“Jenna’s right,” Cam said, taking one of the mugs, then wincing when hot coffee sloshed over the sides onto his hand. Darcy eyed the tray and decided to wait. “Hang out here and keep us company,” Cam added.
“Keep you company?” she repeated. “Cameron Franklin? Mr. Action? Laid up in bed with a sprained ankle, and you want me to just hang out here for the day? Excuse me for being blunt, but that’s really not my idea of a good time.”
“I sprained it this morning, Darcy. Right after midnight.” He ran his fingers through his thick hair, making it stand up in tufts and giving him the look of a man who knew he was fighting a losing battle, but was determined to go on fighting. “You know what day this is. Why the hell did you have to come in to New York today, anyway?”
“Because tonight’s the play,” she said simply. And that was true, since she’d specifically told her friend Bella to buy tickets for the April 1 show. “And because I was able to take the whole day for shopping. It’s not like my schedule gives me that many free days. MIT’s not exactly a party school, you know.”
Also true, but what she didn’t point out was that as a Ph.D. candidate, she had significantly more flexibility than she’d had during the earlier years of her education. Her free time was still sadly lacking, but at least she could move the blocks of time around, like tiles on a sliding-number puzzle, until she managed to create a gap large enough to allow for a trip into the city.
But was it really her brother’s business if she got a certain sense of satisfaction from coming to New York City on this day?
Cam used to dive out of planes on April Fools’ Day—his boldness a way of thumbing his nose at the curse. Darcy did the same. Only she wasn’t daring the curse—there was no curse, after all. Instead, she was proving a point to her siblings who continued to believe in such nonsense.
“Dammit, Darcy,” Cam said, not needing to say any more. She understood his frustration. She even sympathized with it. However silly it might be, Cam was a believer, and her big brother’s concern was genuine.
“Bella’s going to be with me all day,” she said, bringing up her undergraduate roommate the way a Civil War officer might have raised a white flag. “We’re going to shop, have lunch, shop more, then do drinks and the theater. So I won’t be out in the big, bad city on my own.” She shrugged. “That’s the best deal I can offer.”
“It’s not—”
Jenna put a hand on his shoulder, effectively silencing her husband. “Promise us you’ll be careful?”
“I already have,” Darcy said. “But if it’ll make you feel better, I’ll promise again. If you have any of those old family documents that Reg is always digging up, I’ll even swear on those. I’ll do whatever you want to make you believe I’ll be safe—except spend the day locked up in here with you,” she added, as Cam started to open his mouth.
“At least stay for breakfast,” Jenna said. “You brought the bagels. I can scramble some eggs, fry up some sausage.”
Darcy shook her head. “No, thanks. I want to get going. I just—” She cut herself off. She couldn’t exactly admit that she’d done this on purpose, coming here today, knowing that he’d spend the long hours worried about her. She’d come, because it would have that much more impact when she survived the day unscathed. Afterward, it’s just a story. Knowing before had meant her brother would be involved, too. And maybe this would finally convince him.
Maybe, she thought. But as she glanced ruefully at his raised ankle, she had to admit she doubted that he’d ever become a non-believer.
It took another twenty minutes for Darcy to extricate herself from her brother and sister-in-law, and that included fifteen for more arguing and five to search for her driver’s license, even though she could have sworn she’d put it back in her pocket. She finally found it in the cushions of a nearby armchair that she didn’t even remember sitting in. She took two long gulps of the now cold coffee, dribbled enough on her white shirt that she had to beg a replacement from Jenna and finally managed to get out the door and breathe a sigh of relief that at nine forty-five, her day was about to begin.
And, dammit, it was a day that promised to be curse-free, carefree and fun.
The elevator did not stick as she descended to the lobby from Cameron’s apartment. She didn’t slip on the newly waxed floor, and no armed thug rushed the building, prepared to take everyone in the lobby hostage. In fact, the first few moments away from her big brother were so uniquely dull and uneventful that she half considered calling him from the house phone and telling him that a flock of angry penguins had stormed the building, knocked her over and now her picture was going to be splashed all over the front page of the Post with a decadent headline about how an MIT Ph.D. candidate was caught in a torrid penguin lovefest in the lobby of one of Manhattan’s most exclusive apartment buildings.