by Erica Ridley
Someone like him.
Hands on the wheel and eyes facing forward, he opened his mouth and sang along with her. He expected his off-key caterwaul to immediately ruin the moment. There was a reason he only sang in the shower and the car, when no one was around to overhear.
But Sarah didn’t even pause. If she noticed anything unmelodic about his voice, she gave no outward sign. Instead, she leaned forward and turned the dash into an impromptu drum kit, pounding along with the rhythm and ending the set by twirling an imaginary drumstick and flinging it in his direction.
He caught it and flung it right back. She pretended to catch it in her teeth and spit it on the floor between them. He cracked up. The music was too loud to even discern the sound of his laughter. It took him an extra beat to realize that he and pretty, kooky Sarah Phimm were drumming beats and clowning to hair metal as if they’d known each other all their lives.
She’d made him laugh. Actually laugh. For the first time since... the hearing.
Javier swallowed. Had it really been that long since he’d laughed? He’d assumed he’d lost all his friends because they’d never really been his friends to begin with. But maybe they weren’t the only ones who had changed.
He’d been fun once, hadn’t he? When was the last time he’d played air guitar or felt completely unselfconscious in front of another person?
Probably not since high school.
He gripped the wheel a little tighter. Yeah, high school. Sophomore year. Sadie Hawkins dance with a stoner girl who wore shoes just like Sarah’s. He’d gone as her date because she’d been brave enough to ask him, and ended up having the most fun he’d had at any school dance, ever. Despite not knowing any of the same moves. As awkward as they were together, she hadn’t seen any reason not to flounder front and center, right in front of the speakers. They’d owned that dance floor.
The next week, he’d turned sixteen and started apprenticing for his father. No more sports, no more dances. No more patchouli-scented girls in reinforced boots. From that birthday on, everything was about making money. Pleasing his father. Starting his own company. Keeping his eye on the bottom line.
Yeah. That’d all turned out great. He’d given up on all of it. And he shouldn’t feel too cozy toward Sarah, either. She was much cooler than anticipated, but even the coolest of chicks had to walk away sometime. And she wouldn’t be back. Neither would he. He’d be... wherever he was needed. He passed through Malibu only a handful of days in the year. The rest of the time, even he didn’t know where he’d be from day to day, week to week.
It was a good thing his father had conditioned him not to count on anyone except himself. Otherwise this dull ache inside his chest might be misinterpreted as loneliness.
He grimaced. Los Rodriguez didn’t get lonely. They didn’t need other people. As his father was fond of telling a much younger Javier, “Right now, you need me, but I don’t need you. And someday, you won’t need me either.” It was a mark of pride. A goal to work toward. The mythical, fantastical state of not needing anyone. Of not caring about anything but success.
By the time his father passed, Javier had learned the lesson far too well.
Was it too late to unlearn it? He glanced over at Sarah. Her face was turned toward the window and he couldn’t see her expression. Maybe she was trying to sleep. He turned the radio down.
Her face swiveled to his, a question in her eyes.
Well, he had her attention. What was the plan now?
“Uh...” His mind went blank. Javier whipped his gaze back to the road and heroically withstood the impulse to face-palm. Dozens of girlfriends, one hundred international takeovers and a billion dollars later, and he’d still somehow managed to revert to the eloquence level of his fifteen-year-old self?
No. He was still Javier Rodriguez, pillar of confidence, nerves of steel.
So why did spending time with Sarah feel so different?
“You wore a Lakers jersey yesterday,” he found himself saying. As far as exposing his deep insights and razor-sharp wit went, it wasn’t much. But maybe it would at least get them talking again.
“Mm,” she answered noncommittally.
True, it hadn’t exactly been a question. And while she’d turned out to actually know the lyrics for the artist’s music featured on her concert tee, the presence of sports paraphernalia often said less about a person’s athletic fanaticism and more about that person’s geography. Are you from Chicago? Then you’ve got a Bears hat somewhere in your closet. Malibu? Sure, maybe the Lakers. Although a jersey still seemed a little more meaningful than a ball cap.
