Free Night Owls by Jenn Bennett Page B

copied other artists’ work? No. And if I want to be great, I need to be able to draw directly from the source.”
    He didn’t respond, but I was too frustrated with myself to elaborate any further. Besides, he was an artist, right? He had to understand. So why did he look so damn grave? Or maybe it was
disappointment. Not sure what he had to be—
    Oh.
    “I’m such an idiot,” I said. “I’m really sorry.”
    “Why?”
    I gestured toward the anatomy lab. “Because you ‘fixed’ this for me. I don’t know exactly what you did, but I’m thinking it couldn’t have been
easy.”
    He shrugged with one shoulder and waved it away with the flick of a wrist. “I’m more worried that everything I try to do for you turns to shit.”
    “It really does, doesn’t it?” I was only joking, but he groaned, so I whapped him on the shin with the water bottle. “If you think a few tears and some upchucked pretzels
are going to stop me from coming here twice a week, you don’t know me.”
    He didn’t smile, but his shoulders relaxed, and a few moments later he templed his fingers together, looking cheerfully devious. “Know what you need?”
    “A stronger stomach?”
    “Next best thing. Mint.”
    “Umm . . .”
    He dug out his phone and tapped the screen a few times. “An inbound N train is ten blocks away. You feel okay to walk to the stop?”
    “With you?”
    “That was sort of the idea, yeah.”
    “How do I know you won’t lead me into some creeptastic CSI situation?”
    “Damn. There goes my plan to harvest your kidneys.”
    “Please, don’t mention kidneys right now,” I said, pressing the heel of my hand against my stomach.
    He shuddered. “Now you’re making
me
queasy. Look, it’s a busy spot in the Castro. We only have to make one transfer. Fifteen minutes to get there, tops. Just text
someone,” he suggested. “Make sure someone knows where you are.”
    I thought for a moment. “Give me your wallet.”
    “Excuse me?”
    I held out my hand. “If you want to take me somewhere, give me your wallet.”
    He didn’t even hesitate, just dug it out of his back pocket and handed it over.
    The black leather was warm and worn around the edges. “I thought you were vegetarian,” I said as I cracked it open.
    “A bad one, remember? Please don’t dig around too much in there.”
    I wiggled out his driver’s license. “Afraid I’ll find condoms or your My Little Pony club card?”
    “It’s called a Brony card,
thankyouverymuch
. Oh, Jesus—don’t look at the photo.”
    How could I not? It was ten times worse than the one on my state ID, and I wasn’t sure, but he seemed to have a ton of acne, which made me feel a lot better about his stunning good looks
now. “Let’s see, Jackson Vincent
is
your real name, and not some fanfic
Fast and Furious
character you made up—surprise, surprise. And your birthday is in
December, so that makes me, what, five months older than you?”
    “Told you I liked older women.”
    I held back a smile. “Five eleven? You seem taller.” And closer. His cheek was only a few inches away from mine.
    “Six one. I got the card a year and a half ago.”
    “Where’s this address?”
    “Ashbury Heights.”
    “Huh. Do you go to Urban Academy?”
    “Checking up on me?” He puffed up, more than a little pleased about this.
    “Well, do you?”
    “Would that magically make me safer in your eyes?” he asked.
    “Probably not.”
    “Good, because plenty of asshats go to that school, believe me.”
    “If your family’s rich, I’m not impressed.”
    “That makes two of us. What are you doing?”
    Mom thought I was working, and since she was just starting a twelve-hour shift a few buildings away, I figured I’d flown under the radar. But Heath expected me home. I snapped a photo of
Jack’s license with my phone and sent it to Heath with a text: Going out to the Castro. If I’m not home by midnight, this guy kidnapped
me. Then I replaced the ID—seriously,