AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I’ve seen some of the people who work at the museum lead old ladies and little kids around. They’d probably do that for you, too.”
“Well, thanks for the vote of confidence, kid.”
“Hey, you’re the one who said you weren’t that great at athletic stuff.”
Cassie grinned, leading his daughter out the door. “True story, kiddo. Maybe you can show me how. I have a feeling this is going to be a fun day. But first, I need to ask your dad a very important question.”
“What’s that, Bambi?” Jamal asked, an innocent smile on his face. He had a pretty idea what she was going to ask.
“Where’s my coffee and muffin you promised?”
Jamal grinned. “I am holding it hostage in the car. That way, if you got a whim to back out on us, you’d have no choice but to come. If you wanted the coffee, that is. And the muffin smellsfabulous.I almost took a bite, just to see.”
Cassie glared at him. “Punk. I can’t believe you’d hold a girl’s coffee hostage.”
“Oh, Bambi,” he said, looking into her eyes. “I’d do pretty much anything to make sure I had a day with you.” He loved the blush that crept up her cheeks. He was excited about spending time at the museum, which was really cool, but he also had a feeling that it would be the company he was with that made it more special than a trip to the museum.
Untitled
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“Come on, Cassie! You gotta keep up!” Cassie and Jamal were trailing behind JJ, who was running from place to place in Curio-city, the discovery zone of the museum. So far, they’d put on a puppet show, made and flown paper airplanes, tried their hand at walking a (very low) tightrope, dug for dinosaur bones, discovered ebb and flow in the giant water works station and now were waiting to lie on a bed of nails.
“Are you sure about this?” Cassie asked, a skeptical look on her face. “It looks kinda sketchy.”
“Trust me, Cass, it’s perfectly safe,” JJ responded. “They’re notreallynails. They’re just screws that rise up from the table when you push the button. As long as you stay perfectly still, nothing happens.”
Cassie turned to Jamal. “I’ve never heard an eight year old kid talk like JJ does,” she whispered. “She has a bigger vocabulary than some adults I know.”
Jamal grinned. “She was speaking in full sentences when she was eighteen months old. The nurse in her doctor’s office would bring the new nurses into her exam room just to hear her talk.”
“That’s so cute. You’ve definitely got a smarty pants on your hands. I bet her teacher loves her.”
“Come on, Cassie. It’s your turn,” JJ said excitedly.
“Are yousureit’s safe?” she asked Jamal.
“Didn’t you hear my kid? Perfectly safe,” Jamal winked.
With a deep breath, Cassie crawled onto the plexi-glass table and lay down flat on the table. “Here goes nothing,” she said, pressing the button on the hand-held control.
“They’re rising, Bambi,” Jamal told her mischievously. “Are you sure you want to go through with it? It’d be a shame to put holes in that pretty back of yours.”
Cassie couldn’t move because she was afraid the screwswouldpierce her skin. She felt them rising slowly and she held back her shudder. Surprisingly, it really didn’t hurt. In fact, it felt kind of like one of the toys Cassie used to play with as a child. The one where you could push anything on the pegs and they would take the shape of whatever you pushed on them. Cassie loved pushing her hand on the pegs, feeling it massage her hand.
“This feels kindagood,”Cassie said.
“Told ya,” JJ said triumphantly. “Perfectly safe.”
Cassie pushed the button to lower the screws back under the plexi-glass. Jamal held out his hand her way, offering her assistance in getting off the table. Cassie took it gratefully. Once she was off the table, she tried to remove her hand from his grasp, but Jamal just gripped it harder.
“I kinda like holding your hand, Bambi,” he said, moving his thumb back and forth in a soothing motion on top of her hand. “Will you hold hands and go steady with me?”
Cassie rolled her eyes to cover up the beating of her heart that was caused by his thumb running over her hand in the most relaxing way she had ever felt. She didn’t go on dates in high school for fear of what they might see or ask her about. Since moving to Oklahoma, she had gone on a few dates, but none of the men she had dated made her heart pound just by holding her hand. In fact, she didn’t even think she had gone on enough second dates for them totryholding her hand. Yet here she was, melting into a puddle of contentment at the feeling of his hand in hers. And they hadn’t even been on anofficial dateyet.
“Aren’t you Jamal Jenkins?” A kid who looked about twelve years old walked up to the trio in awe. Ironically, he was wearing a t-shirt with Jamal’s face front and center.
“That I am, kid. I am the face that matches the one on your shirt.”
