2. Alex
2
ALEX
“ E arth to Roth. Come in, Roth?”
I glance up from my computer screen as a sheet of paper waves in my face, and I blink in confusion, the rest of the precinct coming into view around me. I cock my head and stare at the chief uncomprehendingly, waiting for context. He grins at me from the front of my desk.
“What do you say?” he prompts, and I realize he asked me a question I didn’t hear.
“Sorry, what?” I ask, pushing the keyboard back to peer at him quizzically.
My mind had been so fixed on the report in front of me, I blocked out the noise of the station around me entirely. As everything comes into view now, I see the papers litter every other desk in the station house, too, not just mine. But no one is paying much attention to the flyers on their desks, making me believe there’s a specific reason I’m being targeted this morning. My eyes narrow suspiciously, alarm bells sounding gently in the back of my mind.
“Can you do this?” He sets the page in front of me. My eyes shoot toward the writing on the page, and I snicker, thinking it’s a joke.
Christmas Scavenger Hunt
Volunteers and Participants Needed Immediately for Friday Morning!
But when I look back up at my boss, he’s still staring at me intently. My grin fades. “Oh. You’re serious,” I realize.
He bobs his head. “It'll show folks we're part of the community too, here to celebrate and keep an eye out in a friendly way.”
I blink again and look back down at the flyer. “Okay…?” I intone slowly. “Why are you looking at me?”
The chief rolls his eyes like I’ve asked a dumb question, and I smother my annoyance, already sensing the answer before he speaks. It was a dumb question.
“It’s not like Holly Ridge is in the throes of a crime spree, and…” He clears his throat delicately, glancing around covertly as my neck stiffens, waiting for the other shoe. “You don’t have much in the way of family obligations, do you? You’re kind of the perfect volunteer for it.”
I bristle. “And the fact that I don’t want to do it?” I retort sharply. Immediately, I regret my words, but his statement strikes a nerve.
The chief is nonplussed by my sentiment and shrugs nonchalantly. “It’s for the community. And there aren’t very many of us.” He spins around as if that ends the discussion.
And it does, really. My superior has spoken, and I don’t really have a say to the contrary. He’s not wrong about the family obligations. It’s not like Mom and Dad will be commanding my time on the weekend of the festival.
The chief wanders off, leaving me irritated as my partner slides her chair toward me, bemused by the exchange she undoubtedly overheard. I’m sure half the station did.
“You should have had a kid,” Catalina taunts me, snatching up the discarded flyer to read. “It’s a good excuse to keep you from attending these kinds of things.”
“I’m pretty sure I’m missing a step before that,” I remark dryly. “Like getting a girlfriend, maybe a wife?”
She laughs and scans the notice in her hands. “This doesn’t look so bad.”
“Then you do it,” I grumble, turning back to my work.
Catalina snorts. “Rest assured, I’ll be at the festival with my in-laws and mother, hearing about how I’m not holding the baby properly, or feeding her right, or enough, or whatever else people like to lecture new moms about. Be glad you only got roped into a scavenger hunt.”
She grins and slides back toward her workstation, leaving me tapping my foot under my desk with jittery anticipation. This isn’t the first time I’ve drawn the short straw in a community event because I’m the one without a partner or kids.
But complaining is futile.
It’s not that I mind doing my community service. Obviously. I’m a police officer, after all. But the idea of spending the weekend paired up with a virtual stranger when I’d rather be home reading or playing online Scrabble is hardly appealing. I suppose I should focus on the overtime hours, but they don’t really outweigh the cons.
Mom and Dad will be there, too.
The thought makes me shudder slightly, their reproving eyes watching me as I… what? Awkwardly hop through a potato sack? Scour for hidden Santas in the dog park? I can already see their haughty gazes as they wander through the festival, shaking their heads as they silently compare my life choices to those of my brothers.
I can almost hear them now.
“Are you doing this for the overtime hours, dear? Is money tight?”
Gritting my teeth, I try to ignore the page that seems to grow larger beside me on the desk. I wish the chief had taken it with him when he left.
Maybe my brothers got it right. Maybe I should have left this town a long time ago, just like they did. I could have been a cop anywhere in the country. Why did I stay?
Thanksgiving comes and goes, and now it’s the Friday of the annual Holly Ridge Christmas Festival. I tried a couple more times to get out of volunteering , but it was no use.
By the time I reached out to Edna, she already had plenty of volunteers. Still, my boss insisted I take part in the scavenger hunt to foster goodwill between the Holly Ridge residents and the police force.