“You like basketball?” he tried again.
Her eyes widened as if she’d never considered the possibility before in her life.
“I’m familiar with it,” she answered hesitantly, as if it might’ve been a trick question.
And, honestly. Wasn’t it? Hadn’t part of him been waiting for her to say she did, just so he could test her with pedantic trivia to prove she wasn’t a real fan? Classy. But now that he’d called himself out on his dickishness, he might as well carry it through.
“Do you have a jersey because you actually like the Lakers, or do you have a Lakers jersey just because they’re from California?”
She wrinkled her nose at him as if he’d lost his mind. “They’re not ‘from California,’” she said in disbelief, as if he’d suggested Santa Claus lived in the tropics. “The Lakers were the old Detroit Gems, relocated to Minneapolis. They picked their new name in honor of Minnesota’s ten thousand lakes. The team didn’t move to LA until 1960.”
He stared at her. Speechless. Words utterly and completely failed him.
“They’re not ‘from California,’” she repeated stubbornly and lifted her chin in the air.
“Marry me.”
“What?” She reared back in nothing short of full-on horror.
He shrugged winningly. “I always said I’d marry the first girl who gave me that answer.”
“You’ve never said that in your entire life!”
“Well, I thought it plenty of times. Is that a no?”
“It’s a ‘you’re crazy,’” she stammered.
He gave a slow smile. “Crazy in a good way?”
“Crazy like Elgin Baylor scoring sixty-one points in a playoff game and keeping the record for fifty years.”
“So, crazy-awesome then. I’ll take it.”
“You oughtta take your meds,” she muttered under her breath.
Once again, Javier had to grip the wheel to stop himself from laughing. He’d twice made People magazine’s list of “50 Most Eligible Bachelors” and he’d just gotten shot down by a Santana fan in a peasant skirt.
He slid another look her way. She was something else.
With or without a plastic cupcake on her head, Sarah was undeniably pretty. Naturally lovely, not a cosmetically altered Barbie clone. Eccentric, sure, but with a big heart. Why else would she give a guy a ride to the middle of nowhere in her factory-condition SUV?
She was refreshingly... real. He’d spent his adult life knowing everyone in his private world feared him, and then the past few years knowing the entire world would be better off hating him. He hadn’t been able to be “just Javier” in... well, in a long time.
If ever.
And yet here, with her, he was singing off-key and playing air drums and poking fun at himself and having one of the best afternoons in years.
Crap. Afternoon. Already the sunlight was growing dim. He glanced down at the odometer. They were almost to the river. Playtime was over. As soon as she saw the village—or lack thereof—Sarah would be on her way. Anybody would. He couldn’t blame her. He was still humbled she’d allowed him to take up this much of her time.
The most important lesson he’d ever learned was not to get attached.
Chapter 4
Sarah stopped drumming a microsecond before the SUV tires skidded to a stop. Not that they’d been clipping along at a speedy pace to begin wit
h. They couldn’t.
Over the past several kilometers, the pothole-sprinkled paved road had given way to a gravel road, which had given way to a dirt road, which had given way to a mud path, which had led them to what had possibly once been a fairly serviceable bridge.
For, like, horses. Or foot traffic. Maybe.
It was barely wider than the SUV. The sides might have concrete supports under the layers of caked-on dirt and mud, but the bottom consisted solely of wooden slats. Moldered slats. Broken slats. Sections of no slats at all, where, forty feet below, wicked currents churned over layers of jagged rock.
Javier put the SUV back into gear.
“What are you doing?” Sarah squeaked.
But she already knew. This? This was why Javier Rodriguez needed a keeper. When he had a goal, every ounce of his concentration, every cell in his body, laser-focused on achieving that goal. He never knew defeat because he never acknowledged opposition, much less setbacks. And he certainly wasn’t going to let a mere death trap stand in the way of him and some no-name village in the middle of nowhere.
