Smash & Grab Read Online Free Page B

Japanese cigarette lighter that his mom gave him. It used to belong to his grandfather. He flicks the lighter on and off, on and off. I think it’s comforting to him, like a security blanket.
    “Oliver, carry this for me?” I push my pack into his chest and he grunts.
    Quinn is already in the car with Whitney and Elena. “Hurry up, you two. Time to go.”
    “Leo?” I ask.
    “Right here.” He runs up behind us, his face flushed pink from the wind, the jump, and the run. The police sirens are louder now.
    Oliver throws my pack into the trunk with the others before crawling into the backseat. I go after him and then Leo squeezes in.
    Whitney looks back at me, frowning, the mirror image of her twin sister, Elena—if you reverse their style sense. Her hair is smooth rather than curly, a dark black curtain falling against her neck. Her shirt is almost always unbuttoned low enough to give everyone a good glimpse of her lacy bra. Tonight she’s dusted glittery powder all along her neck and cleavage, and it flashes every time it catches the light.
    “You broke up with Derek?” She holds up her phone.
He told her? Ugh.
“With a text? Hon, that’s so not cool.”
    Everyone looks at me and I shrug. “I just beat him to the punch. Who wants to date the daughter of an infamous criminal, anyway?”
    “
Alleged
criminal,” Quinn says quietly, hurt clear in his eyes. I immediately feel bad and mouth “Sorry” at him.
    “You don’t know that. Derek’s a sweet guy.” Whitney shakes her head as she pulls out and starts speeding down the road. “He deserved better.” There is disappointment in her voice, not reproach. Even if I’m in the wrong, she supports me.
    Derek did deserve better. He did. I know this. Breaking up with him by text was impulsive. I’m sorry about that, but not about the breakup itself. Even if this thing with my dad hadn’t happened today, my days with Derek as a couple were numbered. We’d been together three months. Long for me. Too long. He was starting to think we had a future.
    “You okay?” Leo asks, the only person in the car who can figure me out just by looking at my face.
    “Yeah, of course,” I lie. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
    We look at each other, and it dawns on me how ridiculous this statement is, and we both crack up.
    “He wasn’t the right guy,” Leo says.
    “I don’t think there is a right guy,” I say.
    Leo grins. “There is. You just haven’t found him yet. God help him when you do, though.” He thinks a minute. “Actually, God help
you.
Because you are going to fall
hard,
my friend.”
    “Never gonna happen,” I tell him. “I’m not interested in becoming my mother.”
    “Apples and oranges,” he says.
    In the front seat Elena’s fussing at Whitney to slow down. “Who are you, Danica Patrick all of a sudden?”
    Whitney rolls her eyes. “I didn’t get to jump. Let me speed,” she says. “And relax. I’ve got skills.”
    The skills she’s talking about developed after a few dates with a stunt-car driver her dad hired for one of the movies he coproduced last year. If he hadn’t found out about those dates and told the guy just how young she really was, there probably would’ve been a few more. It shocks me that the guy didn’t know she was seventeen. Of the twins, Elena is the one who looks much older than she is—which is weird because she and Whitney are identical. They have the same green eyes, dark brown skin, and delicate frames, but everything about Whitney screams high school, from her sense of humor to her habit of crinkling up her nose when she flirts, whereas Elena radiates sophistication, from her dry way of talking to the gliding, confident way she walks. Maybe it’s all on purpose, their way of distinguishing themselves from each other. It works. I never confuse them. No one does.
    Elena and Whitney continue to bicker back and forth about what speed we should be going and whether Whitney does in fact have skills. I can imagine them