Imaginary Grace Read Online Free Page B

boots along with a slightly-wrinkled blue t-shirt. I also noticed that he had quite a few tattoos on both arms, which got me wondering if Tanner had any tattoos hidden somewhere.
    My first thought was to turn around and go back, but I decided to brave it out. As I got closer I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
    Just then Tanner glanced over at me, a flash of recognition on his face, but it was Scott who spoke. “Hey,” he said, “aren’t you in our psych class? You were sitting behind Tanner.” He smirked at Tanner.
    I turned beet red as I nodded.
    “Your name’s Grace, right?” Tanner asked, and again I just nodded, surprised that he knew my name. He narrowed his eyes at me. “Can you speak?”
    “Maybe she doesn’t speak English,” Scott suggested.
    Tanner held up his red cup and pointed at it. When I nodded for the third time, he took the two red cups from my hands and filled them for me.
    When he handed them back to me, I managed to croak out, “Thanks,” before turning and slinking out of the kitchen, trying to ignore the sound of their laughter.
    When I found Beth, I handed her the beer and joined in the conversation like nothing had happened. But inside, I couldn’t shake my uneasy feeling; I just wanted to get out of there before I embarrassed myself again. I hung in there for a little longer, then caught Beth’s eye and jerked my head to indicate that I wanted to leave.
    On the way back to our dorm we rehashed every detail of the night. Well, every detail except my encounter with Tanner in the kitchen. I was just too embarrassed to talk about it, even to her. I just wanted to put my pajamas on and crawl into bed.

Chapter 4
    Tanner
    B y eleven-thirty the party had begun to thin out, so Scott and I left and headed into town. Neither of us mentioned J.D.’s, we just headed there by tacit agreement. J.D.’s was our fallback bar, the place we always went when it was too early to go home. It was also off the college grid, which was good when I was looking to hook up. For the most part, I tried to stay away from the girls on campus—too many complications.
    Of course there were sometimes complications at J.D.’s as well. Amber, for example, who I’d met there the week before, then promptly kicked out of the apartment. She was there again, and as soon as I walked in the door she made a beeline straight for me. Typical girl, she seemed to have forgotten what a jerk I’d been and her anger about it. Now she was back for more. I let her hang around for a couple of drinks but made it clear she wasn’t coming home with me. Told her I had an early study session, an excuse that usually worked on the locals; they didn’t seem to realize that students barely studied at all, let alone on a Sunday morning. Nothing against Amber, but I didn’t think it would be wise to leave with her again so soon; it might give her ideas. She hung in there for a while but eventually moved on, then I took my usual seat at the bar, which Scott had held for me, and waited for the band to start.
    Hudson-Nash had been together for years and were well known in the area. They played a lot of classic rock, 70s and 80s music, and they played it very well. Cole Hudson and Bryan Nash had originally started the band, along with another guy, Marty. A few years later they brought Bobby on board.
    Cole, who was also part owner of J.D.’s, was in his early thirties. He played keyboard and did most of the lead vocals, while Bryan, who was about the same age, sang backup and played bass guitar. Marty was on drums and Bobby played lead guitar. Both of them were in their late twenties.
    One night, a few months back, they’d asked me to fill in when Bobby didn’t show up. As I found out later, he was off on another one of his cocaine binges, something that had been happening more and more frequently. I was a regular at J.D.’s and they knew I played, so when Bobby left them in a bind, Cole reached out to me. I hadn’t