No Rebound

Chapter 9

Chapter 9She didn’t waste any time and 15 minutes later there was a knock at my door. Jess stepped in as I opened it and we automatically hugged and kissed like old friends before I grabbed my crash helmet and jacket to head of to the bike shop.

Now -- I do a lot of my best thinking when I’m encased in a crash helmet and riding my bike. I don’t know why but I find it conducive to de-cluttering the brain and therefore allowing for ideas and decisions to formulate more easily.

On the 20 minute ride to the bike shop my mind was a whir. Jessica was very casual and informally friendly with me, but that didn’t mean anything did it?

She seemed reluctant to leave this morning but surely that was just because we got on well and she was going home to an empty house?

Surely the little touches and caresses was just the way she was with all of her friends right?

So basically I came to the decision that I was just hoping that she was attracted to me because I was definitely attracted to her; I was therefore blowing ordinary gestures out of all proportion and assigning significance to them where it wasn’t justified.

Once I’d gotten that straight in my head I felt better. No, not better but more balanced somehow.

It only took a few minutes to book my bike into the repair shop and then we were back in Jess’s car and heading back to my place -- or so I thought until Jess took an unexpected turn at a junction and started driving us in the opposite direction to my house.

I started to say something but instantly recognised that it was pointless as Jess couldn’t hear me. We stopped at a junction and I touched her arm lightly, making her turn toward me as I started to ask where we were going.

‘Sorry Chris, I need to concentrate on the road so I’m afraid I can’t talk to you.’ She said with a grin like a Cheshire cat.

I tried twice more to get her attention when we were stationary but she studiously ignored me, focusing all of her attention on the road and pretending she had no idea I was trying to speak to her.

Ok, so I was being kidnapped and taken on a magical mystery tour but who the hell was I to complain. I had nothing better to do and if you’re going to get kidnapped it may as well be by someone as sexy as Jess! I couldn’t help but smile, this woman had an incredible sense of fun and she already knew me well enough to know she would get away with whatever she had planned.

We soon pulled into a retail park and I groaned inwardly. Shopping was not something I considered fun and I was dreading being dragged around shop after shop for the remainder of the afternoon.

Jess looked over at me as she parked, laughing heartily as she saw the look of distaste on my face.

‘Don’t worry Hon, I just need to grab some cat food. You can wait in the car if you want to.’