Page 24 of Crossing Paths
“Yes.” Norah figured she might as well admit it. Her sistersalready knew her tactics.
“Why?” Molly tagged in, dropping down to sit next to Cara to present a united nosy front. “What don’t you want to tell us?”
“It’s not that I don’t want to tell you,” Norah said slowly, picking through her thoughts as she spoke. “It’s that I’m not sure what it is.”
There was a pause before Molly asked, “Whatwhatis?”
“I’m meeting Dash—”
“Mmm…sinewy hands guy,” Cara interrupted.
Norah flushed for some reason. “I don’t know if they’resinewy, exactly.” It was unsettling how easy it was for her to picture his hands. “They’re really big though.”
When her sisters exchanged smirks, Norah felt her face grow even warmer.
“So you’re meeting Dash.” It was a relief when Molly got the discussion back on track. “For…a date?”
“Of course it’s a date,” Cara said before Norah could respond. “Why else would she be meeting a guy on a Saturday night right around the time she usually goes to bed?”
Norah made a face, a little offended by that. “I stay up later than nine.”
“Sure, but you’reresearching. That’s like staying up late watching Netflix,” Cara explained with more condescension than necessary for someone who’d researched and studied for class on Saturday nights up until not even a month ago when she’d met Henry. “It doesn’t count as a social life.”
Filing away the argument for a later date, Norah knew she had to redirect the conversation back to the original point. If shelet it, this discussion with her sisters could stretch late into the night, and she had to be outside in seven minutes so she could meet Dash when he pulled his car up to the curb. If she waited too long, he’d park and come to the door, and then the sisters would want to meet him, and there’d be inside jokes about his hands, and Norah would burn up from embarrassment until she was just an awkward, charred husk on the floor.
“We’re working, so it’s probably not a date,” she said.
“Working? Do you mean working out?” Cara looked puzzled.
Here came the part her sisters wouldn’t like. “No, I’ll be working. He’ll just be helping. Backup, if you will.”
“Norah Valentine Pax!” Molly had her sternest big-sister face on. “Are you chasing skips? Didn’t you learn anything from Cara’s mistakes? I thought we talked about this.”
Grimacing a little at the triple naming, Norah shook her head. “We’re just going to follow a possible lead on Leifsen.”
“Your stalker?” It wasn’t reassuring that Molly switched from loud and angry to quiet and calm. Norah knew that was when she was the most irate. “You’re going to go after your stalker on your own?”
“Not on my own.” Norah seized on that part, knowing the seconds were ticking away before Dash’s arrival. Opening the front door, she backed out of it, talking quickly. “Dash is going to be my muscle. If we spot Leifsen, I’ll text you. I promise. Better go so I’m not late. Bye! Love you! Don’t wait up!”
Before she closed the door, she heard Cara snort a laugh as Molly repeated, “He’s her…muscle?”
As Norah trotted down the porch steps, she blew out a long breath. For a moment there, she wasn’t sure she was going to escape the house without Molly following. Date or not, having her older sister tag along would’ve been weird and awkward. Her phone chimed as she saw headlights turn onto her street.
Glancing at her phone, she saw Molly wasn’t letting her get the last word.Text us the second you see Leifsen, or else I’ll draw on your face with Sharpies while you sleep.
Giving a huff of amusement, Norah sent a quickI will!response before pocketing her phone. As she headed toward the SUV pulling up to the curb, she had a sudden worry that it wouldn’t be Dash. The vehicle rolled to a stop as she took a hesitant step back, watching with building dread as the passenger window slid down.
It wasn’t until Dash leaned over from the driver’s side to pop open the passenger door that she exhaled and stepped forward again.
He cocked his head, studying her carefully. “Okay?”
“Yeah.” She slid into the seat, feeling both relieved and a little silly for her moment of doubt. “I just wasn’t sure if it was you at first.”
He glanced around at their sparsely inhabited cul-de-sac. “You get many strange guys rolling by here?”
“Surprisingly, yes.” Her tone was dark with memories of shady detectives and mysterious unknown vehicles cruising by at all hours of the night, their occupants hidden by darkness. “Or not really surprisingly, I guess.” When Dash lifted his eyebrows in a silent question, she explained, “The rumor around town is that the necklace my mom stole is hidden in our house.We get a lot of traffic.”
Even in the dim illumination from the streetlight, Norah could see Dash’s eyes flare with a fierce emotion. “Does this…trafficever stop?”
