Leslie made a face. “I’m used to dressing this way, Dev, and if I can handle a

sprint through JFK airport with a loaded briefcase and two suitcases, I can

handle a stroll through the woods.”

“Fine.” Dev handed her the briefcase but kept the suitcase herself.

“Here you go.”

“I don’t remember you being this stubborn,” Leslie complained, half annoyed

and half amused.

“I guess I’ve changed,” Dev said quietly.

Leslie sighed and slung the briefcase over her shoulder. “We both have.”

Dev smiled softly. “Come on. I’ll walk you home.”

• 51 •

• 52 •

WHEN DREAMS TREMBLE

CHAPTER SIX

Come on, let me walk you home. Standing outside the high school on a late

spring evening, Leslie regarded the ß at tire on her mountain bike with disgust.

She looked over her shoulder at Dev, who slouched against the base of a tall

maple with both their backpacks looped over one arm. She wore ripped jeans,

her motorcycle boots, of course, and the barest hint of a smile.

“You’d just better not laugh.” Leslie almost pouted but caught herself. Dev

would laugh then. “I can’t believe I don’t have a patch kit.”

“You don’t have a pump, either,” Dev pointed out. “So it wouldn’t do any good

to Þ x the leak.” She raised her eyebrows as she scanned Leslie’s pale green

slacks and low-heeled shoes. “And you’re not exactly dressed for doing bicycle

repairs.”

“Ha ha.” Leslie tugged on the sleeve of Dev’s faded blue T-shirt.

“You are. Don’t you have something in your motorcycle bag you can Þ x this

with?”

Dev laughed. “They’re not exactly the same kind of tires, Les.”

“I know that, Devon, ” Leslie said with a huff, but she was smiling.

She knew Dev would change the tire for her if she had the equipment, and

Leslie would probably let her, even though she could do it perfectly well herself.

Dev liked doing things for her. Carrying her backpack and schoolbooks when

they walked down to the lake. Fixing the lock on her locker when it kept

jamming and the maintenance man kept forgetting to replace it. Dev had even

shoveled the snow away from around the Jeep in the school parking lot one day

last winter when Leslie had driven her parents’ car to school and got snowed

under. Leslie could’ve

• 53 •

RADCLY fFE

done all those things, but she could tell that Dev wanted to do it. And she liked

seeing how happy it made Dev. It was weird, but it was nice too.

“So you know I don’t have anything that will work on a bicycle tire,” Dev said.

“We should get going. It’s going to get dark pretty soon.”

“You don’t have to come with me. You’ll just have to walk all the way back for

your motorcycle if you do.”

“I don’t mind.” Dev glanced across the deserted school parking lot. “It’s over a

mile to your house, Les. I’m not letting you push your bike all the way there in

the dark. Besides, you can’t carry your books and—”

“I know! Give me a ride home on your motorcycle.” Leslie grabbed Dev’s

hand. “We’ll leave the bike chained up here and tomorrow I’ll bring a patch kit

and a pump and you can Þ x it.”

For a minute, Leslie thought Dev was going to refuse. She had an odd look on

her face, almost as if she was afraid of something, and her hand shook. Dev

never let anything bother her. Leslie quirked her head. “Dev?”

“Sure. That’ll work. Come on.”

Leslie relocked her bike and followed Dev to her motorcycle.

After Dev secured their books in her saddlebags, Dev climbed on and held out

her hand to Leslie.

“Climb up behind me. Have you ever been on the back of a motorcycle

before?”

“No.”

“Just hold on to me and lean when I lean. Just stay tight to me, okay?”

“Okay. But let’s go for a ride around the lake before you take me home. Do

you have time?”

Dev hesitated again, then nodded. “Sure.”

Leslie straddled the motorcycle behind Dev. It was wider than she’d realized

and she had to lean forward against Dev’s back to keep her balance. When the

big engine roared to life, she wrapped both arms around Dev’s waist. Dev

jerked as if Leslie had surprised her.

“Is this right?” Leslie asked, her mouth close to Dev’s ear.

“Yeah. It’s great.” Dev glanced over her shoulder at Leslie, and her eyes

seemed impossibly dark. “You ready?”

