Page 53 of The Spite Date (Small Town Sisterhood #1)

She blinks back, lifting her brows and making her forehead wrinkle in the most adorable way as she waits for me to find words.

“How do we know the code?” Charlie says to Eddie.

“We can guess.”

“What’s the bank’s address?”

“I don’t bloody know!”

“Why would they give us a keypad without giving us the code?”

I shake my head once more, and this time, my brain reengages, diving headfirst into a distraction that’s an easy out for this conversation.

Which I would oddly like to have.

Namely, so that I can ask Bea how we might continue our, ah, situationship.

I believe that’s what the younger people call it.

And the term fits.

We’re not dating, though everything we’re doing would fall under the normal classification of dating , which means?—

“Do you think they used one of our birthdays?” Charlie says.

“How would they know our birthdays?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t fill out the paperwork.”

“Dad did. Maybe he had to put his birthday.”

Yes.

Distraction.

This works.

“Dad, what’s your birthday?” Charlie asks.

“It’s November fourth, duh,” Eddie says.

“How do you know Dad’s birthday?”

“How don’t you?”

“He never celebrates it, for one.”

Both of my boys look at me.

“Have you thought maybe the clues are tied together?” Bea asks before I can say anything.

Am I still gawking?

I am.

I am still gawking.

Being quite the prat.

“ The clock! ” both boys shriek at the same time.

“It’s five-forty,” Charlie says.

“It’s eight-twenty-five,” Eddie replies.

They stare at each other.

I make a mental note to have remedial clock training for Charlie.

“You could try both,” Bea muses.

My children, the two boys who laughed with me until all of our cheeks hurt yesterday over our attempts at knitting to prepare for this weekend’s adventures in Athena’s Rest, knock their heads together with a distinct crack as they both dive toward the keypad again.

“ Owwww ,” Charlie howls.

“Bloody freaking hell, that hurts,” Eddie groans.

I don’t even realize Bea and I have moved as one until she’s squatting before Charlie, enabling me to direct my full attention to Eddie.

“You okay?” she says to him, touching him lightly on the red mark on his forehead.

“How badly does it hurt?” I ask Eddie, doing the same for him.

Both boys insist they’re fine.

“I can shake it off,” Charlie says to Bea. “I’m tough.”

She smiles at him. “Clearly.”

I, however, am not tough.

I am a bloody marshmallow being slow-roasted over a comfortable fire.

Or perhaps that’s merely my heart.

Melting on the inside.

Have I—have I fallen in love with Bea?

It’s the question humming through my mind as the boys work out the next three clues, until they’ve become stumped as we all four squat before a vault behind a hidden door.

“The gold is in there,” Charlie’s insisting. “That’s what the clue says. That we have to crack the secret code for the vault if we want to have our riches before we depart.”

Bea’s sweeping her fingers over the edges of the door. “Maybe there’s a hidden combination lock that’s not on the vault?”

“That doesn’t make any bloody sense,” Eddie grouses.

“Agreed, but there’s not a combination lock on the vault either.”

“There’s a keyhole,” I point out.

“But none of the keys we’ve found work,” Charlie says.

Bea and I lock eyes.

“Safe deposit boxes,” she says at the same time I blurt, “Both keys must be turned at the same time.”

We grin at each other.

Clearly, we’re on the same wavelength.

“The keys, please, Charlie,” I say to my son. “Bea and I will show you how banks work.”

“I mean, usually safe deposit boxes are lined up inside the vault, and you don’t have to do the two-key method to get in exactly like this,” she says.

“Have you worked in a bank? Are you quite sure there’s not double keys for the safe entrance too?”

She shakes her head. “That’s one career I haven’t had, but I’ve been to banks enough. My parents had three safe deposit boxes. I kept finding keys in different places.”

“ Three ?”

“They had a joint one, and then they both had a secret one they kept from each other where they’d hide nice gifts.

