“I do! Flossie is in the car waiting for us. Shall we put your squirrel costume in with Flossie?”
“Yes,” Sam chirped.
Wendy helped Sam to carry his costume to her rattletrap, and they got in and buckled up. Then, holding her breath as usual, she turned the key.
The engine went RAWR-RAWR, and stopped.
She tapped the gas lightly. Not too much, lest it flood. Turn the key. RAWR.
No. No. NO. It had been fine earlier. It had plenty of gas.
“Mom?”
She drew a deep breath. “It’s okay, darling. Just a bit cranky.”
“Pater says…”
She turned the key again, hoping to drown out whatever poison Bill had poured into Sam’s innocent ears.
RAWR-RAWR…R-R-Rrrrrrrr. *klunk*
Klunkwas never a good sign.
She smacked the steering wheel, teeth clenched against the words she wanted to spew. One more try, and this time, nothing happened.
She drew a deep breath. A ride…did she have enough in her checking account for a Lyft? She pulled her phone out to check on the price, and stared at the app. No ride for twenty minutes. Of course. Now was the time when people were going home from work. There were not a lot of drivers in sleepy little Playa del Encanto. This was the busiest time of day.
Twenty minutes before a car would even show up? And Eve was gone. Lily was home, but she did not have a car—
“Mom?”
She leaned her forehead on the wheel, then heard a light tapping sound. Was that Sam? No, Sam was in the back seat, his face pale as a ghost.
Another tap—at her window. She turned her head, to find Alejo outside her car, smiling. He made a cranking motion.
Wendy opened the car door.
“Need a hand?” he asked.
“Sorry, I think the battery is dead. Or the starter, or both.”
“I thought I heard engine trouble.” Alejo pointed behind him; beyond the wisteria-covered wall lay the terrace, and beyond that, his guestroom. “Need a ride?”
“Oh, no, we’ll figure something out. I couldn’t possibly impose.”
“No imposition. I’ve got absolutely nothing to do. Be happy to help.”
“We couldn’t,” Wendy forced herself to say, though she could feel Sam’s anxiety climbing as his eyes bored into the back of her head.
“Put it like this, if Godiva heard I wasn’t a knight in shining armor in an emergency, what do you think she’d do to me? It might involve spoons, and not in a good way.”
Despite the situation, Wendy spluttered a laugh. That sounded just like Godiva.
He grinned, bowing grandly as he pointed to the pickup. “Hop in!”
Wendy turned to Sam, who had already unfastened his seatbelt.
“Well, if it wasn’t a total emergency,” Wendy said. “This school function is really important to Sam, and I’m afraid that we’ll be late if I call for a car…” She kept on apologizing and thanking him nervously as they got into his big truck, which had a back seat. She set Flossie at her feet, and wrapped her arms around Sam’s squirrel costume.
