‘Argh!’ Ivy groaned and buried her face in his shoulder. ‘I wasted a whole summer on that game, just in case you ever invited me over to your house to play it. I was going to impress you with my mad Ninja skills!’
‘Aww.’ Brendan tipped up her chin and kissed her. ‘Ivy Vega, you are a tremendous dork.’
‘Whatever!’ Ivy whispered back. As the bus jerked to a stop in front of the school grounds, she gave him a mischievous grin. ‘You just love me for my Ninja powers, and you know it!’
Still laughing, she jumped up to follow the students in front of her off the bus, while Brendan playfully hung on to her backpack. She stepped off the bus – and then leaped back, gasping and almost knocking Brendan over, as a flash of black and white gingham swooped past.
Was it a bird, was it a plane . . .?
Oh no. It’s worse!
Ivy cringed as she recognised Sophia, her skateboard swerving dangerously towards a collection of stone benches on the school grounds.
‘Look out!’ Brendan yelled.
Ivy could only watch, speechless with horror, as Sophia’s skateboard took another violent swerve. Sophia’s sunglasses fell from her face, just in time for her to see the bench rising up in front of her. With a super-agile vampire leap, she hopped straight over the bench as her skateboard whizzed beneath it.
Ivy counted it as an absolute miracle when Sophia landed back on the board on the other side of the bench and turned to wobble back over to her friends.
Ivy caught her up halfway. ‘Do you have any idea how close you came to being rushed to the nearest emergency room?’ She pointed at the skateboard under Sophia’s feet. ‘Stop riding that thing!’
But Sophia obviously wasn’t listening. Instead, she was gazing directly over Ivy’s shoulder at something that made her lips curve into a dreamy smile. Using the skateboard to shoot away from Ivy, she scooped up her sunglasses from the ground and shoved them back on her nose.
‘And that’s another thing!’ Ivy yelled after her friend. ‘Stop wearing those things! They’re not good for your health!’
Brendan came up beside her, shaking his head. ‘You do realise she isn’t paying any attention to you.’
‘I know,’ Ivy said glumly, as they watched Sophia aim her skateboard at the group of skater-boys and girls gathered near the front of the school building. She was clearly intent on joining them . . . but in her rush, she seemed to have forgotten how to put on the brakes. She tried to stop, but it was too late. Her arms windmilled through the air.
As Ivy let out a moan of sympathetic horror, Sophia skated her board right over Finn’s feet.
‘Please tell me I imagined that,’ Ivy breathed.
‘I wish you had,’ Brendan whispered back.
Together, they started running, even as the group of blonde skater-girls near Finn all started screaming at once.
Every time Ivy had ever seen Finn, he had been wearing pristine white tennis shoes. They’d been so perfectly white, Ivy could have written an essay on them. Now, though, Ivy could see dirty black wheel marks running over the top of them.
She cringed at the sight. It’s like a sign saying, ‘Sophia was here!’
Sophia’s face was bright red, and her words were tumbling over each other as the skater-girls all glared at her from behind Finn, whispering to each other.
‘I am just so, so sorry!’ Sophia gasped. ‘I never meant – I would never, ever, ever, on purpose . . .’
Ivy started forwards to save her out-of-control friend, but Brendan pulled her gently to one side. ‘Shh,’ he whispered. ‘Look again.’ He nodded at Finn, and Ivy followed his gaze.
Finn didn’t look angry. He didn’t even look annoyed.
‘Hey, don’t worry,’ he said, smiling at Sophia, his eyes twinkling. ‘It’s fine. Totally! I was getting desperate for ways to scuff up these new shoes anyway. You’ve done me a triumphant favour.’
‘Really?’ Sophia bit her lip.
Finn clamped a reassuring hand on her shoulder. His blond hair glinted in the sunlight, and his smile was dazzling. ‘Absolutely. Don’t worry about it, OK?’
‘OK,’ Sophia breathed. Her eyes were shining. As Ivy watched, Sophia’s gaze drifted over to his fingers, still resting on her shoulder. Her lips trembled.
‘See you around!’ Finn gave her shoulder one more squeeze, then wandered off with his gang of friends.
Sophia turned slowly, as if in a daze, to Ivy and Brendan. ‘He . . . he touched my shoulder!’ she whispered.
Ivy rolled her eyes. ‘We saw.’
The school bell rang, harsh and jangling, but it wasn’t enough to jolt Sophia back into common sense. Her eyes were glazed with delight even as Ivy turned her around and shoved her gently towards the school building.
We are going to have to have a real talk soon, Ivy thought grimly. Away from all skateboards and sunglasses!
There might not be time to fix Sophia now, but at least Ivy had finally solved one mystery. Lillian had been right, as usual. Sophia was being driven by a huge crush . . . on Skater Finn!
Chapter Seven
Snap out of it! Olivia told herself.
She was on the deck of a yacht, cruising directly past Hampton Court Palace. It should have been one of the coolest moments of her entire life, but all she could think about was the boy next to her. Jackson.
What was he really thinking as he leaned over her shoulder, pointing out London landmarks? What did he want from her, and for their relationship? And what did Olivia want for herself ?
Hampton Court Palace was impressive. Apparently, Henry VIII had once lived there. Admittedly, Olivia knew less about English history than she did about quantum physics, but Jackson was full of fun facts. The palace sprawled along the riverbank like something out of a fairy tale, but Olivia was very much not enchanted by it.