Lucky Penny by L A Cotton Read Free Book Online Page A

Erica and Brianna, were wary and unsure, and the foster kid in me knew it stemmed from their experiences back home.
    Home.
    If Erica was anything like I was when I was her age, home was not a word used to describe my foster home. It was hell on earth—a time in my life made bearable by one person. That was the reason why I couldn’t let Erica walk away from Camp Chance without doing something… anything, to give her hope of a better life. It was also the reason I needed Blake’s help, but that would have to wait until the group campfire tonight because, right now, I had to get eight girls across the lake on canoes.
    Marissa was our instructor for the afternoon, and she had an endless amount of patience with the girls as they struggled to stay upright in their kayaks. Lucy, being small, was surprisingly buoyant and had managed to navigate across half the lake with little support. Marissa was working closely with Crystal and Brianna, and the rest of the girls were goofing around, flicking water at one another with their paddles.
    “We have to get across the lake, Erica. That’s what today's activity is all about. Perseverance and determination. We could-”
    “I’m. Not. Doing. It,” she hissed.
    I sighed glancing away from her to watch the rest of the girls out on the lake. The water was glistening in the afternoon sun making the water look inviting, but not enough that I was particularly looking forward to canoeing across it.
    Being the calm and compassionate counselor was getting me nowhere, so I wrung my hands in front of me, bent down to pick up the paddle for the canoe pulled up onto the embankment and thrust it at Erica. “Let’s go.”
    “Wha-what?” She blinked staring at me as if I had totally lost it.
    “I said let’s go. In the canoe. You and me. Now.” I pushed the paddle at her a little farther forcing her to take it from me and then spun on my heel to push the canoe to the water’s edge. “Let’s go, Miss I’m-not-doing-it.”
    Inside my chest, my heart was pounding so hard I felt a little nauseous. This was out of character for me. All the kids had me pegged as the quiet one. A lot of them liked that about me, but with Erica, it didn’t work. I couldn’t reach her that way. Blake had told me to give her time, to let her come to me, but time was running out.
    “Move it, Erica. We haven’t got all day,” I shouted glancing in the direction of where I’d left her standing. Only she wasn’t standing there anymore. She was moving toward the canoe with a look of pure hatred on her face.
    “If you capsize us and I drown, I’ll sue.” She climbed in the back end of the vessel and huffed loudly.
    I couldn’t help the slight grin on my face as I sat down and started to shimmy the canoe forward using the paddle to push off the ground. The vessel whooshed into the water and started to float away from the shore. My smirk grew into a full smile, feeling pretty pleased with myself on both fronts—getting us out onto the lake without sinking and coaxing Erica to join me.
    My smugness didn’t last long.
    Marissa was busy showing off to the girls up ahead of us by creating ripples with her paddles to make their kayaks rock. Laughter echoed around the lake each time she did it, as they rocked from side to side. But by the time the ripples reached us, they had merged into waves rolling toward shore.
    “We need to paddle into them, I think,” I called back at Erica, trying to remember what Marissa had taught me during our staff lesson out on the lake.
    Erica muttered something I couldn’t make out, and we both started to rotate the paddles in the water to force the vessel forward into the gentle waves. Marissa spotted us and said something that caused the rest of the girls to look in our direction. The next thing I knew, six girls started copying Marissa’s action with their paddles, sending ripples rushing out toward us.
    “Marissa, seriously?” I yelled, still paddling forward, my pulse