity football players. Supposedly, he was sixteen, a rising junior, just like her. That’s what he’d told her. But he looked like he’d walked out of one of those TV shows where all the high school guys were played by crazy hot dudes in their twenties.
Half of the girls on the summer-long mission were in love with him, and the other half were all moon-eyed over Donovan—even though he had to be one of the biggest jerks she’d ever met. He was the de facto leader of the Connecticut boys cabin —which now included Benjamin after Donovan badgered her mom into making the switch. From what she’d heard, they had a list ranking all the girls they wanted to hookup with on the mission trip on a hotness scale of 10 to 1.
Apparently, they’d been magnanimous enough to deem her a three, with an extra point added for her service with a smile. She had no idea why the other girls would crush on boys who reduced their entire value down to looks and smiling enough. But over the course of the summer, the Connecticut boys had come to be known as the “hot cabin,” and its occupants could get any girl they wanted. Especially Donovan and Benjamin.
Which made it even harder to understand why Benjamin kept on showing up at six a.m. to help her set up when everyone else at the mission site was fast asleep, including her mother.
“Why do you get up to do this every morning?” he’d countered when she’d asked him about his extra-extra volunteer work on Day 3 of finding him under the tree.
“Because I’m a nice person, and it’s the least I can do for my single mom,” she’d answered—somewhat evasively. Having never attended a public institution of secondary education prior to this year, she had no idea how other American high school students operated. But personal business was personal business in her family. Sharing the real reason she was doing her mother’s job every morning didn’t even enter her mind.
In any case, his answer had been just as cagey.
“Okay, you’re a nice girl, and I’m a nice guy,” he’d said with that interesting Mark Wahlberg accent of his. “Let’s just agree we’re both nice people, and keep it moving.”
Fine. Tess dropped it, figuring his real reason would come out any day. An “Oh hey, could you get your mom to write me a special recommendation” or “Wassup! Would you mind letting me and my broskis borrow your mom’s van to go into town?” Or maybe he had one of those special juvie work orders that needed to be signed toward the end of July when the mission would be done, and he’d been too rich and privileged to join the juvenile offender unit on the other side of the camp.
She kept waiting for the penny to drop, but the more she got to know Benjamin, the more reasons he struck off his possible motivation list. While helping her set out all the supplies for the day on long tables outside the trailer, he’d revealed that even though he attended the same posh East Coast boarding school as the guy she’d privately labeled “Donovan the Douche,” unlike most of his fellow hockey teammates, he was there on a full scholarship.
Benjamin had an older brother who had actually started playing professionally.
“I’m not nearly as good as him,” he admitted with a self-deprecating chuff. “But colleges keep sending scouts out to my games, and they’ll probably give me a full ride at some D-1 just ’cause I’m related. You’d be surprised how much nepotism there is in the college recruitment game. But if they wanna be stupid about putting me on their roster because my brother’s got talent, I’m not fighting them on it. I’ll ride their bench and get a free business degree out of it.”
So no, he didn’t need a letter of recommendation to get into college. And despite the hard accent, he was so agreeable and polite. She just couldn’t see him doing anything that would earn him juvie work hours.
That meant he must be in it for all the extra favors she could grant him as the mission director’s daughter. So, she accepted his morning help, and cynically waited for him to make the big ask.
But four weeks in, and only three more weeks to go, he’d yet to ask her for anything. All he did was help her, every day except Sunday, which the whole camp got off to attend church services and relax.
Also, sometimes when her back was turned, she could feel his eyes on her, burning into her skin. A few days ago when she felt the sensation, she turned around quickly, pretending to need something—and totally caught him staring at her.
