Okay, where to next?” Madison asked once they were back in the truck. “The castle ruins. Ever been there?” She shook her head. “I’ve seen it from the overlook, but never actually gone to the ruins.” Even though she’d never visited the ruins, she still knew the story behind the spot. In the early 1900s a businessman from Kansas City visited the area and found it so beautiful he immediately bought 5,000 acres and began construction on a European-style castle. A year later, he was killed in a car accident, and construction stopped, but his sons stepped in and finished the project. Eventually the castle was turned into a hotel, but in the 1940s a fire broke out and gutted the insides. Thirty years later, the area became a state park, including the castle ruins.
“I’ve been to the overlook, too. Grandpa wanted to go a couple of years ago, and I took him. But we didn’t go to the ruins, either. I always think what a sad story surrounds the place. That guy who wanted to live there never got to. It just seems like tragedy went with the place, you know?” She nodded. “Is it a long hike?”
“I think it should only be about half a mile from the parking lot.” He pulled into a space. “Ready?”
“Yep.”
She followed him down a wooded path. “What’s the clue?” He stopped and checked the GPS. “They just get worse and worse,” he said with a grin. “It’s time to stop And get your fill Take your bottle Try not to spill. “
Madison returned his smile. “Okay, obviously we’re looking for water.” The thrill of solving a clue and finding hidden treasure was a lot more fun than she’d expected it to be. Of course, she’d gone through a phase as a child when she wanted to be Nancy Drew.
She glanced at Grant. He concentrated on the trail, glancing every now and then at the GPS. Maybe he had something to do with her sudden change of heart about geocaching, too. He wasn’t as much of a Neanderthal as she’d expected him to be. In fact, if he were to put on a coat and tie and trim his curls a little bit, he could probably fit in anywhere. She quickly pushed the thought out of her mind. He probably didn’t own a tie. And he certainly didn’t seem too interested when she talked about her life in the city.
“Check it out.” He stopped as they came into a clearing. “A water fountain.”
She grinned. “That’s got to be it, don’t you think?”
“Only one way to find out.” He walked over to the fountain and looked around it. “Here it is.” He knelt behind the fountain and pulled out a small box.
“Smile,” she said, holding up her phone and snapping a picture.
Grant opened the box. “Another little plastic castle.” He grinned and dropped a yellow fishing lure in the box.
“You sure do have a lot of those lures.” She raised her eyebrows at him. “Don’t you use them?”
He shrugged and quickly signed the logbook. “I’ve got plenty at home.”
Madison put the box back where it came from. “Oh yeah. I’ve been meaning to ask. Where exactly do you live?”
An unmistakable shadow crossed his face. “Actually, not far from here. I live in a little cabin on the Niangua River. That’s the branch of the Lake of the Ozarks that runs by the park here.”
“Cool. So we’re kind of in your neck of the woods then?” He grinned. “Something like that. A lot of the time when I work as a fishing guide, I like to fish the Niangua. I’ve had a lot of luck there.” He raked his fingers through his hair. “You want to go on to the castle while we’re here? Or would you rather turn back, since we’ve already found the cache?”
“I definitely think we should go to the ruins. I mean, if you want to.” She met his eyes and was struck again by how blue they were.
Grant nodded. “Let’s go.”
They walked side by side toward the looming castle ruins. Just as they reached them, a boom of thunder ricocheted around them.
Madison jumped and grabbed hold of Grant’s arm.
A jagged streak of lightning flashed across the sky, followed by another boom of thunder.
Grant pulled her close. “The rain is coming. I should’ve checked the weather.” He looked around the castle ruins. “Do you want to wait it out here or make a run for it?”
The nearness of him clouded her ability to think straight.
What she wanted right that second was for him to hold on to her and never let go. But that wasn’t an option. “Let’s run.”
He grabbed her hand, and they took off toward the truck just as the bottom fell out of the sky.
Grant let go of her hand so he could unlock the door. He flung it open, and a soaked-to-the-bone Madison jumped in and slid across the seat.
He climbed in behind her and closed the door. The rain pounded so hard against the truck, it sounded like a million tiny hammers. “You okay?” He glanced at her.
Water dripped off of Madison like she’d just climbed out of a swimming pool. She managed a smile. “I kind of need a towel.”
He’d been afraid she would freak out at the prospect of being soaked through. “I’m glad you’re a good sport.” He turned the key, and the truck roared to life. “Let’s go to my place and dry off. Maybe by then the storm will have passed.”
She nodded. “Dry sounds good.”
Grant carefully exited the park. Even with the windshield wipers on high, he could barely see. “It’s not far, I promise.”
Madison flicked water from her arm. “Okay.”
Two turns later, and they were parked in front of his rustic cabin. “You want to sit here and see if it calms down or make another run for it?” he asked.