Mom’s had this gorgeous pocket watch and front-row tickets for the whole family to go see a hockey game in New York, and Dad’s had the matching earrings to the pearl necklace-and-bracelet set he’d given her the two Christmases before. It was really sweet.”

“But safe deposit boxes?”

“One of my grandpas was a banker before he retired and moved to Arizona. I think he gave them a family discount. You ready with that key?”

“Whenever you are, love.”

Bloody hell.

I have to quit calling her that.

Especially with the way it makes my boys giggle.

“Three, two, one,” she says, not reacting in the least to the pet name, as if men call her love all the time.

Probably she thinks it’s a British thing.

She wouldn’t be wrong, but she wouldn’t be entirely right, either.

“…and turn ,” she says.

I turn my key in the keyhole we’ve located beside the teller counter drawer.

She turns her key in the keyhole on the right side of the safe, where she’s balanced in a squat, knees up, making me think of yoga poses and goats.

There’s a clicking noise, as if something has been unlocked.

“It should’ve opened,” she murmurs. She runs her fingers along the edges of the door again, then gives it a slight push.

“It opened.” Eddie crowds behind her.

“I heard it,” Charlie adds, also crowding behind her.

“Must be a sticky door.” She pushes once, twice, and before I can offer my assistance, she puts her shoulder into it.

The door swings open, into the safe, from hinges above the door.

And Bea follows the door with a gasp, her body propelled inward as though she’s lost her balance.

I reach for her, but?—

The door swings back shut again, and a red light flashes from somewhere above us.

I gasp.

Eddie gasps.

Charlie gasps. “ It ate Bea! ”

I shove my boys out of the way and get down on my knees, pushing at the door. “Bea? Bea, are you in there?”

Are you in there?

Bloody stupid question, Luckwood.

Where the bloody else would she be?

And why won’t this door open again?

There’s a muffled answer from inside.

A muffled, higher-pitched answer accompanied by dull thuds from the other side of the door.

My blood runs cold.

How small is it in there?

How small is it in there?

“Charlie. Turn the key again,” I order. “Bea? Bea, if you can hear me, we’re attempting to open the door again.”

Charlie and I count down quickly and turn the keys together.

The door doesn’t open, but another light begins flashing as well.

“Stop turning keys!” Eddie says. “It’s the wrong clue! The police are coming!”

“I don’t bloody care about the police! Bea’s trapped.”

Charlie makes a face at me. “Dad, it’s a game. They’ll let her out.”

Right.

Right .

“Bea?” I call. “Can you hear me? Are you all right?”

There’s another series of thumps on the other side of the door, but no words answer me.

My heart is in my throat, beating madly.

My hands are getting sweaty. Clammy.

My breath can’t come fast enough.

She’s stuck.

Stuck in a tiny place.

And it’s my fault.

“Ring the guide,” I tell Charlie and Eddie. “We must get Bea out of here.”

“Dad—”

“She’s terrified of enclosed spaces. Ring the bloody guide. Now .”

Terrible time to realize one more reason to not do relationships.

Because when the woman you’re suddenly afraid you’ve fallen head over heels in love with is in danger, and you cannot assist no matter the sheer strength you’re putting into breaking down this bloody safe door, it feels as though your entire life is over.

I’ve hurt her.

I’ve put her into a small space.

And I can’t fix this fast enough.

Is she hyperventilating?

Does she know I’m coming?

Will she have nightmares?

“Problem, boss?” Pinky says above me.

My father’s voice and my mother’s voice and the voice of every bossy nanny I had in my childhood comes out of my mouth as I rise and point to the door. “Bea’s trapped and I’ve no idea what’s behind this door and I want her out and I want her out now .”

Pinky looks over his shoulder to the spiky-haired guide. “Open this door.”

The guide frowns. “You did the key thing?”

“We did the key thing.”

“That’s supposed to open the door.”

“It did.”

“And leave it open.”

“Bloody hell,” I mutter. “ Open the fucking door and get my girlfriend out of there .”

Yes.

My girlfriend.

Bea.

My Bea.

If she’ll forgive me for this.