“Let’s do seven,” she said.
“A hot, flaky chicken pot pie at seven,” he confirmed. “With a really big green salad with homemade croutons.”
She smiled back, and Cash took a mental picture that he could store in his heart and call up at any time of the genuine way she looked at him with happiness. Not contempt.
So maybe she did like him.
She left the kitchen while Cash’s thoughts clashed, and he watched her go before he took his candy down the hall to his bedroom and returned to the kitchen to start on the various elements of dinner.
After all, the pie crust would need time to chill in the fridge, and he’d need the oven for the croutonsandthe chicken pot pie.
So he seasoned the croutons with a ranch dressing packet with a little olive oil to get it to stick to the bread, and put those in the oven so that it would be free for the pie later.
He hummed as he chopped vegetables, then chicken, and set everything back in the fridge for when he’d need it.
He wanted to know more about Lark and why she felt called home to take care of her grandmother when no one else did. He’d never heard Wade or Jet mention anything about their grandmother, and they’d lived out of state for years now.
If things were really that bad, why would her parents be on a church service mission, which was a choice, not a requirement?
He hadn’t pegged Lark as a drama queen, but maybe she was. He didn’t know her that well yet, but he really liked that that operative word—yet—sat there.
She seemed open to a relationship with him, and as he stepped out onto the back deck to tend to the hot tub, as he had planned to do that day as well, he stretched his arms high above his head and looked up into the brilliant blue winter Wyoming sky.
“What am I doing?” he asked the atmosphere and the Good Lord Himself. “She doesn’t live here. Lord, am I really going to start a long-distance relationship with my buddy’s little sister?”
He flipped open the lid on the hot tub and stepped back into the house to get the powder he needed to make sure the chemical levels were correct. Back outside, he poured in two capfuls and set the jets to run through one of their cycles, which would take twenty minutes.
He loved having this hot tub here, and he did sit in it every night around ten o’clock and watch the stars in their formations and the clouds move through the sky. Cash did a lot of his best thinking in the hot tub, and he’d spent hours there with his mind on Lark.
“So maybe it’ll be fine,” he said out loud. “She’s almost done with college.”
And as the jets moved the powder through the system so that the hot tub wouldn’t be scaly or the water green from iron, Cash sat on a bench on the deck and pulled out his phone. He needed to know what someone with an animal science degree did with their degree, and if perhaps he could use someone with Lark’s skills at his cutting horse operation.
CHAPTER
SIX
Lark woke to the scent of something baked and browned, her stomach rumbling. Her bladder also needed to be emptied, badly, and she stumbled across the hall to take care of that first.
When she emerged from the restroom, she felt more human, but one glance down the hall reminded her that Cash-money-honey was making dinner for her that night. She ducked back into the bathroom and practically slammed the door.
She took in her reflection, noting her Medusa-like hair and how she had creases from her blanket in her cheek. “My word,” she whispered to her reflection.
After tossing a washcloth into the sink, she turned on the hot water and pulled open the drawer to find her toothbrush. She didn’t find it there, cursed under her breath that she hadn’t unpacked for the week yet, and darted back across the hall to retrieve her toiletry bag.
Ten minutes later, she’d braided her hair to tame it, washed her face, brushed her teeth, and currently stood in front of the mirror swiping on just a touch of black mascara to give more definition to her eyes.
She swiped on a layer of vanilla lip gloss and pressed her lips together before blowing out her breath. “It’s enough, Lark,” she told herself. She didn’t make herself up for anyone, and she didn’t want Cash to think she’d gone out of her way for dinner tonight.
With the mascara tucked into the drawer with the rest of her makeup, she left the bathroom and headed toward the kitchen. Cash hummed, the tune reaching her ears before she left the hallway.
Lark paused, leaning one shoulder and one hip into the wall and ducking her head. She loved coming home to Wyoming, to these woods, to this house. Everything moved slower here. She didn’t have so many things pressing on her, or pulling her in fifteen different directions.
She loved how dark the sky got here, and how silence blanketed everything in the most peaceful of ways.
But here was Cash, breaking it with the soft hum of his voice, and while Lark couldn’t quite place the song, it didn’t matter. This became her new definition of soft, slow, and peaceful. A new place where she could be herself, even with messy hair and an unwashed face and wrinkled clothes.
A place that felt like home.
