Test Drive: Road Tripping Series

by Samantha Chase

  “Worst wedding day ever.”

  Seriously, in the history of wedding days, this one had to set some kind of new record in awfulness.

  Off in the distance, Grace saw a car pulling into the resort driveway and was relieved when she realized it was her ride. Sprinting as well as she could from the bushes, she rushed to meet it and quickly jumped in.

  “Are you Grace?” the driver asked.

  “I am, I am,” she said quickly. “Just drive. Please!” He looked at her like she was crazy but fortunately didn’t hesitate to get moving. It wasn’t until they were off the resort property and a few miles away that she finally felt like she could breathe. Sagging against the back seat, she immediately began searching for flights back to North Carolina. It didn’t take long for her to realize she might not be leaving California or even the Lake Tahoe area tonight. Muttering a curse, she continued to search.

  “Are you okay?”

  She wanted to roll her eyes at that one. Did she look like she was okay? She was sitting in the back of a Toyota Corolla in a wedding gown and heading to the airport alone. However, she didn’t think the poor guy would appreciate her sarcasm and opted to bite her tongue.

  “Um…yeah,” she said with a small smile. “Just…I’m not having any luck finding a flight out tonight.” She scrolled the screen some more. “Where’s the next closest airport?”

  “That would be Sacramento. But it’s two hours away in the opposite direction,” he explained. He looked like he was close to her age, maybe a few years younger, and Grace remembered the app saying his name was Mark.

  “Thanks, Mark. If I happen to find a flight out of Sacramento, would you be willing to drive me there?”

  “Uh…I’d have to adjust the route and it’s not that easy to do,” he said with some hesitation. “I mean, we’d have to pull over somewhere so I could do it and…”

  He prattled on a bit about all the steps it would take for him to change the route, but Grace wasn’t fully paying attention. Her main priority was finding the first flight she could to get out of here. Unfortunately, it didn’t take long for her to realize it wasn’t going to happen. She was stuck. Her only hope was to book a flight for first thing in the morning and find a hotel as close to the airport as possible.

  And pray it was next to a mall so she could buy a change of clothes.

  Her phone began to ring, and Grace was surprised it had taken this long for it to start. Jared’s name and picture came up and she felt sick at the sight of him. She immediately rejected the call and did a quick swipe of her screen to block his number. Not that it would stop him. All he’d have to do was grab someone else’s phone and try again. Still, it was a start. Next, she turned on the do not disturb feature on her phone so she wouldn’t be bothered for a little while.

  “Do I need to turn around?” he asked, interrupting her thoughts.

  With a weary sigh, she put the phone down. “No. We can keep going. There are no available flights tonight. I’ll have to find one for the morning.”

  “I don’t know where you’re trying to go, but you could always rent a car and drive.”

  Again, she suppressed the urge to roll her eyes but…the idea had merit. Sure, a cross-country drive wasn’t ideal, but it would give her plenty of time to clear her head. There would be no distractions and no chance of Jared–or anyone else for that matter–coming to talk her out of what she was doing.

  “Mark,” she said excitedly, leaning forward, “you’re a genius!”

  He smiled at her in the rearview mirror. “Wow. Thanks!”

  “Okay, so where is the closest rental car place? I mean, we don’t have to go all the way to the airport for that, do we?”

  “It might be easier, and considering it’s a Saturday night, I would imagine the smaller places might be closed already. The airport car rental offices have to stay open later.” He shrugged. “At least, I think they do.”

  Maybe he had a point, but reaching for her phone, Grace figured she could find that out for herself without any problem. “Aha! There is a car rental place just outside of Carson City and it doesn’t close until eight!” She leaned forward in her seat again. “Can you get me there by eight, Mark?”

  It had just started to rain, so he flipped on the windshield wipers and grinned at her. “As long as this rain stays light, we shouldn’t have a problem.”

  Relaxing back in the seat, she felt like things might finally start going her way.

