The Bad Boy's Redemption (5 page)

Daisy sniffed as she reached into the coffin for a water bottle. “When you have four older brothers, cheating is the only way a youngest sibling has a chance. I regret nothing.”

“I thought marines were supposed to be honorable,” Olivia teased as she and Colt began to stretch out. “Isn’t playing dirty against your code?”

“Well, I wasn’t a marine back then,” he said tugging his arm across his body. “And I don’t think the honor code applies to games played with your family members. As long as there isn’t money involved, anyway.”

“Don’t trust him,” Daisy warned. “He cheats at poker, too. He took a hundred of my pennies last time we played.”

Olivia was about to insist they get in on the poker game tomorrow at the Brodys’ annual Christmas Eve party when a deep voice came over the loudspeaker. “Good morning racers!”

The greeting was met with a round of rowdy whooping and cheers from the people assembled behind the starting line. “I see a lot of familiar faces out there and some fresh meat, too,” the announcer said, amusement in his voice.

Hal Harper had been emceeing the coffin race since Olivia was a little girl and clearly enjoyed his pride of place at a small desk at the top of the bleachers set up on the courthouse lawn.

“Welcome to the twenty-first annual Lover’s Leap coffin race,” Hal continued. “Looks like we’re going to have beautiful weather for race time today. I’ve just got a few things to run over with you and we’ll get ready to go. First up, no running anyone over. If someone falls down, please go around them.”

The crowd tittered in response and Olivia turned to squeeze Colt’s hand, nervous the way she always was before a race, even one that didn’t involve zombies chasing her across the finish line.

“Secondly, this isn’t bumper coffins, it’s a coffin race,” Hal said. “That means there should be no contact between vehicles or racers. If we see any unnecessary roughness, you will be disqualified and banned from the beer tent for the rest of the day.”

A serious murmur met those words, confirming Olivia’s suspicion that a lot of the racers had already been partaking and intended to continue hitting the microbrewery vendors after the race was through.

“Lastly, remember to have fun. That’s what we’re here for and the whole point of our festival. As the Frozen Dead Dude reminds us every year, life is short so play hard, play often, and always drink good beer.” Hal paused for a round of applause to die down before adding, “We’ll get started in about five minutes. Racers, get your coffins loaded!”

Olivia turned back to Colt and Daisy, bouncing on her toes. “Okay, we ready for this?”

“I was born ready.” Daisy wrapped her fingers around the handlebar on her side of the coffin. “We’ll hold the coffin steady while you climb in Colt.”

Colt reached in, tucking the water bottles rolling around in the bottom of the coffin off to one side before climbing in, wincing as the coffin creaked beneath his weight. “Are we sure I’m not going to break this?”

“Dylan has at least fifty pounds on you and he didn’t break the coffin last year,” Daisy said. “Don’t worry. You’ll be fine.”

Olivia chuckled before leaning in, pressing an impulsive kiss to his cheek.

He turned to her with a grin. “What’s that for?”

“Just because,” she said, helping Daisy push the coffin closer to the starting line. “You look cute all wadded up in there.”

“Oh man, you’re making the girls push you first?” One of the frat boys laughed good-naturedly as the Grim Peeper pulled up behind his crew. “You’re going to get lapped before you make it around the first turn, man.”

“Dude, he’s got a thing,” one of his brothers added in a whisper everyone in a ten-foot radius could hear, casting a pointed glance at Colt’s prosthetic.

“These ladies are my secret weapon,” Colt said, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder at Olivia. “Especially this one. Don’t let the pigtails fool you. She’s fierce.”

Olivia forced a smile for the other men but was grateful when they turned back around to focus on their own team. She didn’t know which bothered her more—the insinuation that she and Daisy were automatically going to be slow because they were female or the pitying looks in the frat boys’ eyes when they looked at Colt. Colt was probably ten times faster than either of them and hardly deserving of anyone’s pity.

