Once he got it going on a level surface, the car moved more easily. At that point, it was the power steering that posed a problem. It made it nearly impossible to make even small corrections in the car’s direction. Hardy gritted his teeth as he struggled to turn the wheels.

It occurred to him that a lesser-determined person would’ve given up already. But not Hardy. He was apparently willing to go to possibly unhealthy lengths just to see Miracle for a few minutes, but that realization didn’t stop him either. He could practically smell her lavender skin, taste her sweet mouth and hear her infectious giggle and that spurred him on. No, there was no stopping him tonight.

Once he had distanced himself enough from the house to start the engine, Hardy jumped into his car and did just that, speeding away and hoping that his father didn’t get up and notice his car missing. He maintained a fairly dangerous speed all the way back to Middleton, arriving almost a full ten minutes ahead of schedule. When he parked at the dead end, he cut the engine and texted Miracle just as she’d instructed. His heart was flying as he watched out the window for her.

He got no response to his text and had begun to think he’d been stood up when almost fifteen minutes had elapsed with no sign of Miracle. He wasn’t angry, as he should have been; he was just incredibly disappointed. He felt like he’d been starved for sunshine and had now been deprived the chance of standing in its warmth.

He was debating whether he should send another text or just leave when movement caught his eye. He saw a small dark figure darting between houses across the street. His stomach twitched in excitement. Surely it had to be Miracle.

He watched for the shape to come out the other side of the house he’d seen it go behind, but it never did. After several minutes, he realized that it hadn’t been Miracle after all.

“Probably a deranged psychopath that stalks people in parked cars,” Hardy mumbled under this breath, not entirely sure his jest had been that humorous. Strange, awful things happened like that all the time in cities across the country. He could very well be the first incidence in Middleton.

Just then, something popped up and smacked the glass of his windshield. Hardy jumped like he’d been shot. His heart didn’t slow its erratic beat until long after Miracle had dissolved into peals of laughter.

After he regained his breath, Hardy’s pulse still skipped, but for an entirely different reason. Miracle was standing outside his window in black jeans and a black sweatshirt that had the neck cut out of it. She was wearing the most beautiful smile he’d ever seen.

“Come on,” she said, loudly enough for him to hear through the closed window.

Without hesitation, Hardy removed the keys from the ignition and hopped out to follow her.

“Where are we going?” he asked in hushed tones.

“There’s a trail that winds along the river. We can get to it without going through the woods. I thought it would be pretty at night.”

“Sounds good.” Hardy didn’t care where they went, as long as he was with her.

They walked back up the street in silence. After a while, Miracle turned off the road to cross a field that lay at the other end of her small subdivision.

“So, what are we doing here, Hardy?”

“What do you mean?”

Miracle stopped, closing her eyes and tipping her head back as she deeply inhaled the cool, lightly scented night air. When she exhaled, she looked up at Hardy.

“You have a girlfriend and—”

“No, I don’t. Cheyenne and I broke up.”

“So you weren’t with her tonight?”

Hardy’s mouth worked itself open and closed several times like a fish out of water.

“That wasn’t my idea. It was my father’s.”

“So you were with her?”

“Yes. My dad invited her to the lake house for the weekend. He wants us to get back together.”

“But you don’t?”

“No!” Hardy cringed.

“Then why not just say so?”

“I’ve told them—both of them—that we aren’t getting back together.”

“And yet your father still invited her.”

“Yes, but…” Hardy could tell Miracle was dubious as she started to walk again. It sounded suspicious, even to him. “My father doesn’t listen to me. He doesn’t care what I want. He just does what he thinks is best.”

“Have you talked to him about it? I mean, really talked to him?”

Hardy laughed bitterly. “No. You don’t talk to Wayne Bradford that way.”

“He didn’t seem like such a bad guy.”

“You just don’t know him.”

Miracle stopped and looked up at Hardy again. Her eyes searched his. He thought he could practically see the wheels of her intuition turning. She was putting it all together.

When she’d finally drawn her own conclusions, a look of sadness slid into place over her features. She put her hand on his arm. “You’re afraid of him,”

“Not anymore.”

“Then what are you afraid of?”

“He doesn’t pick on me so much anymore, but my mother and my brother…well, it’s just best not to make him angry.”

When she’d digested what he’d said, once she fully understood the implications, she gasped. “Ohmigod, Hardy!” Moving forward, Miracle rose onto her tiptoes to wrap her arms around his neck.

Hardy had long since come to terms with having an abusive father, but never in all the years that he had been abused had he encountered such sympathy. Miracle’s reaction so warmed him, he wound his arms around her waist and pulled her close, melting into her compassion like an ice cube on hot pavement.

“It’s not that bad anymore. For the most part, he stopped getting physical when I outgrew him,” Hardy mumbled into the skin of Miracle’s neck. He licked his lips; he could taste the slightly salty tang of her skin.

Miracle leaned back to meet his eyes. “Wait a minute. You said you were spending the weekend at the lake house. So you left Cheyenne and your father in the middle of the night and drove all the way back here?”

Hardy nodded, hoping she couldn’t see the blood he felt filling his cheeks. When put like that, it made him sound like a lovesick stalker.

There’s that word again, he thought in exasperation.

“For me?” she added softly, her eyes searching his face.

Again, he nodded.

Miracle didn’t say anything for the longest time. Hardy began to wonder if maybe he’d freaked her out a little. But when she did finally speak, all his misgivings were erased.

“How can you make me feel this way? I barely know you.”

Hardy’s heart beat so hard, he thought it might burst from his chest. “I don’t know, but you do the same thing to me.”

“So what are we supposed to do about it?”

Hardy hated to bring it up, but he had to know. “I know what I want, but what about you? What about Jonah?”