She grinned. “I see no reason to wait it out now. We look like drowned rats. Besides, all this water might rust out your floorboards right before our very eyes.”
He chuckled. “Smarty-pants.” He got his house key ready and opened the truck door. He took off running toward the door and stuck the key in the lock.
Madison squealed all the way to the door. “Hurry, hurry, hurry!” She raced inside after him and slid when her wet shoes hit the hardwood floor. She grabbed him to steady herself.
Grant instinctively slipped his arms around her. “Whoa.” His face was so close to hers, he could see the water dripping off her eyelashes. He grinned. “Way to make an entrance.”
She laughed. “What can I say, I’m a little dramatic.”
He realized he was still holding on to her and quickly let go. “So welcome to my humble abode.” He waved an arm around the wood-paneled living room.
“It’s … cozy.” She looked around the small room. “Do you have a towel or something?”
“Sure. Hang on a sec.” He went into his bedroom and grabbed a T-shirt and a pair of running shorts out of a drawer. “These will have to do,” he said, walking back in the living room.
She took the clothes and eyed them suspiciously. “Thanks.”
“The bathroom is the second door on the left. There are towels in the cabinet.”
He quickly changed into dry clothes and flipped on the TV to check the weather.
“This is so not my style.” Madison emerged from the bathroom in his T-shirt and shorts, holding her soaked tennis shoes in her hand. Her face had been scrubbed free of makeup, and her wet hair was drying in loose waves.
Grant couldn’t believe his eyes. He’d known she was beautiful all made up and wearing her fancy clothes. But he’d had no idea just how naturally pretty she was. “You look amazing.”
Her cheeks turned pink. “Shut up. I look scary, and you know it.” She put her tennis shoes on the mat next to the door and sat down on the couch.
Grant shook his head. “I’m serious. You always look nice and well put together and all that. But right now you’re on a completely different level.”
She ducked her head and smiled. “Thanks,” she said quietly.
He knew he was playing with fire by telling her what he thought, but he got the feeling she thought she was nothing without her designer clothes and expensive makeup. “So I guess the storm has kind of messed up the day.”
Madison shrugged. “Do you think we really have a shot at winning the treasure hunt anyway? There are some people who are seriously hunting all the time. I looked at the website last night, and there are a couple of groups way ahead of us.”
“I think we make a great team.” He grinned. “Besides, I was looking over the rules. Maybe we’ll find that Rainbow’s End geocoin thing. It would give us extra points.”
She looked at him blankly.
Grant chuckled. “I take it you didn’t read the rules?”
She made a face. “I sort of relied on Brook for that. Sorry if that makes me a loser teammate.”
“Hey … don’t talk about my partner like that.” He grinned. “The deal with the coin is that you get five points if you find it. And you can either keep it and prevent anyone else from finding it or turn it in at the church, and it will be rehidden.”
“You can do either one?”
“Yep.” He raised an eyebrow. “Which would you want to do? Provided we found it.”
Madison sighed. “I’d probably turn it in.” “Look how nice you are.”
She shook her head. “Not really. I was actually thinking that maybe we’d end up finding it again and getting even more points.”
He burst out laughing. “You’re so cutthroat.” She shrugged. “Just makes good sense to me.” He met her gaze. “You know what doesn’t make sense to me?”
“What’s that?” Madison turned toward him on the couch.
“Why are you in such a hurry to leave here? What is it about home that you can’t stand?”
Her eyes widened in surprise. “Wow. Right for the personal questions, huh?”
Grant raked his fingers through his wet curls. “Better than just sitting here watching it rain.” He looked at her seriously. “Besides, I really want to know.”
Madison twirled a damp strand of hair. “It’s not that I can’t stand home. It’s that it makes me so unbelievably sad to be here, that I like to stay as far away as I can.”
Grant listened as she explained her mother’s illness and her daddy’s downward spiral. By the end of her story, he wanted more than anything to pull her into his arms and promise her the rest of her life wouldn’t be as traumatic. Except he knew from experience that no matter how well you thought you had your life planned, sometimes things didn’t quite work out that way. “I’m so sorry. What about now? You visited your dad. Did that go well?”
“He needs a kidney transplant. No one in the family is an acceptable donor.” She met his gaze. “I’m his last shot.”
“Are you a match?”
She sighed. “I’m not sure yet. He doesn’t want me to even consider it.” She shook her head. “But even though he wasn’t always the man I needed him to be, I don’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t at least give it a shot.”
“That’s a lot to deal with, huh?” He could see the pain in her eyes.
“I’ve been consumed by anger toward him for so many years. But now … I guess I have a new perspective.”
He reached over and rubbed her shoulder. “You’ll figure it out.”
She gave him a tiny smile. “I hope so. I’ve been praying about it a lot.”
“Sometimes that’s the only thing you can do.”