Anna’s lips flattened out, and her blue eyes narrowed. She was pissed and letting him know it. When he looked at Jenny, he read a similar expression on her face.
He didn’t give a flying F about Anna, but Jenny was another matter entirely. Clearly, this wasn’t going to be one of his better days.
* * *
Jenny watched Cain talking to the beautiful blonde. She remembered Anna Hobbs from high school, one of the most popular girls in school. Even then, she was beautiful, tall and elegantly curved, with high, full breasts and slender hips. She’d always made Jenny feel short and frumpy. Her hair was the color of the sun, her lips as red as cherries.
Jenny remembered seeing her in the saloon a couple of times a few months back, not long after Cain had shown up in town. He had started dropping into the Star for a beer as construction on the Grandview grew closer to completion, but she couldn’t recall seeing them together.
Anna and Jenny hadn’t spoken. Anna had no reason to remember a lowly freshman while she was the queen of the senior class. Watching the two of them now, it was obvious Anna knew Cain, and not in a high school alumni sort of way. The looks the woman was giving him would melt a branding iron.
Jenny turned away and went into the kitchen to see how Myrna, the cook, was doing—anything to block the sight of Anna and Cain together. She couldn’t believe she was jealous, but she wouldn’t lie to herself, either.
Unfortunately, Mondays were often slow, and that was the case today. Jenny braced herself. She couldn’t hide out much longer, but the thought of standing next to Anna, dressed in a sweatshirt and dirty work jeans, was simply too much.
Maybe if she waited a few more minutes . . .
Cain appeared in the doorway, tall and impressive, taking up far too much space to be ignored. “Where’s that lunch you promised me?”
She’d been hoping he would just leave. Clearly, he was involved with Anna. Even if Jenny had been wearing a cocktail dress and high heels, she couldn’t compete with a sophisticated woman like Anna Hobbs.
“Something’s come up,” Jenny said. “Go ahead and find a table, and I’ll have it brought out. Burger and fries okay, or would you rather have something else?”
Cain gave her a long, searching glance. “If you aren’t going to join me, I’ll take a rain check. I can get something back at the hotel.”
Jenny managed to smile. “A rain check, then. Sorry.”
He looked at her as if he had something he wanted to say, but in the end, he just nodded.
“I’ll see you tomorrow. What time will you be there?”
“Around ten, if that works for you. I’d like to check on things here before I leave.”
“That’s fine. See you tomorrow at ten.” Cain walked out the door, and Jenny breathed a sigh of relief. She tried not to wonder if Anna Hobbs would be spending the night in Cain’s bed, but her vivid imagination was already picturing it.
She’d been stupid to pretend he might have an interest in her. She was hardly on the level of a woman like Anna Hobbs.
Which didn’t change the fact she had already accepted a job at the Grandview, and it didn’t change the fact Jenny intended to do that job as well as she possibly could.
* * *
It was late, the bar empty except for Troy. Jenny said good night as he walked out the side door to his car. She checked to be sure everything was locked up, then went out through the lobby and up the stairs to her suite.
She was mostly unpacked, the stuff she didn’t need stored in the old stone basement, along with her mother’s pretty flowered china.
She undressed and climbed into the queen-size bed, her muscles aching after a day of packing and moving, determined to catch up on her sleep. At least her head wasn’t pounding. Mostly she was just bone-tired.
With a deep sigh, Jenny plumped her pillow and settled back in bed, pleased the mattresses she’d purchased for the new section were so comfortable. Her eyelids were just beginning to close when she caught a flash of light from the corner. Startled, her eyes shot open, and she peered around the room, trying to see what it was.
She spotted the object near the window, perfectly round, a bright, gleaming white spot of light, and it wasn’t stationary. It was drifting around the room.
Her heart began to pound. She slowly sat up in bed, her eyes never leaving the brilliant white object. People who visited Jerome often came to see ghosts. Customers had mentioned things called orbs, supposedly connected to spirits, but she had never seen one. More than one person had claimed to have seen an orb in the saloon. One person even showed her a photo he had taken showing a bright white circle up by the old balcony above the bar.
At the time, she’d figured it was probably a problem with the camera, but now, as the brilliant circle of white hovered near the ceiling, she watched it, more intrigued than frightened. What was it? Where had it come from? Why was it in her bedroom?
The light darted boldly one way and then another, then streaked across the room and blinked out of sight. Jenny’s pulse was still racing, her thoughts spinning.
So orbs were real. Tomorrow she would go on Google and find out more about them. Or at least what other people said about them.
