This Fearless Girl (St. Clary's University #2) - E. M. Moore Page 0,107

were up here?” Lucas asks.

“We’ve been all over these mountains. Dad used to take a sharp stick and push it into the ground as far as it could go. He’d do it every so often, kind of like what we’re doing now, but obviously more room for error. We found a few things like that, but we never found the lantern. If you think about it, it’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack. We don’t know if we’re in the right area, we only know that this could be it based on today’s topography. Boulders could have shifted. Terrain could’ve changed due to weather.

“Not only that, there are more chasms in these mountains that resemble the map. If it’s not here, we’ll keep looking. My father used to tell me we wouldn’t stop until we made our family famous again.”

“Did you ever wonder....” Wyatt starts. “I mean, did you ever think about not finding it? Last time it didn’t go so well for the Wilders. I wonder what your ancestors thought would happen if they actually found it.”

“Most of them, I think, believed that it was only ours to find. Our families not only had the first possession, we had the stories. Now with getting the ring looked at, the four of us know more about the treasure and where it came from. It makes it more real, and I don’t know if I care so much about getting rich, it’s the fact that us Wilders fulfilled something we were always meant to. What if this treasure has historic value? What if it’s some European king or queen’s treasure? How awesome for our town. How awesome for everyone here, whether they gave a shit about the treasure or not. Things like that aren’t meant to be hidden away forever, you know?”

Lucas grins at me. It’s a boyish smile that squeezes my heart. Wyatt, however, goes in a completely different direction. “It’s sexy when you talk like that.”

“What? Talk treasure?”

“Yeah, talk treasure to me, baby.”

“Sounds like a hit song,” Lucas teases, rolling his eyes.

Wyatt gawks at his friend. “Um, have you not heard Bruno Mars’ hit?”

“Who’s Bruno Mars?”

Lucas and Wyatt stop to look at each other. I break into a laugh. “Kidding. I think you’d have to be dead not to know who he is.”

The afternoon fades away as we walk the Superstition Mountains with the metal detector. We push rocks out of the way that have rolled down from the rock face above. There are two big boulders in this section that aren’t going to be moved so easily. We detect around them as best as we can, then devise a plan to move them on another day. Who knows if these boulders were here when my ancestors came through, or if they dislodged from above us, completely obscuring one of my ancestors’ clues that would take us to the treasure. That would be just our luck, wouldn’t it? A huge boulder obscuring our path to find what was always ours.

We call it a night when the sun starts to slip behind the peaks. Dusk is one of the prettiest times up in the Superstitions. The mountain seems to go to sleep, and the night insects come out, chirping.

We make camp where we did on our last trip, each of us doing our jobs. This time, I help Lucas put the tent up while Wyatt starts the fire for dinner. It isn’t until we gather around the fire that I think about Stone and how he should be here. A quiet mind is a restless mind, and a restless mind never did me any favors.

36

Did you know phones can be used as alarm clocks?

How handy when I want to make sure I take my turn watching over camp. I don’t trust Wyatt and Lucas not to let me sleep.

It vibrates, and I quickly turn it off. Lucas’ soft breaths heat the back of my neck. His arms make it too damn comfortable that I don’t want to leave, but I also know that Wyatt’s out there watching over everything, and he’s probably super tired.

Carefully, I extract myself from Lucas’ long limbs and throw on a sweatshirt I laid out for myself. The temperature drops at night, but when I step out of the tent, I find it’s not that bad. I leave the zipper open and walk toward the shadow blocking out the fire. He hears me approach and looks over his shoulder. “How did I know