Page 53 of Dotted Lines (Runaway 5)

“Great. She just had a baby. She’s married to my boss, Brody. They live next door so we can invade each other’s privacy on a regular basis.”

“Good for her.” I leaned forward and put my elbows to my knees. “Okay, I was going to go for small talk, but the curiosity is killing me. How are you here?”

She stretched for her coffee mug. “Like I said. Londyn. That’s the short answer.”

“Londyn.” Another name. Another memory. “I’m going to need more than that.”

Clara laughed and shifted in her seat, crossing a leg over the other. She moved with such elegance. It was something I’d always noticed. She was graceful, like a dancer who’d missed out on dance lessons, but the talent didn’t need instruction because it was in her bones. If anything, time seemed to have only accentuated her poise.

“Londyn hauled the car to Boston and had it restored,” she said.

“But she didn’t keep it?”

Clara shook her head. “She wants you to have it.”

“Me?” My jaw hit the area rug beneath the couch. “Seriously? Why?”

“Because it was yours too. That was the reason she gave me. But I think because she doesn’t need it anymore. She found what she was looking for.”

“Is she happy?”

Clara smiled. “She is. She lives in West Virginia with her husband. Has a couple of cute little kids.”

Something inside me clicked. A piece snapped into place. A worry disappeared. For many, many years I’d wondered what had happened to Londyn. To Clara. To the rest of our junkyard crew. I hadn’t had the courage to seek them out. Maybe I’d been too afraid of what I’d find. But knowing Londyn was happy was a balm to the soul.

“Good. You’ve seen her?”

“Just on our virtual chats. We have them every month or so. It started as a book club but we rarely discuss books. Mostly we talk. Catch up on the years we missed. The chats are a fairly recent thing. Ever since the Cadillac started its trip across the country.”

Another string of questions zipped through my mind but rather than blurt them in rapid succession, I picked up my coffee and settled into the couch. “I think you’d better give me the long answer now.”

She laughed. “We might need more coffee.”

“For you? I’ll make all the pots in the world. I also have lemonade with lots and lots of ice.”

“You remember that too?”

Everything. “I remember everything.”

An hour later, I stared at Clara in amazement. There was no other word for her story. It was simply amazing.

“Handoffs. That’s . . . damn, that’s cool.”

“Right?” She’d been smiling for nearly the entire hour we’d talked. With every twist and turn of the Cadillac’s journey across the country, her smile seemed to widen.

And I kept on drowning, sinking deeper and deeper into those twinkling eyes and breathtaking smile.

“So Londyn’s in West Virginia,” I said. “Gemma and Kat in Montana. And you and Aria in Arizona.”

“Yep.” She nodded. “I don’t know if we would have come together again without that Cadillac. Maybe. I guess I like to hope so. But it’s been the catalyst. All because Londyn wants you to have it.”

“But I can’t take it.” I shook my head. “That car must have cost her a small fortune.”

“She doesn’t care about the money. She wants you to have it. You deserve that car. You were the one who made it safe for us to live at Lou’s. You stayed. You protected us.”

“It’s too much.”

“No, it’s not enough.” She shook her head. “Besides, I’m not taking it with me when we go home. And after you spend an hour or two behind the wheel, you’ll never let it go.”