The scene before me is even worse than I imagined. The entrance to Holly Ridge Park is fully blocked, a line of bodies milling around the wrought-iron gates as I near, excited chatter reaching my ears even before I can see the sign-in table.
Don’t these people have jobs? It’s Friday morning!
I can’t believe how many people have turned out for the scavenger hunt.
“…paired up with whoever I want!” a squeaky teenage voice protests as I draw closer.
“You are,” Edna Monroe intones from somewhere between them. “But you need to wait for the volunteers to pair some people up. Just sit over there and find something to do until we’re ready. Maybe catch up on all that staring at your screen you’re behind on.”
“Who am I being paired up with?” another person demands, and Edna just rolls her eyes in response.
This is already going well, I muse, weaving my way toward the gate. A town worker ties red bows to the finials, and another hangs a sign announcing the Christmas Festival’s commencement for later this afternoon.
A flash of silken dark hair catches my peripheral vision, and a semi-familiar voice rings out over the group.
“Guys!” A hand clap follows the firm but pleasant call. “We’re trying to get organized here. Why don’t we all take a breath, okay?”
My head cocks back toward the speaker, and my breath catches as they rest on the shocking blue of Quinn Tanner’s irises. Her full lips curl into a patient smile as she rests her hip on the side of the folding table next to the park entrance. “Why don’t we listen to what Mrs. Monroe is saying before you jump all over her? I’m sure if you quiet down for a second and listen, it will all make a lot of sense. We are all here to have fun, remember?”
Begrudgingly, the crowd bows their collective heads apologetically, and I quirk a smile at the elementary school teacher, who scans the group approvingly. “This is new to all of us, so let’s take it step by step, okay?” Quinn continues. She turns to Edna. “Go ahead, Mrs. Monroe.”
Edna gazes at Quinn bemusedly, one of her trusty dogs raising his floppy head in tandem from his spot by her feet. “Why, thank you, Ms. Tanner. Whatever would I have done without those exceedingly large lungs of yours?”
Quinn flushes and straightens herself, smoothing out the front of her stylish red coat with her oversized mittens, giant white snowflake stitched on the front of each. As if she feels my eyes on her, she raises her long lashes and sets her gaze on me, her smile dissipating immediately.
Why does she always look at me like that?
Her head swivels back to Edna, who continues to explain the rules of the scavenger hunt.
“As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted by the lot of you,” the elderly woman says, rising from her plastic chair to splay her own mittened hand over the surface of her sign-up table. Her crystalline eyes blaze against her porcelain skin and the silver of her hair. She’s always reminded me of a mean Mrs. Claus. “The rules of the scavenger hunt are simple. You are supposed to work in teams. Some of you formed your own teams, and some of you chose to be paired up to meet new people in the community. Ms. Tanner here will hand out what you need.”
“But when do we find out?—”
“I’m not finished!” Edna cracks out. The speaker immediately shuts their mouth, and she continues. “We are pairing up people without partners now. Ms. Tanner has the list I put together.”
Sometimes it’s hard to believe that Edna Monroe is as old as she is. She’s a tough character, filled with spunk and sass, yet she’s been the same relic since I was a kid. It’s almost as if time preserved her at… sixty-five? Sixty-seven? I have no idea. But she’s always been the same age to me.
She turns to Quinn. “Ms. Tanner, please hand out the directions to everyone. Everyone who doesn’t have a team, come see me. If you haven’t registered your team, come see me. And adults, stay with your children.”
Edna thrusts a stack of paper at the younger woman, and Quinn immediately gets to work, handing out the directions to start the event.
Edna prattles on. “Each team will start in a different section of the park, looking for the allotted clues within a set time frame. They may only move on to the next section when every clue in their section has been solved. Any questions so far?”
A dozen hands shoot up, and Edna releases a dramatic sigh. “Of course there are,” she grumbles. “And I’ll bet that I already answered half of them.”
I’m distracted as Quinn approaches me, and I miss the litany of queries fired off at Edna. I offer the schoolteacher another grin. “Hey—” I start to say, but my greeting is cut off curtly.
“We’re paired together,” Quinn interjects before I can finish my sentence, her tone completely flat.
She hands me a piece of paper with instructions and saunters off, leaving me gaping after her. My brow furrows, and I watch her wander toward the other teams, her smile returning, that pleasant teacher persona flowing from her as she pauses to chat with some of the other residents.
Do I smell bad or something?
Quinn and I have never been friends, but we graduated from high school together and grew up in Holly Ridge since childhood. I don’t understand why she’s so standoffish with me when she has a smile for everyone else.