• 54 •

WHEN DREAMS TREMBLE

Leslie nodded, feeling a tingling in her stomach as she leaned against Dev.

Nerves, she guessed. When Dev pulled out of the parking lot and onto the road,

the wind rushed around her so hard that she felt exposed to the world in an

exciting and unexpectedly scary way. She pressed even closer to Dev, amazed

at how strong Dev felt. Her waist was narrow and Þ rm, her back broader than

Leslie had expected and hard with muscle. Leslie rested her cheek between

Dev’s shoulder blades, letting their bodies move together, and felt completely

safe.

“Do you want me to take this suitcase inside?” Dev asked, stopping at the end

of the path to Leslie’s cabin.

“No, I can get it. Thanks.” Leslie took the luggage. “Do you know if there’s

Internet access in the cabins?”

Dev laughed. “Uh, Les? There isn’t even a phone.”

“Great,” Leslie sighed. “I thought by now they’d have done that, at least. I guess

I should be glad there’s electricity and ß ush toilets.”

“You’ve been living in the city too long. You’re getting soft.”

Leslie regarded Dev with indignation. “You obviously don’t know anything

about Manhattan.”

Dev grinned. “True.”

“Where are you living?”

“I’ve got a place up near the Finger Lakes. But I move around a lot for the job,

so half the year I’m practically itinerant.”

Leslie was curious about just what had Þ nally captured Dev’s interest, but it

was almost 6 p.m. and unless things had changed drastically, her mother would

have dinner ready for the family at seven thirty, right after she set out the buffet

for the guests. If she was going to shower and catch a few minutes’ sleep, she

needed to go inside. Plus, being around Dev seemed to bring up things she

hadn’t thought of in years. On top of her fatigue, the memories were starting to

make her feel as if she’d tripped into an alternate reality. What she needed was

to check her e-mail and call the ofÞ ce. Then she’d start feeling more like

herself.

“Well,” Leslie said. “Thanks again.”

“No problem.”

In a few seconds, Dev disappeared into the trees and Leslie was alone. She

carried her bags into the small, plain pine cabin and looked around. It was just

as she remembered from her days of cleaning

• 55 •

RADCLY fFE

the units on weekends and during summers. One big room with a kitchenette

against the rear wall and a bedroom partitioned off to one side. The tiny

bathroom adjoined the bedroom, also in the rear. There was a Þ replace on the

left wall as she entered and a sofa ß anked by chunky end tables facing it. Two

large front windows overlooked the porch and the clearing and the path that led

down to the lake.

Leslie put her briefcase on the coffee table in front of the sofa and dragged her

luggage into the bedroom. The bed was somewhere between a single and a

double in size, neatly made up with a chenille bedspread, the likes of which she

hadn’t seen since she’d been a teenager.

She kicked off her shoes, draped her blazer over the back of a chair, and slid

off her silk shell. The skirt went next and then her stockings. She stretched out

on the bed in her bra and panties and closed her eyes. As she drifted off, she

was distantly aware of a tingling in her stomach and the sensation of her breasts

pressed against a Þ rm body, the muscles rippling against her nipples.

v

Dev settled into a wooden deck chair on the front porch of her cabin with her

laptop, intending to enter data while she still had some daylight left. She and

Natalie had collected a fair number of samples the previous day and that

morning. She worked a few minutes, then glanced to her left, squinting to see

through the trees to the neighboring cabin. It was still impossible to believe that

Leslie was over there right now.

Dev hoped she was taking a nap. Up close, she’d realized that Leslie was

unhealthily thin, with tension etched into the tight lines around her eyes and

mouth, and an aura of fragility surrounded her that seemed totally foreign. Leslie

had always been feminine, that was true. Dev laughed. She actually used to think

of her as girlie, in a really nice kind of way, but she’d also been athletic and Þ t.

Leslie was a terriÞ c swimmer, far more ß uid in the water than Dev, who

tended to power through rather than work with the waves. When they’d run into

each other at the public beach, Leslie would almost always beat her when

they’d race for the dock that ß oated a hundred yards offshore.

Leslie would pull herself up onto the wooden platform, laughing as she looked