Page 63 of Ex Marks the Spot
“Illegal chop shop manager?” Treva asks, brows climbing her forehead.
Playfully rolling my eyes at my would-be tattletale, I shake my head and decide to set the record straight. “When we were doing our team interviews back in Dallas, I mentioned that one of my jobs was a COO of a startup in the automotive industry.”
“See?” Hartley grins with amusement as she lifts her palms upward. “That reeks of mafia chop shop.”
“I mean . . . she’s not wrong,” Boyd says to me.
“Except she is, considering I’m not Italian and don’t have a criminal record.”
Hartley shrugs. “Non-Italians can be in the mafia, and maybe you just haven’t been caught yet.”
I breathe out a laugh as my jaw moves to the side. “It should disturb me that you’ve put this much thought into it.”
“Are you some sort of venture capitalist?” Treva asks.
I flip back to my thoughts this morning about sharing personal information with Hartley. I didn’t expect to include Kick Asspen as well, but I guess now’s as good of a time as any.
“More like the opposite. Being a COO of a startup in the automotive industry is just the pretentious way of saying I manage the car wash my bestfriend owns. It’s a long way from the career I planned on having, but life doesn’t always work out the way we want it to.”
There.
I said it.
And although it wasn’t technically a lie to begin with, I feel better about coming clean. Slightly embarrassed, but better nonetheless. To my surprise, no one bats an eye. In fact, Hartley looks...excited?
“I used tolovegoing to the car wash when I was a kid! I always felt like our car was the canvas and the soap was paint that the giant brushes could spread around.”
Huh. “I never thought of it that way, but I can see that.”
“The car wash was the only thing that calmed my youngest when she was a baby,” Treva says. “For about eight months, I was on a first-name basis with the entire staff and had the cleanest car in town.”
“Now that you mention it, a handful of our regulars are moms with little kids.”
“Umm...while we’re on the subject of jobs and curveballs from life, I wasn’t entirely truthful either,” Hartley says, wrinkling her nose. “I’m a painter, but for houses instead of canvases.”
“As in murals?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “As in, I took over my dad’s house-painting business after his accident because it turns out that being in a wheelchair makes it difficult to climb a ladder.”
“That’s actually really sweet,” Treva says.
“It’s definitely notmything, but I promised I’d stay and help.”
“So why didn’t you say that in the interview? I mean, I know why I wasn’t forthcoming, but running your dad’s business isn’t anything to be embarrassed about.”
She stares at her hands while she considers my question, finally responding with, “Self-preservation, basically. I figured the less you knew about me, the less ammunition you had during the race.”
I almost laugh at the irony. She thinks I was the one looking for ammunition, but she’s the one who’s had the power to destroy me this whole time.
CHAPTER 13
HARTLEY
Day 11—Nepal
The Shortcut is still in the clue box when we make it to the shrine called Swayambhunath Stupa, which tells us that the A Team and the Alaska Girls didn’t use it. After reading the task, it’s easy to see why.
Take the Nepal Mathematical Society’s twenty-five question test. If your team passes with a minimum score of ninety percent, you can proceed directly to the checkpoint. If you don’t pass, you must return to this box to receive your next clue.