  “Dude, are you all right?”

  Finn Kavanagh was so busy muttering curses that he almost didn’t hear the guy. Pacing back and forth in the crowded parking lot, he wasn’t expecting anyone to come up and talk to him. “Yeah. Peachy, except my car is gone.”

  The guy looked at him in shock. He was glassy-eyed and looked no older than twenty; there was no doubt he’d used a fake ID to get into the casino, and right now was of completely no use to Finn.

  “You gonna call the cops?”

  Under normal circumstances he would have, but considering he knew exactly who had taken his car and why, it was pointless.

  But he wanted to. Boy, oh boy, did he want to. Cursing again, he paced and turned and…oh, right. He still had an audience. “Uh, no. No, I’m just gonna call…a cab or something.” With a forced smile, Finn walked back toward the casino as he pulled out his phone. With the help of an app, he knew he could have a ride here in less than five minutes, but he had a call to make first.

  Pulling up the number, he hit send and–surprise, surprise–it went right to voicemail.

  “Hey, Dave,” he said through clenched teeth. “Classy move taking the car. Where the hell are you? In case you’ve forgotten, I’m eight hundred miles from home, and I got here in the car you currently hijacked, you son of a bitch! You need to get back here and…”

  Beep!

  If he didn’t need the phone so damn much right now, he would have tossed it in frustration. Not that he expected his brother to answer the phone, but he also didn’t expect the bastard to leave him stranded in Carson City over a petty fight.

  Okay, so maybe pointing out how irresponsible his brother was wasn’t the smartest thing to do, but who knew he’d be so willing to prove Finn right immediately?

  They had decided to take this road trip together as a way of bonding. Honestly, they had never gotten along, and after trying again and again, to find Dave jobs and keep him from mooching off their parents, Finn thought the time away together would help. The idea of them being in neutral territory and away from prying eyes seemed perfect.

  Clearly, he was wrong.

  Now he was stranded. Dave had his car and Finn needed to get home to Atlanta so he could get back to work. Granted, he was his own boss, but the garage could only run for so long without him. Actually, it probably would be fine without him for a while, but he was responsible and the garage was his baby. He hated being away from it any longer than he had to be.

  And that just filled him with rage again because thanks to his brother, he had no choice but to delay his return. Chasing Dave across the country wasn’t going to be a quick and easy task, no matter how much he wished it could be.

  Looking at his phone, he did a quick search for car rental places in the area. There weren’t many, and the smarter thing to do would be to just go to the Tahoe airport, but that was wasting time he didn’t have. The sooner he got on the road, the better chance he had of catching up with his wayward brother. Once he made a mental note of the closest place, Finn pulled up the app for Uber and ordered a car to take him there. There was no way he was flying home, even if it was the fastest way to get there. Finn had a fear of flying and just the thought of getting near an airplane was enough to make him feel a little sick. Hell, even walking back to Atlanta was more appealing to him than flying.

  It started to rain and he groaned. It was the icing on the cake of the crappiest day ever. He’d already lost all the money he’d brought to gamble with and now he was going to have to pay to rent a car to get home.
His luggage was in his car because he and Dave had planned on leaving tonight after dinner. As soon as they had finished eating, his brother excused himself to use the men’s room and never returned.

  Just thinking about it pissed Finn off more than he thought possible.

  His ride pulled up just as the rain really started to come down, and he’d never been more thankful for anything in his life. Climbing into the car, he thanked the driver and immediately tried calling his brother again.

  “Come on, man,” he all but growled into the phone as the call went to voicemail again. “This is bullshit, Dave. It’s my damn car and I can have the cops on your ass for this!” His driver eyed him suspiciously, but Finn didn’t care. “Just…call me back.” Again, the urge to throw his phone was great, but it would hinder more than help him.

  Throwing his head back against the seat cushion, he started thinking his plan through. Maybe he should have just stayed at the casino and waited Dave out. His brother was many things, but he wasn’t despicable enough that he’d strand Finn and steal his car.

