Stolen Chances (2 page)

“Of course.” While Sophia Hudson wasn’t interested in running the hotel anymore, she still wanted to have the final say in everything that went on there. Just another nail in Maren’s proverbial coffin. She was expected to do all the work but not make the big decisions.

“My plans have changed, dear. I’ll need a car to pick me up at the airport.”

Maren sat up straight in her chair. “You’re coming home?”

“Yes. I had a call from your father. You’ve spoken with him?”

“No.” Confusion hit. “I mean, he sent me a text, but we haven’t spoken.”

Sophia sighed. “Well then, I’ll be the one to fill you in. Your father’s had an accident.”

Maren pushed out of her chair. “What? Is he okay?”

“I’m not sure. You know your father. He’s impossible to read.”

Multiple ways he could have been hurt rushed through Maren’s mind. He refused to slow down. He was still working in the field as if he were twenty-five instead of fifty-nine. She looked around the office but didn’t see any of it. “Where?”

“He’s in the southern Yucatan, at a small facility just north of Belize.”

For a second, time stopped, and inside her chest, Maren was sure her heart stopped too.

Mexico. The Yucatan.
No…
Of all the places…

Her pulse sped up, and perspiration dotted her forehead. “What is he doing there?”

Her mother sighed again. “I can’t really say, Maren. You know your father never shares the details of his work with me.”

Yes, Maren did know that. Her parents’ strained relationship was worse than her own strained relationships with both of them. “Are you going?”

“He hasn’t asked for me. Only you. And considering the tension between you two these last few years, I think you should go to him. I know your father has his faults, but he’s your father and he loves you. You owe him this, Maren.”

Maren didn’t owe her father anything, especially when it came to the Yucatan. But if he was injured or—God forbid—dying, as her mother was making it sound, she couldn’t ignore him either.

“Listen, dear,” her mother went on. “Isabel will stay with me. I’ll be home tomorrow to take over the hotel. You can fly out the day after. It’s all been decided.”

“It has?” Anger replaced confusion, causing Maren’s breaths to quicken. It was always like this with her father—him ordering, her jumping. And now her mother was joining in? Though part of her needed to see him if he was hurt, another part balked at the thought of going anywhere near the Yucatan. “By whom?”

“Careful, young lady. You may be almost thirty-three, but I’m still your mother. Now…” Sophia took a deep breath. “I have to pack. And don’t worry, dear. I’m sure everything will be fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

When the phone clicked in Maren’s ear, she fought the urge to hurl it across the room. Slowly, she replaced the receiver and rested her hands on the desk.

Fine? Things weren’t going to be fine. Her father was hurt. In
Mexico
. And he was ordering her to come to him.

She was still reeling from her mother’s call when Candace poked her head around the door and handed her a message. “I forgot to tell you. Lisa Maxwell called earlier. Said she’s meeting you in Cancun day after tomorrow. I guess this means you’re taking a trip, huh? Gotta be a hot surfer or two in Cancun. I’d go for that over a pharmaceutical rep any day.”

Maren stared at the slip of paper in her hand, barely hearing Candace’s words. Lisa? Cancun? Her heart raced. If her father had asked Lisa to come down for moral support, it meant things were a thousand times worse than Maren had predicted. Should she go now? If things were really that bad, why was her mother telling her to wait until Friday to leave?

The phone rang again. In a daze, Maren lifted the receiver out of its cradle. “Hudson.”

“Ms. Hudson, ah, it’s Randy out on the course. We have ourselves a little...situation...out here.”

Situation…
It took several seconds for Randy’s words to register, but when they did, Maren realized there was nothing she could do until her mother came home. She had too many responsibilities to leave and jump on a plane this afternoon. And she didn’t want Isabel anywhere near Mexico.

Maren pinched the bridge of her nose and focused on breathing. Slow, in and out. The way she always did in a crisis. “I’m listening, Randy.”

“Well, ma’am, it seems we have an excavation going on. Eighth fairway.”

“Shit.” This, at least, was a normal crisis. One Maren could handle. She rubbed her temples. “Sand pit again?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Get a golf cart up to the lobby. I’ll be out in five minutes.” She clicked off the phone and glanced at Candace. “Forward any calls to my cell. I may be dealing with this for a while.”