“I’m driving across,” Javier answered reasonably, as if anyone in their right mind would’ve come to the same decision. “We can’t abandon your car. The village is on the other side of this river. Driving across makes the most sense.”
“Absolutely not,” Sarah said flatly.
His eyebrows rose as if he were honestly shocked that in her world, respect for one’s life outweighed foolhardy hero-complex risks.
“What’s your—Oh.” His eyebrows lowered and he nodded in belated understanding. “Your car. Right.” He shifted back into neutral and set the parking brake. “Thanks so much for taking me this far. I really appreciate it. Let me give you some money to cover the detailing and probably a new pair of shocks...”
Sarah tilted her face heavenward but the only illumination was the dome light. She didn’t care about the car. She cared about his freaking life. Why was her job so hard?
He’d finally given her the opening she’d been looking for, in terms of disappearing without suspicion, and she couldn’t even take it. Firstly because she’d never driven anything. Sure, she’d been right next to him during Drivers’ Ed and pretty much every second of rush hour traffic since. But she’d witnessed enough first-time driver mishaps to know there was no chance of her pulling off a successful three-point turn… on sloped mud… in an unfamiliar stick-shift behemoth… and navigating out of sight without raising suspicion or totaling the stupid thing worse than the bridge was likely to do.
And the bridge! As long as she stayed glued to his side, she could ensure the bridge would last another day. If she drove off, she wouldn’t be there to save him from rapids or pit vipers or food poisoning. Javier could find trouble in seconds. Even if she managed to drive away semi-competently and ditch the car around the first curve, that was more than enough time for a man who thought this was a good idea to get into a lot more trouble.
“Drive.”
His fingers froze on his open wallet. “What?”
“Drive,” she repeated, gesturing toward the dilapidated bridge in defeat. “But I’m going on record as saying this is a terrible idea, and you have to stop risking your life on the off chance you might be able to help others.”
“Why should I?” His bafflement was genuine, damn him. “My life doesn’t have any more value than anyone else’s. Have you checked Twitter lately? Some would say my life doesn’t have any value at all. But here I am. I might as well do what I can to make a difference, don’t you think?”
Sarah glared at him in silence. I’ll get fired if you die seemed the wrong response here, as was I’ve been half in love with you for years, so... yeah. Your life matters more to me than a whole village of strangers. They were going to have to agree to disagree.
“Are you driving or not?”
“I’m driving.” He lowered the parking brake and shifted into gear.
The SUV inched across the bridge. Tires slipped, planks groaned and cracked, but Sarah kept it from falling apart.
When they reached the other side, Javier grinned at her as if he’d never had a doubt in the world. But he shot an unnerved glance toward the rearview mirror. “Where’s the department of transportation when you need them? They really ought to fix that bridge.”
Sarah crossed her arms and stared straight ahead. He was right. “They” should. But they wouldn’t, because there was no “they.” The Bolivian government could barely handle what was already on their plate. Which left who? Sarah was contractually prohibited from performing any miracles that removed her focus from her assigned client. And as to other guardian angels in the vicinity? As far as she knew, there weren’t any. The solitary life of a guardian angel wasn’t exactly the most-requested track at Uni.
Javier coaxed the SUV along the increasingly indiscernible path. “Don’t worry so much. I knew the bridge had to be stronger than it looked.” He grinned. “And maybe I’m just lucky.”
She gaped at him as if he’d lost his mind. Maybe he had. That bridge was held together by spit and sunshine. If she hadn’t helped it along, he’d be trapped between a twisted SUV and jagged rocks right now. She was his luck, both good and bad. And she definitely couldn’t trust him to be alone for a second.
He killed the engine when they finally rolled up on the village.
A dozen flimsy, weather-beaten shacks. Rusty tin roofs missing whole sections. A few crops, a few chickens, two cows. That was it. No cars. No stores. Not even a church.