  Or was he?

  The phone rang, and he nearly jumped out of his skin. “Dammit, Dave, where are you?”

  A low chuckle was the first response. “Just drove through Fallon, but I’m considering heading south and going back to Vegas,” Dave said. “Remember how cool the strip was?”

  Finn mentally counted to ten before speaking. “Fallon’s what…an hour from Carson City? How the hell fast are you driving?”

  Laughter was the only response.

  “Can you please just stay put and I’ll meet you there so we can head home like we planned, okay?”

  “No can do, bro. You see, you wanted to lecture me on how irresponsible I am, so you shouldn’t be surprised by all of this. I mean, we all know Perfect Finn is never wrong.”

  If his brother were standing in front of him, Finn would strangle him. There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that he’d do it. Dave could test the patience of a saint.

  “Shouldn’t you be trying to prove me wrong?” he asked through clenched teeth. “I mean, that is what you normally do! Why do you feel the need to prove me right now of all times?”

  “Ha-ha!” Dave said, laughing heartily. “I don’t really care what I’m proving. All I want to do is piss you off just like you pissed me off. Doesn’t feel so good, does it?”

  “Dave…”

  “Dammit, Finn, where do you get off passing judgment on me?”

  “Right now, I think I have every right! You stole my car!”

  “Technically, I’m borrowing it.”

  “No, you’re not. You’re stealing it. Borrowing it implies I gave you permission, which I did not. And how the hell did you get my keys?”

  “When you went to the men’s room while we were waiting for our food, I swiped them,” Dave said flippantly. “So really, you have no one to blame but yourself for leaving them lying around like that.”

  Pinching the bridge of his nose, Finn had to wonder how he was going to get through this–or better yet, how he was going to keep himself from beating the crap out of his brother when they were both back in Atlanta.

  “Dave,” he began, trying to be reasonable, “you know I need to get home. Let’s just agree that things got out of hand and move on, okay? Now, where are you? I’m in an Uber and can meet up with you.”

  The low laugh Dave gave as a response did not fill Finn with hope.

  Letting out a long breath, he willed himself–again–to stay in control. “It’s getting late and we’re wasting time here.”

  “You got that right.”

  “It’s already an almost forty-hour drive back to Atlanta, Dave. Four grueling days of driving,” he added. “We weren’t going to get too far tonight, but we can make up time if you just tell me where you are so I can meet you.”

  “Vegas.”

  “You’re not in Vegas!” Finn yelled. “It is physically impossible for you to be in Vegas already! Now enough is enough! Do not make me call the cops! I’m serious!”

  “Sorry…bad…breaking…up…later…”

  “Don’t hang up! Don’t hang up!”

  Dave hung up.

  The things that flew out of Finn’s mouth would make most people blush, but he didn’t care. When he kicked the seat in front of him, the driver yelled, “Hey!” and that instantly snapped him out of his tantrum. He was screwed; there were no two ways about it. His brother had his car and he wasn’t getting it back any time soon. The sooner he resigned himself to that fact, the better off he’d be.

  So, he had to rent a car, so what? And so what if he was going to have to stop and buy himself clothes and supplies to get him through the trip? Worse things could happen. But the worst of it all was how it was going to take him longer than the planned four days. Finn believed in being smart and not overdoing things and knew driving for ten hours a day alone wouldn’t be smart or safe.

  Something Dave had mocked him about on their original trip.

  There was a flash of lightning, and the rain was really coming down. At this point, Finn knew he would be smart to grab a car and then find a hotel and start driving first thing in the morning. With a sigh, he sat back and stared out the window until they pulled into the rental car parking lot.

  “Holy crap! Did you see that?”

  Finn looked out the front window toward the building and saw…wait…what was he seeing? “What the hell is that?”

  The driver laughed awkwardly. “Looks like a bride–or at least, someone in a wedding gown.”

