Inheritance by Malinda Lo Read Free Book Online Page B

figure this out. She pulled her hand away at the same moment that David moved back, looking flushed. “Okay,” she said again, and scooted onto the chair that Diana had vacated. “So, what’s the story?”
    He rubbed a hand over his face. “Um. We met through debate?”
    “Yeah. We were partners.”
    He grinned. “And you had an uncontrollable crush on me?”
    “Hey, I’m not taking all the blame,” she said without thinking, and her cheeks burned. Why did she have to blush so easily? But David didn’t seem to mind.
    “Oh, I think the feeling was mutual,” he said. Even though he wasn’t touching her, she could swear she felt the warm twist in his stomach as he spoke.
    “Really?” she said, and then was overcome with shyness. She probably was the color of an eggplant by now.
    David laughed. “Sometimes you’re a little dense, Reese. I can’t believe you didn’t notice.”
    “Until nationals.” She made a face. “Where I acted like a total dork.”
    “Good thing I didn’t give up.”
    She smiled slightly. “You’re gonna spin it that way? It’s sort of old-fashioned, isn’t it?”
    “Boy meets girl, girl rejects boy, girl dates other girl—”
    “I don’t want you to mention her,” Reese interrupted. David looked startled. “I just don’t want to get into it.”
    “Sure. I won’t mention her.”
    “Thanks.” She ignored the twinge of guilt that rose in her. “So let’s just say we met through debate, we got to know each other, things happened.”
    David considered her for a moment. “Right. Things happened. We went through a traumatic experience that revealed the truth about our feelings.” He paused. “It is the truth, isn’t it?”
    There was an uncharacteristic note of vulnerability in his voice, and she knew what he was really asking. He wanted to know if she honestly liked him, even after the way she had felt about Amber. They had never discussed it in detail—that would be way too weird—but he knew she had had strong feelings about Amber. For the first time, Reese realized she might have the upper hand in her relationship with David. Before, she had always thought that
she
was the vulnerable one, because she was the one who froze up and couldn’t deal with her emotions; because David was the guy everybody liked at school, whereas she was just some girl. But whatever had transpired between her and Amber gave her the power to hurt him.
    A new tenderness rose in her, and along with it came a sense of responsibility. It made her reach out and put a hand on his knee. “I would never lie to you,” she told him softly. “I can’t, even if I tried.”
    He covered her hand with his. Everything was open between them. He could see the truth.
    He stood, pulling her to her feet, and when they kissed, it was sweet. Her hands slid around his back, and he was alive beneath her touch, his whole body focused on her, and she trusted him.

CHAPTER 5
    Reese knocked on her mom’s door. When she heard her mom’s voice calling, “Come in,” she rubbed her clammy palms against her thighs and went inside. The bedroom was empty, but she heard the sound of running water from the attached bathroom.
    “Reese, is that you?”
    “Yeah.” Reese closed the bedroom door and headed toward the bathroom. Her mom was washing her face at the sink.
    “Your dad said he’d make pancakes this morning.”
    It was Sunday morning, and the statement was so ordinary and yet so incredibly unusual—when was the last time her dad had been there to make pancakes?—that Reese temporarily froze.
    Her mom turned off the tap and reached for a towel to blot away the water. “Is something wrong?”
    “No.” When her mom looked up, Reese looked away. “I wanted to tell you something.”
    “What is it?” Her mom straightened and leaned against the edge of the bathroom counter. “You’re scaring me, honey.”
    Reese crossed her arms. “It’s nothing bad. I thought you should know—before we do the