She moved for the door. Candace’s hand on her arm stopped her.

“Maren? Are you okay? You look a little rattled.”

She was more than rattled. She was reeling. “I’m fine. But you might not be in a minute. Sophia Hudson is coming home. By Friday, you’ll be working for her again, not me.”

She left Candace staring wide-eyed at her back and headed for the lobby. Moments later, she eyed the pristine grass laid out before her like a carpet of green as she drove the cart across the grounds. Not that she saw any of its beauty. All she could see was her father’s face when she’d left him in Mexico nine years before. Yeah, she’d seen him since then, but that image of him was forever emblazoned in her mind. And knowing she was going back there again…

Her stomach rolled. She forced the images away and waved a greeting to the greenskeeper as she passed the maintenance building and cut across the fairway, then glanced up when she rounded the hill. Just as Randy had said, the marauders were camped out on the eighth fairway.

She turned off the engine, hit the brake with her foot, and eased out of the cart. Her heels sank into the soft ground as she stalked toward the sand pit, making her wish she’d worn slacks instead of the pencil skirt she’d slipped into this morning.

“No, you guys are doing it wrong!” The young girl’s terse voice drifted to Maren’s ears as she drew closer. Dark hair tied back in a ponytail whipped across the girl’s shoulder when she turned to the two boys crouched in the sand behind her. “You can’t just tear through the dirt. You have to be gentle. You’re dealing with years and years of sediments there. If you yank and pull, you’ll ruin the integrity of the artifacts. Use your trowel and your whisk.”

The boys grumbled. It was clear they just wanted to dig and get dirty. They didn’t want to play this game or be bossed around by a girl. One boy flicked sand over his shoulder, contaminating the site, which had been carefully cordoned off with rope and stakes. The girl turned and glared at him.

Amusement cut through the fear bubbling in Maren’s belly, but she tamped it down and put on her best head-honcho face, then cleared her throat. The dark-haired girl whipped around at the sound.

“Just what, exactly, is going on here, young lady?”

Lacing her fingers behind her back, the girl quirked one dark eyebrow and bit her lip. “Ah, an excavation?”

Maren forced back the smile teasing the corners of her lips and wished like hell she could do that damn one-eyebrow thing. She could hardly blame the girl for setting up her own dig. Maren had done it a thousand times herself as a child, on the same golf course, in the same exact spot, for that matter. But there were rules. And rules had to be followed. She'd learned that the hard way.

“The guests don’t like having a dig on their course.”

“Ah, Mom. Can’t you tell them to leave us alone? This is science here.”

The
ah, Mom
did it. Maren’s heart slammed against her ribs as her eight-year-old daughter shifted her weight from one foot to another, reminding Maren that
this
was all that mattered. Not a place. Not a moment in the past. Just this.

Maren eyed the dirty khaki pants and T-shirt that read
Archaeologists do it in the dirt
, then frowned. “Science or not, this dig is dug. Get your tools, and get out of that pit.”

“Bugger,” Isabel muttered under her breath. “Come on, guys. We’re busted.”

The two boys grumbled again as they stood and dusted off their legs. But they did as they were told and followed.

“Who are your partners in crime?” Maren asked as she watched.

“This is David. He’s staying in 518. And Paul. He just got here today.”

Maren studied the two boys. They looked decent enough. At least halfway normal, even if they were palling around with a bossy girl. Isabel was always running with kids staying at the hotel.

She waited as the children hauled themselves out of the sand pit, and remembered, with vivid clarity, what it was like to be the hotel brat. She’d lived it herself. And though she hated that Isabel was now experiencing the same things she'd gone through as a child, she knew her father’s influence was the reason they both shared a love of the past.

She had to go to him. She could put aside her own fears and horrible memories of the Yucatan for him. This one last time.

“Pack up your gear,” Maren said to her daughter, fingering the locket at her chest, “and I’ll give you all a lift back. And I want you to change your shirt when you get back to the lodge, young lady. You know how I feel about that shirt. And Isabel,” she added when her daughter dropped her shoulders. “The next time you want to set up a dig, do it in the hills behind the hotel, not on the golf course.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Isabel muttered.

