My body protests and disappointment washes over me, but I pull it together and try to look unfazed as I nod and brace my hands against his wrists. “Ready.”
Bending his knees, he easily lifts me up and sits me on the boxcar’s open frame. Then he steps back and hoists himself into the car beside me. He carefully stands up, and offers me a hand to help me to my feet.
My high heels waver on the uneven metal floor of the train car but Daren keeps me upright until I’m standing on my own.
Good God. I’m never wearing high heels again.
We walk to the back of the boxcar to retrieve the paper. I’m still hoping it’s a check. Or a savings bond. Or a money order. Daren swiftly picks it up, unfolds it, and both our faces fall. Another note.
Daren mutters a curse and I groan.
“Why couldn’t I have had a normal father?” I say.
Daren reads the letter out loud. “ ‘Congratulations on finding this clue. Lesson number two: Always bring the heart. Wherever you go, however you get there, bring a loving air with you and leave kindness in your wake. Life is too short to keep your heart to yourself. Now I’m sure you’re frustrated and wondering where the money is, but not to worry! The money is very real and will soon be yours. The next place you’ll need to go is the thing Kayla liked more than stickers and the thing Daren looked forward to every February. Ask for the Turner key.’ ”
“Another clue?” My mouth hangs open. Oh my God. This really is another one of my dad’s quirky scavenger hunts. I can’t believe he thought a scavenger hunt would be a good way to share his money with me. Ugh!
I throw my arms up in exasperation, accidentally whipping Daren’s wrist against the wall of the boxcar with a loud bang.
“Hey now,” he grunts. “There’s no need for violence.”
“This is all just a big game, you know.”
He blinks at me. “What is?”
“This!” I gesture around wildly, accidentally thwacking his hand against the train car. Again.
He rubs his banged-up hand with a scowl. “Okay first of all, cool it with the hand gestures. Second, what do you mean this is a game?”
“This thing that we’re doing?” I hold up the note. “It’s all a big scavenger hunt that my dad must have orchestrated before he died.”
“A scavenger hunt?” He screws his face into a befuddled look.
I nod. “He used to make scavenger hunts for me all the time when I was little. And now he’s sending me on another one and giving us clues to find the inheritance.”
He bobs his head. “Cool.”
“No. Not cool,” I say, pointing at him. “Annoying.”
He scoffs. “So we follow some clues, so what? Why is that annoying?”
I let out a sigh. “Because scavenger hunts were something my father used to do for me back when he still cared and was all involved in my life. Being sent on one now just feels… insulting. Like I’m a puppet in his little game—a game he didn’t bother playing with me for years, mind you—and now he thinks he can just handcuff me to strangers and send me out on wild-goose chases whenever he pleases. Don’t get me wrong, I’m beyond grateful that he left me money in his will. But by wrapping this inheritance in a scavenger hunt and asking me to play along, he’s destroying one of my favorite childhood memories.” I rub a hand down my face, my heart twisting. “It just hurts, that’s all. I don’t want to be his puppet. I want to be his daughter.”
14 Daren
Kayla looks positively forlorn. Her rosy cheeks have lost their color, her bright eyes are clouded with sadness, and her pouty lips are… well, they’re still sexy as ever. But the point is that she’s obviously unhappy and I don’t know how to change that. So I try to distract her.
“Well frankly, I’m disappointed,” I say in a righteous manner. “For the last time, Kayla Turner, we are not strangers.” I let out a dramatic breath. “Good God, woman. What does a guy have to do to achieve ‘friendship’ status with you? I thought tonguing each other would do the trick but clearly we didn’t do it right. So come on. Let’s try it again.” I sigh in mock weariness, waving her in. “I’m willing to rub tongues all day if that’s what it takes. Hell, I’ll tongue you all night if it’ll get me off your Stranger Shit List.”
She shakes her head and snorts through her downtrodden expression. “You are shameless.”
I place a hand against my chest. “I prefer to think of myself as an opportunist.”
“That too.”
“So what do you say?” I flash my dimple. “Are we friends yet?”
Amusement plays in her eyes. “Why do you care so much about being friends with me?”
I scratch my cheek, feeling more unsettled than I care to admit by her question. “No idea. I’ll get back to you.”
She straightens her shoulders. “Okay. Well while you’re pondering that, I’ll be over here trying to figure out this clue.” She pulls the note from my hand and examines it with a frown.
“What does ‘something you liked more than stickers’ mean?” I glance at her.
She shakes her head. “I don’t know. What about your thing? Something you looked forward to in February? What, like Valentine’s Day?”
I choke on a laugh. “Yeah, no. Valentine’s Day is my least favorite holiday. Too much pressure.”
“Oh-kay. Good to know where you stand on that,” she says, raising her eyebrows. “So it’s probably safe to assume this clue doesn’t have anything to do with Cupid’s holiday.” She mutters, “One possibility down. A trillion more to go.”
“Let’s head back to the car and do our sleuthing on the road. I’m starving.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
I tuck the paper clue in my pocket as we walk to the edge of the boxcar and stare down. “Do you want to climb down first or should I?”
Below, the ground declines into a steep hill just a few feet from the boxcar, but the drop to the flat area before the descent isn’t too bad.
Kayla says, “Let’s just jump.”
“All right.”
She takes off her shoes and grips them in her free hand while I wrap my cuffed hand around hers.
“On the count of three,” I say. “One… two…”
“Wait. Wait,” she says. “Are we jumping on three or after three? If we jump at different times and go flying in different directions, we could snap our arms off at the cuffs.”
Girls. So dramatic.
“Yeeeah, no.” I shake my head and press my lips together. “We might bruise a wrist—or two—but I’m pretty sure our arms won’t snap off.”
“Still.” She juts her chin. “On three or after three?”
“After three,” I say.
She nods.
“One… two… three!” I tighten my hand around hers as we jump out of the boxcar. But we overshoot it and jump too far out. We miss the flat area and land in the dirt with heavy thuds at the top of the hill. Then we promptly tumble over each other down the steep decline.
Our bodies flail in opposite directions as we roll, but the handcuffs force us to smack back together as we topple over each other, skidding through the gravel and dust in a tangle of limbs until we finally reach the bottom of the hill and come to a dusty stop.
Kayla lands sprawled across my chest with her long hair no longer tied back but now completely loose and splayed over my face. My right knee is wedged between her legs, where her skirt has ridden up and is now barely covering her ass. And our shackled hands are trapped between us, with my open palm pressing against her large, soft breast.
There are worse ways to fall out of a train.