  And sure enough, that was what they were seeing. Whoever they were, they fell getting out of the car and were now in a heap of white satin on the pavement. Finn quickly climbed from the car–thanked his driver–and immediately ran over to help her.

  At her side, he held out a hand to her and noticed the guy who was with her coming around to do the same. “Hey, are you okay?” Finn asked, noting the dirty gown and the curses flying out of the woman’s mouth. He pulled her to her feet and held on until she was steady. The rain was pouring down on them and he did his best to guide them up onto the sidewalk and through the doors of the rental office.

  She was a little breathless and pointed toward the car she’d just vacated. “My bag,” she said, shaking her hand. “My bag is still in the back seat!”

  “No problem,” he said, hoping to calm her. “I’m sure your husband will bring it in.”

  Pushing him aside, she walked back out the door and slapped a hand on the trunk of the car as it was about to pull away. Finn watched with mild curiosity as she opened the back door and grabbed her bag before slamming the door shut again.

  Okay, not her husband, he thought.

  Because he had manners, he moved to open the door for her. “Thanks,” she muttered, shaking the rain off herself–and onto him. He wanted to be mad, he seriously did, but what would be the point?

  With a shrug, he walked over to the agent at the counter and did his best to smile. “Hey…Carl,” he began, reading the agent’s name tag. “I would like to rent a car.”

  The agent smiled but it didn’t quite meet his eyes. “Then you’ve come to the right place!” he said in a semi-flat tone. Finn would bet good money this was a repeated exchange at a car rental office.

  Beside him, the bride stepped up and said the same thing to her agent–an older woman named Tammy. He looked over and gave her a small smile and wasn’t surprised when she didn’t give him one back. Any bride trying to rent a car while still in her wedding gown couldn’t possibly be having a good day.

  Finn handed over his license and credit card and waited. The only sound in the place was the typing coming from Carl and Tammy’s computers. Finn looked around and saw the office was a little run-down and there weren’t any cars in the parking lot.

  That’s when he started to worry.

  The cars could be around the back, couldn’t they?

  “Um…”

  “Oh, uh…”

  Both agents spoke at the same
time as they glanced nervously at each other. “Is there a problem?” he and the angry bride asked at the same time.

  “Well, it looks like,” Carl began.

  “There seems to be,” Tammy started.

  “Oh, for the love of it!” angry bride snapped. “What’s the problem?”

  Finn had to hand it to her, she was pretty fierce. Even he stiffened up at her tone. Deciding that one of them should be respectful, he looked at the agents and smiled. “Is there a problem?” he asked.

  “We only have one vehicle available,” Carl said.

  “Oh, well…okay.” This didn’t seem to be a problem for him since he got here first. “I’ll take it.”

  “Wait, wait, wait,” angry bride said, moving closer to him. “Why do you get it? We got here at the same time.”

  “Actually…we didn’t,” he corrected. “I got to the counter first, and that was after I held the door for you to come back in.”

  If looks could kill, he’d be a dead man for sure.

  “Look, um…I know this is a bad situation,” he reasoned, “but it can’t be helped. It’s been a really bad day and I need this car.”

  “Oh, really?” she asked sarcastically, motioning to her ruined gown. “And do I look like someone whose day has gone well?”

  “Uh…”

  “Because it hasn’t!” she cried. “If we’re going to get into some sort of contest over whose day was worse, believe me, buddy, I’d win!”

  He was beginning to see that.

  Unfortunately, he needed this car too. Maybe if he reasoned with her…

  Holding out his hand, he said, “I’m Finn. Finn Kavanagh. And you are…?”

  Swiping her dripping blonde hair away from her face, she eyed him cautiously. “Grace. Grace Mackie.”

  She didn’t shake his hand.

  “Look, Grace, it seems like we’re both in a bad way right now. But you have to believe me when I say I have to have this car. You see, my brother stole my car, and I’ve got to get back to Atlanta and…”