“Jonah’s just a friend. Well, at least that’s how I feel about him. I think he’s just feeling guilty.”

“Guilty?”

“Yeah, for buckling under the pressure.”

“Pressure?”

“You know, the whole sick girlfriend thing. Must run away quickly,” Miracle added in an attempt at levity. She tried to look unaffected, but the way she cast her eyes down was a dead giveaway. Hardy could tell it bothered her.

“I can’t imagine anyone running away from you for any reason.”

“Not yet maybe.”

“Not ever.”

“You say that now…”

“Give me a chance, Miracle. I’ll prove it to you.”

“Nobody deserves all the baggage I come with, Hardy. I should be the one running away from you.”

“I’d just follow you.”

Miracle laughed, but then looked at him oddly. “Why do I get the feeling you might be telling the truth?”

“Because I am.”

Miracle’s expression sobered, as if at the thought of something unpleasant, then cleared seconds later and she smiled again. “Let’s walk,” she suggested, slithering out of Hardy’s arms and reaching for his hand.

They walked the path along the river, holding hands and talking for hours. When they’d made the return trip, they stopped and sat in a patch of clover in the field near Miracle’s neighborhood. It wasn’t until Hardy was admiring the way the rising sun illuminated her alabaster skin that he realized what time it was.

“As much as I hate to, I’m gonna have to go.”

Miracle frowned. “Do you think he’ll find out you’ve been gone?”

Hardy shrugged. “Nah, I don’t see how he could. He should still be asleep by the time I get back.”

“Then you’d better go,” she said, rising to her feet and brushing off the seat of her pants.

“Can I see you Sunday night?”

Hardy hated the thought of not seeing her until then, but it would make the weekend more bearable if he had that to look forward to.

Miracle smiled brightly. “Sure.”

They made their way back to the road and down the street to Miracle’s house. Hardy stopped at the curb and turned toward her, his stomach swimming with anticipation.

“Sorry I kept you up all night,” Hardy confessed sheepishly.

Miracle giggled. “No, you’re not.”

Hardy grinned. “Okay, maybe I’m not that sorry.”

“Actually, I’m kinda glad you did.”

Reaching forward, Hardy pulled a clover from Miracle’s hair and handed it to her. “I guess it’s never too late to bring you flowers.”

Miracle gave an exaggerated gasp, her eyes rounding as she took the tiny stem from Hardy’s fingers. “Oh, they’re…um, I mean it’s beautiful,” she teased.

“I went to a lot of trouble to get you that flower. Don’t make fun,” he responded in mock seriousness.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I would never make fun of your extensive efforts to make me smile.”

“Actually,” Hardy said, turning serious as he reached forward to trace the corner of Miracle’s mouth, “I would do almost anything to see you smile.”

Miracle’s gaze flickered from Hardy’s eyes to his mouth and back again. She licked her lips and Hardy thought he heard her catch and hold her breath as he leaned toward her.

His face hovered above hers for several long tense seconds before he lowered his mouth to hers. Barely making contact, Hardy brushed his lips back and forth over Miracle’s with the gentlest of pressure. He wanted more—wanted to kiss her and touch her so much more—but he wanted to leave her with something as delicate and perfect and special as the moment they were sharing there in the orange glow of the sunrise.

“I’ll see you Sunday,” he said when he lifted his head.

“Sunday,” Miracle said a bit dazedly.

She started up the sidewalk and Hardy saw a light come on in one of the front rooms.

“That’s not your room is it?” He knew hers would have a window at the front of the house, but he wasn’t sure which one.

“No, mine is the last one on the right. That’s Mila’s.”

“Are you gonna get in trouble?”

Miracle chuckled. “Nah. Mila’s the wild child of the family. She’ll probably just want details.”

It was Hardy’s turn to chuckle. Somehow, that fit with what little he’d seen and heard from Mila. “Cool.”

“Sunday?” Miracle smiled as she walked backward up the sidewalk to her front door.

“Sunday,” Hardy answered, his smile mirroring hers.

When she disappeared inside her house, Hardy continued on to his car, his heart light. For the first time he could remember, he had something in his life that he really looked forward to.

********

Miracle tiptoed inside, gently closing the door behind her and creeping down the hall to her bedroom. She had just sat down on the edge of the bed to take her shoes off when Mila burst through the door.

“I want details!” she loud-whispered, launching herself onto the bed behind Miracle.

“What are you doing up?”

“You may not have much of a social life, but I do. I was on the laptop chatting with Summer and Dane when you left. I heard the front door.”

“Why did you turn your light on when we got back then?”

“That was your signal to come and talk to me when you got done.”

“Sorry. I didn’t know that.”

“You had to know I’d want details. He is so freakin’ hot, Miracle. Ugh,” Mila moaned, flopping onto her back dramatically. She rolled over quickly, pushing her hair out of her eyes as if she had a sudden thought. “You didn’t think I’d get you in trouble, did you?”

“You? Mila, if I did even half the things you’ve tried to talk me into doing, I’d be in jail. I’m surprised this even registered on your radar.”

“You kissing a boy that looks like that? Hells yeah, it did!”

“So if he’d been ugly…”

“Meh,” she said, waving Miracle off. “I wouldn’t care. Unless you’d slept with him. Then, I’d care.”

Miracle couldn’t help but smile. Mila was too much. “You’re terrible.”

“No, I’m not. Life is short. We gotta make the most of it.”

Miracle always worried about how her sickness had affected Mila. Ever since she’d finished chemo, Miracle had noticed a wild abandon in Mila that she wasn’t quite sure was healthy. She didn’t want to see her sister get into trouble or end up ruining her life in her efforts to live it to the fullest. It was possible to go overboard after all.