The Best Part of Hello [sample]

09

dedicated to judi_x because her comment was really sweet!

Chapter Nine

"AND PEOPLE SAY that school vacations are boring," Evan sneers beside me. The cop car rattles against the cobbled pavements that cover the streets of Rome. I'm soaked in an unfamiliar liquid, and I'm even more convinced that I have peed a little as the cop fastened my handcuffs moments earlier. The frustration of trying to decipher the cop's bad English as he read me my rights makes me question if I need a lawyer or not. And I'm pissed, again, which happens a lot recently when Evan Winters is involved.

"We have just been arrested, Evan!" I cry. "I'd hardly call this the kickstart to the weekend trip we'd finally started getting," I say bitterly. The taste of the lemon spritzer he had made me down earlier is just as bitter in my throat.

"It was hardly my fault," he says defensively, swinging one leg over the other. "You're the demented one who thought bargaining a chicken for some 'soldi soldi' was a good idea." Solidi being money. I want to kick him, it wasn't even my suggestion. This entire elaborate plot was concocted by him.

"Oh, for God's sake, the chickens weren't even my idea!" The furious look I have been armed with since the police tossed us into this car suddenly diminishes and I realize something. "Holy shit, we are going to jail."

"Well," Evan leers, the muddy water he had face planted into on the way here is now sticking chunks of his hair together. "It could be worse."

I look at him, bewildered. "Really, how might that be?"

"We could've actually sold the man that chicken," he's laughing before he finishes his sentence and before I have a chance to smack him.

My bewilderedness goes to disbelief. "It's not funny, Winters."

"Don't do that," he cuts off his laughter with a cough.

"Do what?"

"Use my last name as if it's meant to evoke some sort of authority," he says numbly. I realize this is a case of déjà vu. Expressionless, he proceeds to fiddle with his seat belt. "You sound like my Dad."

"I use it because the way Evan sounds is just so...oh, forget it, I don't want to talk to you." I turn away as best I can and face the window. The cop car stops, one of the policemen getting out to greet the chicken man who stands with his eyes wide at the front steps of the police station. I watch him express his anger through wild gestures, giggling into my sleeve as he uses the middle finger and waves it at the two of us.

"You're going to have to talk to me eventually, Kayla," Evan sighs and leans back against the leather seat. "It looks like we're taking the high road together."

"Over my dead body," I mutter.

I can hear Evan chuckle. "It's not going to be just your dead body you're gonna be worried about when we are confined to four walls," his handcuffs clink against the window. "It's gonna be both of ours."

3 DAYS EARLIER:

It all happened so fast. One moment I'm trapped in a torrential storm with a neighbor I have hated for years and a handful of non-English speaking tourists, and the next, six preened guards file through the duty-free area with smiling faces and with the news that the weather warning that has now been lifted to a category safe for us to evacuate.

"It's happening," Sophie murmurs, clapping her hands together like we are waiting for the arrival of someone's kid. "We're finally getting out of this place."