Page 61 of False Start

“So, what’s on the agenda today?” I asked.

He shrugged. “You tell me. You had the book.”

My fingers stopped on the keys in the ignition. “No. You did. You had it at when we got out of the car last night.”

He patted his pockets. “Are you sure?”

A flare of anger heated my chest, replacing the weird ball of feelings I’d been batting around all night. “Yeah. In the bar, you had the book. Did you seriously lose the book we need to compete in this race?”

Trent frowned, hopping out of the car and smacking the trunk. I pulled the release, frustration mounting as he rifled through the luggage in the back.

“Bad news.” He returned to the passenger seat with a grimace. “It’s not in the back.”

“So, you lo?—”

He held up a hand. “And I just remembered that you had it last night. You took it from me in the bar.”

The bar. My cheeks heated even as I played through everything that happened before Trent got us unceremoniously kicked out. The drink, the game, my brilliant idea to trick Trent into netting us a few more points.

I winced, vaguely remembering holding it in my hands as I watched Trent embarrass himself. “I didn’t see it this morning.”

“Okay, so probably not in the hotel room. Definitely not in the trunk. Do you think you stashed it somewhere else?” He opened up the glove box, papers and napkins spilling onto his lap. No book.

“The bar.” I bit my bottom lip. “I think I left it at the bar. When you got kicked out.”

His gaze shifted across the street to its empty parking lot.

“Damn,” I swore, tipping my head back and closing my eyes. “I am the worst.”

The slam of the car door jolted me back. Trent’s seat was empty. He ran across the parking lot, hands waving overhead like a lunatic. Or, at least he seemed like a lunatic, until another rally car that had been turning onto the street, reversed back into the parking lot.

Trent leaned in the driver’s side window for a few minutes before running back to the car. “I got pictures of their book. And I think if you can read chicken scratch, we might even have a couple of addresses. Between the two of us, maybe we can probably remember what we still needed for bonus points and grab a couple of those today.”

The pictures on his phone showed the other team’s book, along with a bunch of addresses. “Do you want to take off and let me decipher this, or should we take ten and try to put together a plan?”

“You’re not mad?” I asked, guilt settling in my stomach at the thought of how eager I’d been to rip into him. Anything to scrub away the memory of last night.

He shrugged easily. “Nah. Honest mistake. If we run into the judges today, I think I can sweet talk them into giving us another guidebook. Until then, at least we’ve got this.”

He punched my shoulder playfully.

“And what was your plan if they didn’t stop?” I asked, stomach dropping.

“Start finding nearby weird shit and call my assistant to tell me which shitty motel I was supposed to check into tonight.” A good plan. Hell, a brilliant plan. Certainly better than my plan, which mostly consisted of berating Trent for losing the book. “So, plan now or let me handle it from the passenger’s seat?”

“Passenger’s seat,” I said with a nod. “I trust you.”

My cheeks heated, the words just as intimate as the kiss we shared the night before. I turned the engine, ignoring the beaming smile plastered on Trent’s face.

“You trust me?” he asked with a grin.

“Just a little. Really, a minute amount.”

“Still counts.” He reached across the seat, his thumb and forefinger pinching my cheek, letting it go just as fast. “I trust you, too. And we’re still in the hunt to win this thing.”

I brushed away his touch and the tingling sensation it left in its wake. “We’re definitely not winning. Not even close.”

“Top three.”

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