Payback by Deb Loughead

Author:Deb Loughead
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781459814714
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
Published: 2017-05-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Six

“This is your grandmother?” Eliot said. “Seriously, she looks more like your mom.”

Gran was smiling widely now. As I was trying to send her a telepathic message, she pushed past me, turned my key in the lock and held the door wide open. “I think I like you already, kiddo. I just made some fully loaded raisin chocolate-chip cookies you might enjoy. You look like you could use some fattening up.”

Did she really just say that? When I glanced at Eliot, he was laughing. “It’s kind of late, Gran,” I told her. “I’m bushed right now, and I should go to bed. Work tomorrow, ya know.”

“What did you say your name was?” Gran said, totally ignoring me.

Eliot followed her into the lobby. “My name’s Eliot Barnes, ma’am,” he told her.

“That’s a nice name. Eliot was the middle name of my favorite prime minister, by the way.”

He grinned at me over his shoulder as we stepped into the elevator. “Your granny totally rocks, dude,” he said.

I couldn’t believe this was happening. Before I knew it, one of the weirdest, sketchiest guys in town was sitting at our kitchen table, drinking hot chocolate and munching on my favorite cookies. While Gran interviewed him like she was a newspaper reporter or something. She found out everything too—where he lived, who his father was and that he’d been kicked out of school a while back. Then she started lecturing him about cleaning up his act and how important an education was. I was so stunned, I couldn’t even swallow. All of a sudden she stood up.

“Well, I’m turning in now, boys. I’m pooped. Clean up the table for me please, Dylan. And don’t stay up too late. You have to work tomorrow.” Then she headed off to her bedroom and left the two of us sitting there staring at each other.

“Sure wish I had a granny like yours,” Eliot murmured. “Think I can snag some of these awesome cookies to eat on the way home? Hey, maybe we can play a few video games first.”

“No! Absolutely not,” I half yelped. “You need to go now. I don’t even know how you got in here in the first place. My gran would normally never let a stranger in.”

“But I’m not a stranger.” Eliot nudged my sore arm. “You know me from school. And now we’re friends, right?”

I almost felt like puking on the table. I hadn’t planned on getting in deep with Eliot and all his problems. And right now it already felt as if I was in this thing way over my head.

“Look, this was a one-time deal, okay?” I said. Then I stood up and walked over to the door. “We’re not friends. We don’t hang out, and we never will. So take some cookies and get going, because I really am fried. And messed up from what your friend did to me too.”

Eliot got up, grabbed a few cookies, then shuffled toward me. “Yeah, sorry about that. I tried to stop him from going after you.

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