Chapter 23
CHAPTER
TWENTY-THREE
“What do you think about these?” Cash held out the box of ornaments depicting Peanuts characters. Lark frowned at them, and that answered his question.
“I’m not into the cutesy stuff for the holidays,” she said. Cash wasn’t really sure what he was into for the holidays, because he didn’t spend very much time at home in December.
He’d managed to fill his days with working out and testing new recipes, spending time with his family, or working with Bryce at his horse rescue ranch.
He also spent a considerable amount of time out at Cousins Creek, chatting with Boston and Beth, and Cash had enjoyed the slower-paced lifestyle he’d had for the past few months.
“So we’re talking traditional red and green?” He put the box with Charlie Brown and Snoopy back on the shelf.
“Or silver,” she said. “Or gold, or blue.” She plucked a box of ornaments from the shelf further down the aisle. “These are purple, and they’re nice.”
Cash stepped toward her and took the box from her. The ornaments weren’t a tacky bright purple, but a really pretty eggplant, and they had silver swirls through them. “Yeah, these are nice,” he said.
They’d already agreed upon white lights, and Cash thought the tree would be real pretty with lots of colored ornaments. Lark seemed to only want metallic ones, and they’d provide a nice shine.
“These will reflect the lights real nice,” he said, and he pulled the cart forward and put them in it.
“What else do we need?” He peered down into his cart, honestly not quite sure what it took to decorate a house for the holidays.
The tree still sat tied in the back of his truck, and they had lights, a crimson tree skirt with white fur around the edges, a couple of stocking holders and stockings, and now eight or nine boxes of ornaments.
Lark looked in the cart too. “I think this will be fine,” she said. “Unless you want some washcloths and kitchen towels?”
He raised his head and blinked at her. “Do I need washcloths and kitchen towels?”
She grinned and nudged him with her hip. “No, silly, but they’re festive.”
“I think having a Christmas tree and a couple of stockings over the fireplace is going to be plenty festive,” he said. “You get washcloths and dish towels dirty.” He rounded the cart and leaned into the handle. “I think this is good enough.”
“Okay,” Lark said, and Cash turned the cart toward the front of the store from the outer recesses of this Christmas décor aisle.
He’d been surprised that there weren’t many people here on Black Friday, but he supposed they had come closer to dinnertime than before breakfast, and the real crowds had probably shown up at five a.m.
The Christmas-centric shop had been closed by the time they’d made it out of the canyon with the tree, so he and Lark had resorted to the only big-box store in the area.
“Look, they have those tins of popcorn,” Cash said, pausing at one of the end-aisle displays. “Did you want some?”
Lark had fallen into her phone, and she glanced up, her expression confused. “What?”
He indicated the teal containers of popcorn. “You said you liked the cheddar cheese and caramel combo.”
“Oh, yeah.” The pretty little line between her eyes disappeared. “But we have so much food at the house.”
“You could take it back to your apartment.” He raised his eyebrows, seeking permission
Lark nodded, dropping her head to look at her phone again.
He put the tin of popcorn in the cart and continued toward the checkout at a slower pace as she texted frantically. “I’m just gonna call him,” she said, that familiar grumpiness in her tone.
“Who is it?” Cash asked.
“It’s Jet. He said Grammy called, but he couldn’t really get anything out of her.”
“She called Jet?” Surprise ran through Cash as Lark lifted her phone to her ear.
“Yeah, he said she told him she tried to get in touch with me, but the call wouldn’t go through.”
“We were up the canyon,” Cash said. It had taken them a good half-hour to get down, and they’d been out looking for a Christmas tree for at least that long as well. Her grandmother could have called a couple of hours ago and Lark wouldn’t have received it.
She half-turned away from him and paused on the corner of the seasonal aisle. “What’s going on?” she asked, bypassing the hello completely. She listened for a couple of seconds, and Cash could hear a tinnier version of his best friend’s voice on the line, but he couldn’t make out any words.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Lark said, which only set Jet off again.
Cash touched her forearm and nodded to the cash registers only ten yards from them.
She waved him away, and Cash felt dismissed like a little child, but he walked away to start the checkout process, because he had the feeling they would be headed to her grammy’s place next.
He opted for self-checkout, as that was the closest to Lark, and he wanted to keep an eye on her.