I don’t overthink it. It’s just the icing on the cake in an already ridiculous situation. It’s not like there was anyone I’m specifically hoping to be paired up with. I just want this whole stupid day to be over already.
“Who did you get teamed up with?”
I glance to my right where the newly elected mayor is standing, peering over my shoulder at my tag. I’m not surprised to see him here, but the sight of him makes me more uncomfortable, not that I have an issue with Drew Pierce himself. We’ve become friendly over the years, particularly when he was campaigning. But his presence means more publicity, more people, and more reasons for me to want to be in my house and avoid this entire event.
This just keeps getting better and better.
“Quinn Tanner,” I reply, stifling my growing resentment as much as I can.
It’s getting difficult, and the day has barely started.
Drew’s face brightens at the mention of the teacher, his eyes scanning through the horde of people filling the park. “She’s a gem. They didn’t have teachers like her when we were kids, right? Remember Mrs. Parks?”
We both snicker at the reminder of the stern-faced homeroom teacher who would scowl every time we asked to use the bathroom.
“I’ve been trying to forget her,” I admit. “Who did you get?”
He grunts heavily. “I’m teamed up with Cassie Gray,” he mutters.
I guffaw before I can stop myself. “Your ex-girlfriend?” I remember their tumultuous relationship from high school.
The mayor gives me a faux grimace of disapproval. “I can still raise your property taxes,” he jokes. “Watch yourself.”
“You want the police force on your good side,” I jest back.
“Good point. May the best team win.”
We shake hands good-naturedly, and he wanders off to chat up the other members of the hunt, leaving me to seek out Quinn for the start of the game.
The wind picks up slightly, tousling her dark hair around the collar of her coat and tinting her cheeks rosily. She gives me a sidelong look as I approach, turning her head slightly away. I can’t help but notice how her whole body stiffens when I near her.
“You have all the rules?” she asks primly, her smile vanishing again.
I hesitate, half tempted to ask her why she’s so cold with me, but I decide against it. It’s best to just get this whole thing over with. We’re not here to make small talk.
“Yep,” I reply. “Where are we starting?”
She gestures toward the hiking trails. “Over there.”
Without waiting for me, Quinn strides away, leaving me to stare after her again, a flutter of uneasiness knotting in my gut. Inhaling sharply, I start after her, wondering if there isn’t some way out of this, if I can’t bribe one of my coworkers into taking my place in this somehow.
Like she’s reading my mind, Quinn’s head snaps back in a fan of chestnut flare. Her brilliant blue eyes narrow. “Are you coming?” she asks. Her tone isn’t cold exactly, but it’s definitely not friendly, and I tense as I pick up the pace, hurrying to her side.
The group we are starting with consists of parents and children, teens, and other adults, everyone apparently eager to be a part of this new game. Everyone but me.
I really am a giant Scrooge, aren’t I?
Idly, I consider just losing early, but I that will make Quinn hate me even more than she already seems to. Besides, I’m already here, and the last thing I want is to get on my boss’s bad side.
I just need to suck it up and stop counting the minutes. It’ll be over soon enough.
“Okay, everyone!” Quinn calls out, her cheerful voice back in play. “You know what to do?”
There’s a collective nod among the teams.
“Great! Then get together with your partners. In ninety minutes, the teams who haven’t solved all the clues won’t proceed to the next round, unfortunately. If you gather all your clues, you can move on to the next section.”
A cool wind picks up from over the triple peaks, chilling the air around us, and I bury my face deeper into the wool of my dark gray scarf.
“What are we winning?” a teenager pipes out from the back.
I pull my nose up from the depth of my scarf and peer at her. A murmur rushes through the group again.
“You don’t know?” Quinn asks with a laugh. “The winners get to officially light the tree tomorrow night. You’ll go up in the cherry picker and place the star on top, then you’ll light the tree in front of the town!”
The chatter reaches an impossible din as the children explode into titters of excitement, and their parents are forced to calm them down.
“Come on, guys! We’re wasting time! I think I already know what the answer to the first clue is!” Quinn tells them encouragingly.
She wriggles her dark eyebrows meaningfully, and they all flick their attention back toward their pages eagerly as I amble closer to her side.
“Do you?” I ask, but she doesn’t respond to me and strides off toward the woods.
Is it really going to be like this all day?
Gritting my teeth, I chase after my partner, again cursing my life choices. I should have just stayed home and reaped the repercussions. But it’s too late now. I’m stuck here, and I better make the best of it.