Empathy and appreciation for the sacrifice he’d made, yes. Pity, hell no.

Thankfully, before Olivia could dwell on annoying college boys for too long, the mayor climbed up onto the platform set up near the bleachers and lifted the Frozen Dead Dude flag above her head. She turned, giving Hal a thumbs-up.

“Okay, racers, when the flag drops, get ready to roll,” Hal said. “Remember, you must make three circuits of the track and each member of your team
must
ride around in the coffin for one complete lap. No cheating. You will be watched and cheaters disqualified and pelted with snowballs. Now get ready, on your mark, get set…”

The flag dropped and Hal’s “Go!” was drowned out by the sound of fifty coffins launching into motion.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Olivia

Daisy shouted a battle cry from the other side of Colt as they took off hard, the rattle of wheels and the slap of feet on the pavement rising all around them. Olivia dug in and pushed, leaning so hard on her handle that she was running with her body at a forty-five-degree angle, her toes digging into the asphalt as she and Daisy shot forward.

She kept her eyes on the road ahead of them, not daring to shift her focus until they had pulled past the three blind mice and swerved around the first group of red-shirted frat boys. Only when she could hear the majority of the racers trundling along behind them, did she turn her head, taking in the competition.

The frat boys in the blue shirts were out in front of them, along with the LLPD’s championship team, a male and female team from the cross-country club, and burly out-of-towners who looked like they might do some lumberjacking in their spare time. But the others weren’t that far ahead and the lumberjacks were already slowing after a gung-ho start. She and Daisy were holding their own, Daisy making up for her lack of training with sheer, stubborn Brody determination.

They crossed the starting line the first time only seconds behind the other leading teams and Colt vaulted out of the coffin. Before Olivia could make a move, Colt had swung her up in his arms, deposited her in his place, and was urging Daisy on as they pulled out for a second lap.

Olivia clung to the sides of the rattling wooden crate, concentrating on catching her breath as Colt and Daisy careened down the road, taking her up to a much faster cruising speed than she and Daisy had managed the first time around. By the time they rounded the first corner—on two wheels, making Olivia squeal and squeeze her eyes shut until she felt the coffin steady beneath her—they were even with the blue-shirted frat boys and hot on the heels of the LLPD and cross-country teams.

During the next straight stretch, Colt and Daisy poured on the speed, pulling ahead of the frat boys and passing the cross-country team on their right. By the time they reached the starting line again, they were grinding to a stop right beside the LLPD.

But the policemen already had their third man in position and were poised to take off.

“Arms, Liv,” Colt barked. Olivia held out her arms and Colt worked his magic again—swooping her out of the coffin before plucking Daisy up and dropping her in.

“Go, go, go!” Daisy shouted, panting like she was about to pass out as Colt and Olivia launched into motion.

Olivia dug her toes in hard but pushing Daisy was so much easier than pushing Colt. She and Colt sprinted down the road toward the first turn, moving so fast that Daisy bounced up and down in the coffin as she breathlessly shouted encouragement to her teammates and abuse to the police officers barely three feet ahead.

“Gotta slow on the turn,” Colt panted. “Or she’ll tip over.”

“Got it,” Olivia said, pulling back as they neared the turn and holding tight to her handlebar as it tried to jerk up into the air.

This was it. They couldn’t take a turn any faster. That meant they had to pull ahead of the LLPD team on the next straight stretch or they didn’t have a chance.

“Go, go, go!” Daisy cheered as they hit the straight stretch. “Give it everything you’ve got!”

Olivia and Colt poured it on, moving so fast Olivia couldn’t think of anything but sucking in her next breath. Her knees trembled and her legs started to feel loose in her hip joints, but still she pushed harder, the sight of swiftly moving legs sliding past in her peripheral vision enough to keep her going. They reached the turn a good six feet ahead of the LLPD team and Olivia dug her heels in, skidding along on the backs of her shoes, keeping the coffin from tipping over on her side as Colt kept them steady around the turn.

