Stolen Chances Read Free Page A

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