Maren let go of the locket and turned for the golf cart just as her cell phone rang. She pulled the clip off the waistband of her skirt and hit Answer without looking at the screen. “Hudson.”

“That’s Dr. Hudson,” a weak voice said on the other end of the line, “and it gets confusing when we’re both using it.”

“Dad?” Her heart felt like it skipped a beat as she waited. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine,” he said again, this time stronger. “Did you speak with your mother?”

“Yes. But you don’t sound good. If you’re not well, I should come earl—”

“Friday is good. Just…” He coughed. “Don’t miss your plane, Maren. I need you.”

He needed her. The words caused her chest to tighten. She couldn’t count the number of times she’d wished to hear those words from his lips. Not her, the archaeologist, but her, the person. His daughter.

She swallowed around the lump in her throat. “I’ll be there. I promise.”

“Good. Good,” he said again on a sigh. “You won’t regret it.”

Maren closed the phone and looked toward her daughter, laughing and joking with the boys in the golf cart. And though she couldn’t explain why, his last words sent a shiver straight down her spine.

C
HAPTER
T
WO

W
ith her fingers gripping the seat of the Cessna as if her life depended on it, Maren tried to take her mind off the rumbling aircraft and her overwhelming fear of flying by reciting the periodic table. It was better than imagining the small plane nose-diving into the Caribbean. Way better than thinking about her father and what was happening to him. She made it as far as silicon before Lisa interrupted her.

“I still think they’re fake. No woman has boobs that perky. Rafe assures me they aren’t, though when I asked him how he knew for sure, he got all quiet on me. ’Course, then I had to give him hell about it, because that’s what wives are supposed to do. But I’m telling you, it’s unnatural.”

Maren glanced sideways at her friend. Lisa’s flame-red hair was cut short and spunky and set off her emerald-green eyes. They’d exchanged a few hugs and tears when they’d met up in Cancun, but since climbing on board the rattling tin can that was their plane, Maren could barely focus on anything besides her fear of dying. “What?”

“The model.” When Maren only stared at her, Lisa rolled those pretty gems skyward. “Haven’t you been listening? God, it’s like talking to my husband when
Baseball Tonight
is on. I told you about Pete, right? Rafe’s friend? His sister is a big-time model. Wait. Correction.
Underwear
model. With giant silicon boobs. I’m telling you. Not normal.”

Maren looked back out the window as Lisa prattled on. She knew Lisa was simply trying to keep her mind off the flight and what was happening with her father, but gossiping about someone she didn’t know and had no interest in meeting wasn’t helping. Neither was concentrating on that tickle in the back of her throat.

“You won’t regret it.”

Why had her father said those words? Yeah, he knew Mexico was the last place she wanted to visit again, but what could she possibly regret about seeing her injured, possibly dying, father?

The plane bumped, jostling Maren in her seat, distracting her from the frantic thoughts rushing through her head. When the metal contraption dipped to the left, she closed her eyes and resumed reciting the periodic table.

The plane jolted again, and Maren’s fingers dug into the seat until her knuckles turned white. “Nickel, copper, zinc,” she said louder.

Lisa smiled and reached out to pat Maren’s hand. “You’re doing good. You haven’t made it to xenon yet. It’s not so bad.”

“Not so bad? Are you
nuts
?”

Lisa chuckled. “In a few minutes, you’ll look back on this with fond memories.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“We’re comin’ in, ladies.” The pilot’s raspy voice drew Maren’s attention away from her father and onto the terror that lay ahead. “Hold on. This runway’s short.”

“Oh God. Did he say the runway was short?” Maren cinched her seat belt down tight and gave up any pretense of holding it together. She grabbed Lisa’s hand.

Even Lisa tensed as the small plane rocketed down the runway. Maren braced her feet wide and slammed her eyes shut. The shaking only convinced her the landing gear would fall off at any moment. Metal screamed against metal in the small cabin as the pilot applied the brakes. Maren rushed through the fourth line of the periodic table.

By some miracle, they slowed. And as they began to turn toward the right, Maren finally opened her eyes.