“Got it.” The police weren’t going to sweep thisunder the rug, and that simple fact calmed her racing heart. Asa was right. She wasn’t alone in this, even if it sometimes felt like she was the only one still looking for Anthony.
Someone had called in a sighting. An anonymous person in Winchester claimed he saw a man matching Anthony’s description at a pawn shop. It was the first sighting in years, and she had another sliver of hope to hold on to. All that time and effort she put into making sure his profile was at the top of every missing persons database was worth it.
Lauren scanned the map of Winchester, noting the pawn shop and the surrounding area. It looked like any other small town in Wyoming. Had Anthony been hiding just down the road for years?
The bigger news was that Anthony was probably alive. If the person had actually seen her cousin, then she wasn’t chasing after a ghost.
The rumble of Zach’s truck made her glance at the clock. She’d been watching Winchester weather and traffic cameras for hours. How had so much time slipped by her?
Zach’s footsteps thudded on the porch just as she was stowing her laptop by the couch. He’d made it clear he didn’t want to hear about Anthony anymore, so she wouldn’t bother him with the news. He’d just remind her how senseless her search was and bring up all of Anthony’s mistakes. Plus, she’d promised Asa she wouldn’t tell anyone.
Lauren got to her feet and tried her best to look innocent as Zach walked in. “Hey. How was your day?”
Zach paused halfway in the door and furrowed his brow. “Um, fine. How was yours?”
She pushed her hands into her back pockets, then took them out again. Standing in front of him wasn’t going to make it easy to hide her thoughts, so she headed for the kitchen. “Good. I should probably get started on dinner. How do you feel about meatloaf?”
“Meatloaf is fine.” He silently followed her to the kitchen where he leaned a hip against the counter and crossed his arms. “Are you okay?”
Lauren pulled a loaf pan out of the cabinet and opened another to get the mixing bowl. “I’m fine.”
Zach stood there watching her for a moment before he spoke again. “Are you sure? You look tense.”
She rose to her feet and moved to the refrigerator. “I’m fine. Working two jobs isn’t easy, so I’m just a little stressed and tired.”
She’d put in her notice at the library weeks ago, but they hadn’t found a replacement for her yet. The job at Blackwater Hope House was full-time now, and jumping back and forth between the two was draining the life out of her. She’d expected as much from the counseling position. Add in the therapy sessions she’d been attending for her own mental wellness, and she was emotionally tapped out.
Shifting her focus to dinner preparations kept her thoughts from wandering to work or Anthony. Hertherapist warned her that it would be tough to counsel others without becoming emotionally attached to her patients’ success. She’d known it would reopen old wounds when she decided to work with abused women and children, but if she didn’t step up to help them, who would?
There was another warning lingering in the back of her mind. The ugly reminder that she would inevitably fail. She would encounter people in her line of work that she wouldn’t be able to reach, and their losses would become her own.
Her heart was too big sometimes. It was hard to look at them as patients when she saw herself in so many of them. If Anthony hadn’t protected her, if she hadn’t been placed in good foster homes, if she hadn’t done everything in her power to get the education she needed to pursue her dreams, she could be in the same position as any of the women she met with at the shelter.
She turned around with a carton of eggs and a bottle of ketchup and bumped right into Zach. When she fumbled everything in her hands, he caught them with the calmness of a ninja.
“You look tired. Let me cook dinner while you take a bath or something.”
Lauren stared up at Zach. Was he saying she looked haggard or was he being sweet? “You want to cook dinner?”
“I didn’t say I wanted to. I can give it a try, but I make no promises.”
“But after the spaghetti?—”
“Shh. We’re not talking about that.” He looked around the kitchen. “Do you have a recipe or something?”
She slowly turned and reached for the recipe book she stashed by the coffee pot and flipped to the page she had memorized. If Zach was offering to try something new and do something nice for her, she wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth.
She lay the book open flat on the counter and propped her hands on her hips. “That should be pretty easy. You just put everything in a bowl and mash it up with your hands.”
“With my hands?” Zach looked down at his calloused hands that sported grease stains from a day of working at the ranch.
“Well, you’ll need to wash them first. I’d suggest taking the meat out of the refrigerator now because your hands are going to be freezing when you start mixing.”
Zach shooed her away as he moved to the sink to wash his hands. “Go. I can handle this.”
All Lauren could do was stand beside him and gawk. What extraterrestrial had given Zach Wilson a lobotomy?
Once his hands were washed, he slung them, shooting excess water into the sink. He looked at her with eyebrows raised. “What are you still doing here?”
