Heavenstone 01 - The Heavenstone Secrets

lips touched mine, I didn’t do that. I couldn’t help it. When I closed my eyes, all I could see was Cassie’s disapproving face.
    “Don’t you like me?” he asked, obviously disappointed in my reaction.
    “Yes.”
    “You don’t act like it,” he said.
    “I’m a little nervous, Kent.”
    “Sure. Me, too,” he said. “But you can’t let that stop you from having a good time, right?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “I do,” he said. He kissed me on the neck and brought his hands up the sides of my arms to put them behind my back and pull me closer to him so we could kiss again. This time, I really tried, and he liked it. “Semantha,” he said. “Semantha. You have the nicest name, too.”
    I was beginning to wonder if he was as shy as he claimed to be. In one of the romance novels I read, the novels Cassie mocked, there was a man who pretended to be shy and awkward, and that way, he always managed to get the girl he wanted to be more cooperative.
    “I’m glad you’re as shy as me,” he said as if hecould read my thoughts as easily as Cassie could. “That way, we’ll both help each other, discover each other. You want us to do that, right?”
    Before I could respond, his hands came around my shoulders and quickly slipped over my breasts. When he pressed his palms to my nipples, the tingle shot through me with electric speed. As if she was part of the lightning, Cassie’s face flashed in front of me.
    Instantly, I jumped up.
    “What’s wrong?”
    “We’d better return to the party. Your father will be here soon.”
    “Not that soon. Don’t you want to be alone for a while?” he asked, his voice full of disappointment. “I thought you’d want to be alone with me, and that was why you agreed to come with me.”
    “It’s getting late. I think we’d better return to the party.”
    He looked at me with confusion. “Why are you getting so upset? All I did—”
    “Let’s just go back, Kent. Please.”
    He smirked, looked down a moment, and then stood up. “Yeah, let’s just go back,” he said, and walked quickly toward the door. I had to hurry to keep up with him, and he was silent all the way back into the house.
    The party did seem to be getting more raucous. Someone had talked Eddie into spiking his soda, too, and he looked dazed and unaffected by the way the older students were banging into the furniture and spilling drinks. The kitchen looked as if it had been hit by a hurricane—the plastic forks on the floor aswell as the counters, the garbage can overflowing, half-eaten pieces of pizza on the counters and even one smashed into the tile.
    “Eddie’s parents are going to be pissed,” Kent muttered. He looked at his watch. “Maybe my father is here. Let’s take a look.”
    I followed him to the door. We heard Noel call to us, but Kent ignored him and walked out. We stood in the entryway, looking down the driveway. One of the older boys was kissing Kaley Lester by a parked car. Kaley was in our class and usually very quiet and to herself, but the boy she was with was all over her, and even from this distance, we could see that his right hand was under her skirt.
    “I guess she’s not as shy as we all thought,” Kent muttered. I was going to suggest that someone might have spiked her soda, but before I could reply, he said, “There’s my father.”
    We walked down the sidewalk to the driveway, and Kent practically lunged for the rear car door when his father stopped. I got in quickly, and he followed.
    “How was it?”
    “Okay,” Kent said.
    His father hesitated and then nodded at the house.
    “Everything all right in there? The music sounds pretty loud.”
    “They’re celebrating a great school victory, Dad,” Kent said sharply.
    His father nodded and started away. The silence between us made him uncomfortable. “You guys tired?”

    “I guess,” Kent said.
    “The great thing about being young is that you can burn the candle on both ends for a while, but believe me, it catches up with you.”
    “Dad …”
    “I know, I know. You guys have a right to make your own mistakes. Is that what you tell your parents, Semantha?”
    I looked at Kent, who was looking out the window. “No, Mr. Pearson.”
    “Good for you,” he said, and we drove almost the remainder of the way in silence. When we turned into our gated entrance, Kent muttered under his breath.
    “What?” I asked.
    “No wonder you’re a princess. You live in a castle,” he said.
    I felt tears