Hunted by T.M. Bledsoe Read Free Book Online

relief rolled over Lanie.  At least she wouldn’t have to reject him again.  “I think we should probably wait a while.  It…it doesn’t seem right, going out and having fun.”
    Chase nodded his dark head, his handsome face set with a serious expression.  “I was thinking the same thing.  But, we’ll do something in a few days?”
    “Okay,” she told him with a nod.
    “I’ll talk to you later, then.  I have to get back,” Chase said and surprised Lanie by leaning down and dropping a quick kiss onto her mouth.  With that, he spun around and hurried away down the field, leaving Lanie to stare after him.
     
    What was that?  What the hell was that !  They hadn’t even had their first date and Chase was already kissing her?  Maybe she would re-think going out with him, after all!
    Feeling slightly rattled, Lanie turned back to head down the field toward the Spirit Squad, resisting the urge to reach up and swipe her hand across her mouth.  It wasn’t like she hadn’t been kissed before.  She had.  She’d had a steady boyfriend or two during her high school career and there had been a couple of instances when she hadn’t behaved as chastely as she should have, but those instances had been her choice.  Clearly, Chase Wylie thought those kinds of moments should be his choice, probably because there wasn’t a single girl who attended Fells Pointe High that would turn him down. 
    Well, there was one .  And Chase Wylie was going to figure that out pretty quick.
    Lanie meandered down to the end of the field, where Johnna caught sight of her and waved her over to the group.  Lanie tried to put on her game face, which was necessary when in the presence of a dozen gorgeous, perky Spirit Squad-ers who despised anyone who wasn’t one of them, yet who was just as attractive.  Those girls did not like anyone they perceived as competition and Lanie Bancroft was in that category, so they always had their claws out.
    “Hey, Lanie,” Johnna greeted her brightly.  “We were just talking about fundraiser ideas.  Do you want to help?”
    Lanie caught all the cold glances from the rest of the Spirit Squad and actually felt the temperature around her plummet a good ten degrees.  Yikes.  Even in the midst of a crisis, they were still…cheerleaders.
    “I’ll just go and hang out on the bleachers,” she told Johnna.  “I don’t want to interfere with you guys doing your thing.”
    “Are you sure?” Johnna questioned.  “You can help if you want to.”
    There were more icy glares from the Spirit Squad—well, all but Devyn, who was smiling reassuringly at her.  “This is your thing.  Just let me know if you need me to help once you’ve figured it out,” she told Johnna. 
    Lanie turned and headed for the bleachers, leaving the Spirit Squad to discuss the fundraiser amongst themselves.  Far be it from her, a lowly non-cheerleader, to interfere in official Spirit Squad business.  She didn’t want her eyes scratched out, now did she?
    The bleachers were fairly crowded, so Lanie found a seat on the bottom row at the very end, wanting to put some distance between herself and everyone else.  The number of parents who’d shown up to watch practice seemed a little much.  Did they think that whoever had…done that…to Stacy would show up at football practice and try to nab one of the players or the cheerleaders?  It seemed unlikely.  Whoever was responsible for what had happened to Stacy Miller would be wise to lay low for a while instead of coming to a crowded football field to try and snatch another victim.  Besides, statistics said the person responsible for…doing that…to Stacy was someone she knew and in all likelihood, that person would not commit the offense again.  Hopefully.
    Sitting on the metal bleachers, Lanie watched the Fell Pointe Panthers line up on the field and start their warm up exercises, led by Coach Rossi, who was really laying on his whistle this practice.  The team