As soon as the left wheels hit the ground again, they were off, straining toward the finish line, crossing over in first place with three seconds to spare.

“Yes!” Olivia lifted one fist into the air as she hauled on the handlebar with the other, helping Colt pull Daisy to a stop. “Victory!” she gasped. “Is. Ours!”

“That’s what I’m talking about!” A panting Colt swept her up into his arms, twirling her around with a growl as he hugged her hard enough to make her spine crack. “You’re amazing.”

Olivia laughed, so happy and high on victory that she didn’t think to be self-conscious when Colt kissed her on the lips. It was a quick kiss—they were both breathing too hard for anything else—and a second later, Colt had Daisy swept up in an equally fierce hug.

But still. He’d kissed her. In front of half the town.

That meant something. It meant that “seeing where things go” had become “public displays of affection in front of their friends and family.”

So maybe, just maybe, by the time Colt was cleared to return to duty, he would have decided there was something in Lover’s Leap worth staying for. Look how far they’d come in just a few days.

At this rate, by February they’d be engaged.

The thought made Olivia’s face flush even hotter as Colt drew her under one arm and Daisy under another, posing for a picture as Hal read their names over the loudspeaker, congratulating them on breaking the LLPD’s five-year winning streak.

CHAPTER NINE

Olivia

Engaged to Colt.

It was the stuff of her girlhood fantasies, but it was quickly starting to feel like an inevitable eventuality.

That’s what you did when you fell in love like this. You promised to spend your life together and did your damnedest to live happily ever after.

“This is fucking bullshit!” an angry male voice growled from near the starting line, breaking through her rosy, post-race, love-induced glow.

Olivia turned in time to see the frat boy who had pointed out Colt’s prosthetic shoving one of his teammates. The blond man’s pale face was bright red and his eyes swollen from the run, but instead of taking a rest he was taking his frustration out on his friends.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he continued. “How can you even call yourself a brother?”

“Relax, man.” His friend lifted his hands into the air, a shocked, embarrassed expression on his face. “It’s just a race.”

“A race we lost because you drank too much last night,” the red-faced man continued. “We got beat by a gimp with one fucking leg and two little girls, Dawson. How is anything about that okay?”

Before Olivia could think twice, she was storming across the pavement, quickly closing the distance between her and the man-child with the anger management issues.

“You should leave,” she said, stopping directly in front of him and pointing a finger back toward the highway. “Now. We don’t like men without manners in this town and anyone who would call a hero who lost his leg in service to his country a gimp doesn’t belong in decent company.”

The man had the nerve to roll his eyes. “Whatever, bitch.”

“You should leave.” Colt’s deep voice came from behind her a second before his arm went around her waist, pulling her back against him. “I’m not inclined to fight you for my own sake, but if you call my girl any more ugly names, we’re going to have a problem.”

“Come on, Chris. Let’s get out of here.” The boy’s friend touched Angry Jerk’s elbow, but the other man pulled away with a rough jerk of his arm.

“Joining the military doesn’t make you a hero,” Angry Jerk said, swiping the back of his hand across his nose. “It makes you an idiot too dumb to go to college. So what if you lost your leg? It’s your own damned fault.”

Colt’s arm tightened around her, lifting her off her feet before she could lunge for the idiot.

And she
had
been in mid-lunge, there was no doubt about it.

The violence of her response shocked her.

She had never physically attacked another person in her life, but the urge to get her claws into this punk was like lightning running through her veins. She had never been so angry in her entire life. How dare he talk to Colt that way, after everything he had been through and how hard he’d worked to take care of the people he’d promised to protect, both when he was in the service and back here at home?

“You wouldn’t know a hero if he came up and punched you in the face,” she spat. “And I bet you have the smallest penis in the entire world or you wouldn’t be such a clueless, classless, life-sized prick.”