“Perfect.” Javier’s eyes shone.
Sarah sighed. She knew where this was going.
“This is where I’m meant to be,” he continued happily. “These are precisely the people who could use some Christmas spirit.”
“And some roofs,” she muttered.
“Definitely new roofs. And a school! Can you believe there’s no school?”
“Gobsmacked.”
“Come on, let’s go find Alvaro.”
“Yay.” She slid out of her seat, vaporizing every mosquito within a three-yard radius of the car. He was not getting yellow fever before they even grabbed their luggage. If she caught it fast enough, she could zap viruses and germs right out of his bloodstream, but prevention was the best cure.
A handful of cute, barefoot children in ill-fitting clothes bounded up to them, bubbling with rapid-fire Spanish. “Who are you? What are you doing here?”
Javier crouched down to eye level. “We’re looking for a man named Alvaro. Do any of you know Alvaro?”
“Grandfather!” two of the children screamed in unison.
A man whose body seemed twice as old as his face limped over to them. “Buenas tardes.”
“Good afternoon, sir. I was told to ask for you when I arrived.” Javier showed him the paper the schoolteacher had drawn.
The man’s eyes softened. “You’re friends with my daughter? Come. Eat with us. You must spend the night.”
Chicken and rice was straightforward enough, but it was immediately apparent that spending the night would be more problematic. Alvaro’s tiny house could barely offer standing room to its inhabitants. The thin walls shook as thunder rent the air.
Cold rain fell like automatic gunfire against the metal roof, slithering through the cracks and drizzling the two-room interior with a miserable layer of wet. A puddle grew in the middle of the living area. The children curled up around the edges, careful to stay between the growing puddle and the slick slime of the damp walls.
Javier lowered his mouth to Sarah’s ear. “Do you have a tent, by any chance?”
Sarah nodded quickly, closing her eyes as she adjusted the contents of the trunk. If Javier needed a tent, he’d get the most miraculous tent she could muster.
“Sweet.” Javier turned to Alvaro and his wife. “I’m here to fix the roofs in this village. I don’t yet have the supplies, but we do have an extra tent that will keep the children safe and dry until I can do more.”
Sarah hesitated. If the
tent was for this family and not for Javier personally, she wasn’t supposed to share the miracle love. If she followed the letter of her contract, she probably ought to unmiracle the tent and claim she’d forgotten to bring it after all. But it was already in the SUV... And these kids... And that roof...
It wasn’t worth getting fired over and not be able to guard anyone anymore, but if she justified the gray area by claiming a tent for the family would directly affect her assigned subject’s peace of mind—and then was very careful not to stretch any more rules—she might get through her end-of-month review with her title still intact.
Decision made, Sarah led Javier to the trunk and watched his eyes sparkle when he saw the size of the tent.
“This baby will fit everyone! It’s perfect!” In his delight, he gave her a quick, excited hug he probably wouldn’t even remember doing, and launched himself into the task of setting the tent up alongside the shack before the freezing drizzle coalesced into an outright downpour.
Sarah, on the other hand, was perfectly motionless. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe. She could barely even think.
Javier had touched her. Happily. Voluntarily. Consciously.
He might’ve accidentally trod upon one of her feathers a time or two without knowing any different, but this—this! Her heart pounded.
She’d never even dreamed about being hugged. Not by him, not by anybody. Sure, people hugged each other as much in heaven as they did on Earth or among the bureaucracies of Nether-Netherland. But the life of a nonmanagerial guardian angel was a life of unending solitude. Constantly surrounded by throngs of people, including the one you cared the most about in the whole world, but doomed to remain unnoticed and invisible for eternity. No one to talk to, to laugh with, to cry with, to love. Endless loneliness.
Until now.
She’d been hugged. By Javier!
Sarah rubbed her arms and shivered. It had been over in an instant, but she would remember it forever.
