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God, she hadn’t thought about that night in a long time. She remembered snow falling. Doors slamming. Raised voices. Her mother crying.
“My dad left a week before Christmas. He came into my room, tossed a couple of presents on the bed, and told me to be good for Mom. He said I’d see him soon.” She shook her head slowly. “That never happened, and my mother found a new love at the bottom of every whiskey bottle she could get her hands on.”
Chess was glad for a bit of quiet. She sank to the bed and stared dully at the floor.
“What happened the other night?” Cash asked as he moved closer to her. When she felt his weight on the mattress, Chess closed her eyes and shook her head. Why stop
now?
“A girl I know, Bonnie, hooked me up with this man, Gerald Martin. He’s a local businessman and wanted a date for dinner. Someone to look pretty on his arm while he visited the high-roller table at the casino. That’s all it was supposed to be, dinner. I was to smile and perform like a damn circus animal. I’d do that and end the night with five hundred dollars. It sounded pretty straightforward to me. But Mr. Martin and I weren’t on the same page, and he…” She tumbled over her words. “He wanted more, and things got physical.” She pointed to her face. “I wouldn’t give in, and eventually, he had enough. He kicked me out of the car about a mile from town with a fifty-dollar bill for my trouble.”
Silence greeted her confession.
She got up from the bed and took a few steps away from him, hating the sudden sting of tears. She peered through the window as the wind continued to moan. Already what little light there was had faded, and soon it would be dark.
“The diner’s still open,” she said.
“It is.” His voice was soft and husky, the timbre meant to soothe. “Joely and Steve are making dinner tonight. She told us to come.”
She whirled around in surprise. “Us? Since when did we become an us?”
Cash shrugged. “She knows you’re staying with me because you couldn’t get in your room.” He frowned and dug through the pocket of his jeans. “That reminds me.” He held up a key. “I convinced Jerry it was in his best interest to hand this over. You don’t have to worry about him anymore.”
Cash smiled at her, and it knocked a hole in the ice around her heart. “What do you say?” he asked. “Do you want to be my Christmas Eve date?”
Her hand crept up to her still-swollen cheek and puffy eye. She knew how awful she looked. How could she go anywhere like this?
Cash moved toward her slowly. When he stopped an inch or so away from Chess, she kept her eyes glued to the pulse at his neck. It beat rapidly, and she thought that maybe it matched the tempo of her own. He smelled clean and fresh, and he was so big, a girl could get lost in him.
His hand slid up her cheek. She fought the urge to rest her head in his strength. Cash Bodine was something she shouldn’t get used to. Because just like Christmas, he was here now, and soon he’d be gone.
“You look beautiful, Chess. Go and get changed and come with me to dinner.”
She didn’t answer on account of the big lump in her throat.
He pressed the key into the palm of her hand and stepped back, giving her some much-needed room. “Think about it. I’ll probably head over in an hour or so.”
Chess stared down at the key in her hand. In the space of a few minutes, Cash had shown her something she thought was lost forever—kindness. He was a man who could make her think about things she had no business thinking of. And what did hope do to a girl like Chess Somers? It set her up to fall.
Chapter Six
Cash pulled on his boots and then sat on the edge of his bed for a few moments, listening to the wind slam snow and ice against the window. It was never-ending, this storm, and he was restless, not used to having so much downtime and being cooped up inside. He had an hour to kill before heading over to the diner and decided it was as good a time as any to get some work done.
Plus, work was a distraction, and at the moment, he needed one. It was that or wear a hole in the carpet, pacing the room while he wondered about the woman next door. About whether she’d come to dinner with him and if anything could make the sadness he’d glimpsed go away.
He grabbed a folder from his duffel bag marked “Tanesha Davis.” A picture of a pretty young black woman was pinned to the top. Her hair was straightened and long, her dark eyes shiny, her smile big. It was a candid photo that captured something special. Love. Happiness.
She was from Kentucky, had gone to college in upstate New York where she was a junior, and, up until six weeks ago, things seemed to be fine. But then she suddenly dropped out of school and moved in with some guy her parents had never heard of. Tanesha called them once a week but refused to come home. She wouldn’t tell her parents where she was living, wouldn’t give them any details about this man, and in desperation, they’d hired Cash to find her.
It was something he was good at. Finding people who didn’t want to be found.
He read over what little information he’d gotten from the parents, then made notes about her social media accounts, which, for the most part, had gone silent, save for a few pics she’d posted to Instagram and Twitter. Nothing on Facebook, but that didn’t surprise him since Facebook seemed to be a platform for folks over thirty these days. He looked through the names of people who’d commented on her posts, investigated them as much as he could, and came up with a list of kids to talk to. By the time he was done organizing the file, it was after four. He grabbed his coat and knitted hat and headed outside.
The window to Chess’s room was lit, though the blind was pulled down. He knocked on her door, but there was no answer, then waited a minute or so before knocking again—still no answer. He listened carefully, moving closer, but with the wind in his ears, it was hard to do. He gave one last rap.
“I’m heading over, Chess.” His voice sounded muffled even to him, and he doubted she heard.
No answer.
