Ann Aguirre - Hell Fire

“You kept it,” I breathed.

“I knew how much it meant to you.”

Without regard for modesty, I wiggled out of my clothes and into the worn cotton. It felt like coming home, a hug from my mother. Tears prickled at my eyes. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized how much I missed this silly old yellow shirt.

“Why didn’t you give it to me sooner?”

“I forgot,” he said honestly. “I stuffed it in my bag before I left Tampa to go looking for you. I meant to send it to you after I tracked you down. It was the one thing I felt sure you’d want out of everything you left behind. But then—”

“Min went missing, and you had other things on your mind,” I finished.

He’d arranged himself beneath the throw as I got myself situated. His arms came around me, snuggling me into his side with an alacrity that suggested he missed me more than he’d said. I decided I’d let him snuggle me a little before I kicked him out. It had been a long day for both of us.

To my surprise, he didn’t push the situation. “You must have been like Shannon once,” he said quietly. “I can see you in her. I imagine you were a lot like her when you ran away from Kilmer. Meeting her, talking to her, well . . . I think I understand you better now.”

I saw what he was getting at, but I couldn’t agree. “No matter what might be wrong with them, she has a family. She’s not like me.”

“Yes, she is. You’re both looking for where you belong.” That stymied me because it was so clearly true. And it was more perceptive than I’d come to expect from Chance. He didn’t used to deal well in emotional coin; he preferred to show his feelings through material things.

When we’d have a fight back in Tampa, he’d come home with roses, chocolate, and an expensive piece of jewelry. At first, I found that charming, but eventually, I started wanting him to apologize and tell me how he felt; why he did the things he did. And he didn’t want to tell me anything at all.

Now he seemed to be genuinely trying to open up. We’d stopped to pick up some more clothing for me on the way to Georgia, but it had been a convenience, not an attempt on his part to impress me with what he could offer financially. He’d finally figured out I wanted more from him than his magical way of turning a hundred bucks into a thousand.

“You can’t stay,” I said softly. “If you give me your bed, it’s the couch for you.”

He pushed off the mattress with a faint sigh. “You can’t blame a guy for trying.”

“Good night, Chance.”

“Sweet dreams, love.”

I found myself thinking, Maybe people can change. Maybe —

Sleep snatched me before I could complete the thought.

When I woke, the slant of the sunlight told me I’d slept half the morning away, so I took a quick, tepid shower and got dressed. I plucked my cell from where it was charging in the hall and called Miss Minnie. “Good morning. It’s Corine. How are you?”

“Old and achy,” she said with a little laugh. “How about you, dear?”

“Good. I was wondering if you still wanted us to come to supper.”

“I surely do. I’ll make a nice big pot of soup and some corn bread. You like peach pie, don’t you?”

“Cherry is my favorite,” I felt compelled to say.

“Cherry it is. It will be so good to catch up and get to know your young man. I don’t have guests as often as I’d like these days. Everyone’s just so busy. . . .” She rambled on, giving me some idea why people didn’t stop by more often, but I needed any information she might possess.

“I’ll have two more friends with me, if that’s all right?”

“Oh, more young people.” She sounded genuinely delighted. “Soup can always stretch, don’t you fret about that. I’ll see you tonight at six, then?”

“I’m looking forward to it.” And I was. Miss Minnie had been the second-best cook of all my foster mothers, surpassed only by Miz Ruth. And actually Miss Minnie’s pies were better. I might as well enjoy some aspects of being back in Georgia.

Though the food was delicious in Mexico, it was also different. You just couldn’t find decent biscuits and gravy there, or fried chicken, let alone picnic food like potato salad. And the pie was nothing like the same. If I wanted cherry pie, I had to go to the gourmet foods section at Palacio del Hierro—an upscale department store—and search the shelves for the filling. I’d never been able to find ready-made piecrust, either, which meant making it from scratch, and I wasn’t nearly skilled enough for that. Plus, my initial attempts at baking had failed due to the high altitude.

Just thinking of all the delicious Southern food made my stomach rumble, and I realized as I rang off that I hadn’t eaten breakfast. The others were waiting for me in the kitchen, drinking coffee someone had made with the old-fashioned pot. Jesse offered me a cup when I stumbled in, still braiding my hair.

“Wow,” Shannon said. “Your hair is really long. Pretty. Is it real?”

“Depends on what you mean by that. It’s real hair .”

“The color.” She rolled her eyes.

I grinned. “As much as yours is.”

That surprised a smile out of her. I guessed she wasn’t used to grown women who admitted to coloring their hair; I could hear her mother chiding that it wasn’t genteel to discuss such artifice. I ate an apple and drank a cup of sweet coffee, liberally mixed with powdered milk. It was better than you’d think. I followed that up with toast and jelly.

Shannon seemed more relaxed than I’d ever seen her. I could understand why. With men like Jesse and Chance telling you they wouldn’t let anything happen, it was easy to relax. I’d learned the hard way—sometimes there was nothing anybody could do.

“Are we ready?” I asked.

“Yeah, we already ate,” Saldana told me. “We should take my Forester. People already know the Mustang, if someone tried to run Corine over the other day.”

I scowled. I would love to have a talk with the guy who owned the Cutlass. In fact . . . we had a native here. Maybe she could tell us who drove it.

“Good point.” Chance seemed more cheerful this morning—less inclined to smash Jesse’s head in with a claw hammer.

“Shannon, do you know who drives a dark blue Olds Cutlass Supreme?” I asked. “It was an older car, but very well kept.”

As we left the kitchen, she thought about that, pale brow furrowed. “Yeah, actually. Sounds like Little Ed Willoughby. His mother owns the hardware store. She’s on the school board and the town council—a real meddler, if you ask me.”

When we came into the parlor, Butch raised his head from where he’d been napping on the love seat. He leaped up and trotted to the front door, but he wasn’t agitated. His calmness reassured me, though; the wards must be solid.

“You think you’re going with us?” I asked the dog.

He yapped once.

Despite her own gift, Shannon gazed at him wide-eyed. “Oh my God, that is the coolest thing ever. You have a talking dog!”

“Kind of,” I said.

“How? Is he magical?”

I considered as I swept him into my handbag. “I’m not sure. We didn’t train him to do it, that’s for sure. Maybe one day we’ll figure out what makes him tick.”

“He’s so cute,” she said, going for the sweet spot behind his ears, and Butch wore an expression I liked to call “blissful dog.”

As I headed down the front steps, the others followed.

Jesse couldn’t stop being a cop long enough for us to climb in the Forester. He prompted Shannon for more info as we opened the doors. “Willoughby’s dad is Big Ed?”

“His dad’s dead,” Shannon said flatly. “Or presumed so. He went missing about three months ago.”