And I can remember his responding happy grin.
Warmth hits me as we finally move our fingers back.
“I wasn’t talking aboutThe Goonies,” I say finally. “I was talking about that show on Netflix about those kids who were looking for gold.”
“You’re going to have to give me more than that.”
“Outer Banks. You didn’t watch it?”
“Outerwhat?”
The expression on his face tells me he’s never heard of the show, and I vow then and there that I will make him watch it with me. A twinge of despondency hits me when I realize it will likely have to be over the phone. We don’t have enough time with all the festivities to watch the show in its entirety. Not if we want to sleep.
“Outer Banks. It’s set in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, and it’s about these kids?—”
“You’ll have to tell me another time.” He frowns as he looks at his watch and jumps up. “We should get going. Sorry, I have a call in an hour. Let’s go to your place first. I’ll have a look, and then I’ll head to Salty Sirens. They still have that spot in the back to work in quiet, right? I can’t miss this call.”
He pulls his phone out and starts typing something rapidly. I’ve lost his attention.
“You have a call in an hour, Luke? Really? This is your first day here.”
I’m annoyed. We haven’t even finished discussing the treasure hunt clue.
“Technically, it’s my second.” He looks up from his phone. “You’re headed to work today as well, right? We’ll both get shit done.”
“I know, but I’m not on vacation. I live in Coconut Beach.”
“And I used to live on the island too.”
“But you’re on holiday, Luke. You haven’t been back home in ages. We haven’t spent real time together in years. I thought you’d want to see what I do at the bookmobile, catch up with Juni in a meaningful way, check out our old spots again.”
“I wish I could, but I still have a job.” His voice sounds pained. “I’m working on a really big deal, Mi-Mi. This is the deal of my life. I close this, and I am officially a big deal. I close this, and I can show everyone that I?—”
“I know,” I sigh as I cut him off.
I don’t want to continuously go on about him having to work, but I really wanted to spend some quality time with him. I wanted him to say that he’d left his job back in the city and was once again on island time. I just wanted us to hang out by the beach. I wanted him to sell books with me. I wanted him to take me up on the offer of finding him a romance book. I wanted us to read steamy romance scenes togetherand laugh at some of the crazy sex positions that authors wrote about. I just wanted to spend time with him in person, doing nothing and everything. And more than that, I wanted him to want that as well. But I overestimated his ability to walk away from his job for even a day.
“So, this looks like an old map of Coconut Beach,” he says, his eyes narrowed as he holds up the card. “Notice that the mark appears to be the waterfalls at Hidden Cove.”
He points to the right of the card, and I nod. He’s good at changing the subject when he doesn’t want to argue or is just ready to move on from a topic. It irritates the heck out of me, but I don’t want to argue with him. Plus, I’m not sure if I’m being unreasonable or not.
“Where the bigXis?”
“Yes, and you notice there’s a number one, two, three, and four on the map?”
I grab the card from him again and survey it. “I didn’t before, but now I do. What do you think it means?”
“I think it means that we go in order. We have to find whatever’s at number one first, and I think it will give us a clue how to get to number two.”
“But how do we find where number one is?”
“That I don’t know.” He shakes his head. “I’m curious who sent this to you though.”
“Do you think I should even bother trying to figure it out or just forget it, seeing as we’re already super busy?”
“No, we have to do it. We’ve always loved a challenge. It’s fun, right? Plus, we have two weeks. We’ll find the treasure.”
“Yeah, that would be cool.” I don’t remind him that he was always the one that loved a challenge and I was the one who just went along with them because our adventures were always fun. Being with Luke was always exciting and we always had each other laughing. Our temperaments just seemed to fit each other. “I mean, if you can take time away from your job.”