His heart squeezed when she finally joined him, just in time to put the last box of ornaments on the tiny shelf for him to scan. Part of him didn’t want to know what was going on, but the other part wanted every detail.
Cash had spent a vast majority of his time with this woman in the last seven days, and he wanted to know everything about her: her family, what made her happy, what upset her, her favorites, the things she didn’t like, and who she was at the core.
Because they’d been joined at the hip without worldly responsibilities, Cash felt like their relationship was six months old instead of six days. He glanced over to her with an abundance of caution running through him. “What’s going on?”
“I just tried calling her,” Lark said. “And she wouldn’t answer.” She shook her head at her phone, turned it off, and stuffed it in her pocket. “Can we go over there after this?”
“That’s why I came to check-out quickly.” He tapped the button to pay with his debit card and held the chip to the reader.
“I guess she called Jet, and she was in a real tizzy. The line was really fuzzy and kept cutting out,” she said. “But he swore he heard beeping in the background, like a smoke alarm.”
Cash jerked his head up and looked at Lark under the brim of his cowboy hat. “Like there’s fire in her condo?”
“Jet didn’t know,” Lark said. “He called her back a couple of times, and she wouldn’t answer. Now I’ve called, and she won’t pick up. We just need to go check on her.”
“No problem,” Cash said, and he swept up their last bag of ornaments and put them in the cart. “Let’s go.”
He knew enough about Lark to watch her disappear inside herself on the drive from the grocery store to the fifty-five plus community, which only took twelve minutes. He hadn’t seen her chew on her nails before, but she did now, and that only added to her anxiety symptoms.
“I’m sure it’s fine,” Cash said, hoping to ease her nerves. “There’s no smoke in the air. Look.”
Lark had been looking out her side window the whole time, and now she turned and looked out the windshield. “Yeah,” she said, but her voice sounded distant. She held her phone in one hand and had her arms crossed, and Cash knew enough not to try to touch her in this state.
He turned into the parking lot nearest to her grandmother’s condo, but bypassed all of the empty parking spaces. “I’m going to drive you right up to the sidewalk,” he said. “Then I’ll park and come join you.”
She nodded, and only a few moments later, Cash came to a stop, his truck covering two handicapped parking spots directly in front of her grammy’s building. Lark got out without a word, slammed the door behind her, and hurried down the sidewalk.
Cash sighed and rolled his neck. “Dear Lord,” He prayed.
“Bless Lark that she can find a way….” He trailed off because he wasn’t sure what he was praying for.
Lark to be someone else? Less tense, less intense, less worried about someone she cared about?
All of those felt wrong, and Cash sighed again, put the truck in drive, and went to find a parking space.
After braving the twilight chill, which had dropped the temperature ten degrees from when the sun had been out, and the biting wind against his chin, Cash arrived in front of Lark’s grandmother’s door and knocked.
He heard movement and voices beyond, and a few moments later, Lark opened the door. “See? It’s Cash,” she said.
All of his senses went on high alert, and he swept the area behind her for smoke or evidence of charring but found none. He breathed in deeply, but it simply smelled like his grandmother’s house, albeit with a hint of sourness that Grams and Gramps didn’t have in their condo.
Lark stepped out of the way, and Cash moved into the room so she could close the door behind him.
“Good evening, ma’am.” He tipped his hat at Grammy and then swept it off his head, clutching it in front of him as nerves ran through him. He didn’t understand why he felt this way, only that Lark’s intensity had somehow bled into him as well.
Her grandmother looked at Cash from a few feet away at the edge of the galley kitchen. She reached out one hand and placed it on the countertop. “Who is this?” She sounded like she’d been using her voice a lot, and it had turned rusty and hoarse.
“Grammy,” Lark said in a placating tone. “This is Cash. You’ve met him before.”
“I have never met this man in my life,” Grammy said.
Cash blinked, though her grandmother certainly couldn’t be attacking him personally.
“Why did you invite him here?”
“Grammy, he’s staying in Momma and Daddy’s house,” she said. “It’s Cash. Remember, Jet came and got you and brought you up there for Thanksgiving? Cash made all the food.” Lark stood at his side, her voice getting a little bit louder with every word she said.
Cash had no idea what to do in this situation, and remaining silent seemed to be the best thing.
“Come on. I want you to come stay with me at the house tonight.” Lark gestured for her grandmother to go with her down the hall to the bedroom.