“How can we help?” This from Austin because Kenzie had gone mute under the barrage of Lani’s words.
“Two months ago, she relapsed and was admitted for additional treatment. At the time, her doctors hoped she’d respond to a new experimental therapy. Jamey was very unhappy about having to return to the hospital.”
“Can’t blame her for that,” Austin said.
Lani nodded in acknowledgment. “In order to put a smile back on their daughter’s face, her parents promised her they’d buy her a horse for Christmas. You see, Jamey’s horse crazy, has begged for one for years. Because there’s nothing left for us to do for her medically, she’s going home on Friday.”
“Does she know how sick she is?”
Lani shrugged. “No one has said the words, but I believe kids sort of know the truth no matter what they’re told. Children are pretty insightful, especially teens.” Lani bit down on her lower lip, gathered her emotions. Lani glanced between Kenzie and Austin. “So—and this is where you two come in—I want her to have a horse.”
Kenzie asked, “How can we help?”
“I want to fulfill Jamey’s last wish. I want to give Oro to Jamey, just for a little while….The Taylors live in a rural area, so they have property around their house and space for my horse. And they’ll pay for feed. All that’s needed is someone to load up Oro and transport him, call and check on him, and bring him back to Bellmeade”—she paused, collecting herself again—“after.”
Kenzie certainly understood the finality of after.
Lani forged ahead. “Please believe me, I’d do this myself if I could. My last day of work is Thursday, and I have no wiggle room before my wedding on Saturday. Then I’ll be on my honeymoon, and I don’t think this gift can wait until Dawson and I return.” Lani leaned forward in earnest. “I can’t make Jamey well again, but I can give her a horse. I just need you two to be my helping hands. I haven’t committed you, so if you’d rather not—”
“Of course we’ll do it!” Kenzie said before Lani could finish her sentence. She looked to Austin, who nodded emphatically.
Lani closed her eyes. “Thank you. She’ll be so excited when she sees her very own horse.” She reached inside the tote once more and pulled out a folded piece of paper. “Here are her parents’ phone numbers and address. I’ll tell them when I see them upstairs you’re on board.”
“Can Jamey…Is she strong enough to ride?” Kenzie asked.
“It won’t matter. She’ll believe she has a horse. Good medicine.”
“So we’ll bring a saddle with us,” Austin said.
“Yes, and anything else that will make Oro look like an honest-to-goodness Christmas gift.” Lani looked at the oversized watch on her wrist and stood. “I’ve got to run.”
“Wait!” Kenzie called before Lani took off. “How do we gift-wrap a horse? It’s not Christmas.”
Lani offered an enigmatic smile. “It is at Jamey’s house.”
* * *
—
Kenzie and Austin left the cafeteria, exited the hospital into the shimmering heat of the parking lot, and crossed to her SUV. Once in the car, she turned on the engine and the AC but didn’t put the vehicle in reverse.
“What are you thinking?” Austin asked as Kenzie hesitated.
“I’m thinking that Lani’s the kindest, most thoughtful human being I’ve ever met.”
“Agreed. When do you want to call the Taylors?”
“I’ll call tonight and make arrangements with them.” She didn’t pull out of the parking space.
“I can’t help but notice that we’re not moving.”
“I’ve had Lani’s wedding invite hanging on my refrigerator door since she handed it to me. I see it every day, and yet”—she shook her head—“I totally didn’t notice that her wedding day is this Saturday. This Saturday!”
“Yeah…I’d lost track of the date too. So again, I ask, what now?”
She glanced into her rearview mirror. “I’m going to drop you at Bellmeade and go shopping. I haven’t got a thing to wear.”
Austin roared a laugh. “A woman’s lament. I heard my sister and Mom say that more times than I can count.”
She made a face at him, backed out of the space, and headed out of the lot. “This is serious. The skirt I wore on my birthday has grass stains around the hem.”
“A crisis,” he deadpanned. “Where are you going to shop?”
“Toward Nashville, familiar territory.”
“Bellmeade’s in the other direction. Save some time and let me come with you.” She flashed him an as if look. “I’m serious. Maybe you can help me pick out some guy duds, because come to think of it, I don’t have anything fancy enough to wear either.”
“It’s dressy casual.”
“And so, what does dressy casual look like? Should I Google it?” He reached for his phone.
“You could probably wear the khakis you wore to my birthday party and a jacket.”
“And you’ll look like a million bucks and I won’t. Nah…I want something new to wear too.”
She rolled her eyes. “Never mind. We’ll shop for both of us.”
He offered a satisfied grin and settled into the comfort of the SUV’s cream-colored leather seat.
* * *
—
She drove to a trendy outdoor mall where cars were relegated to large parking lots surrounding the outlying area, and shoppers walked in to a wide thoroughfare of spacious brick pathways and sidewalks. Stores, boutiques, and small bistros lined the U-shaped plaza, anchored by a movie theater with a discreet marquee at one end. Gurgling fountains, colorful landscaping, and light posts with hanging flower baskets gave the space an aura of tranquility. As they window-shopped, Austin said, “The whole place smells like crisp hundred-dollar bills, but it does seem to have something for everyone.”
“It was Mom’s and Caroline’s favorite place to shop. They could spend hours here.”
“Not yours?”
“I’ve never been much of a shopper.” Memories of summer days of the three of them strolling the mall, of her mother and sister ducking into almost every store, while Kenzie, if they had talked her into coming with them, grew bored and ended up sitting on benches near fountains, reading and wishing she’d stayed home with the horses.
Today, with Austin, she shelved her memories, concentrated on finding a dress suitable for a wedding. She chose a boutique with a French-sounding name, entered, and was met with a cool blast of air heavily scented with lavender. An attractive salesgirl greeted them and offered Austin a flirty smile. Kenzie crossed to a rack of dresses, flipped through the merchandise in her size, and muttered, “I don’t know what I want. Everything looks the same.”
Austin stepped beside her. “Not everything.” He withdrew two hangers holding strappy sundresses with fitted bodices and full skirts and held them up for Kenzie. “What about these? They’re pretty—at least, pretty to guy eyes like mine. Tasteful and quietly elegant,” he added in a flourish of exaggerated fashion speak.
She grimaced but took the dresses and followed the sales clerk to the changing area at the back of the store. Kenzie discarded one of the dresses after one look at herself in the full-length mirror. The second dress, pale yellow, was more to her liking. The shoulder straps were wider, one shoulder plain, the other adorned with a cascade of printed flowers that fell over one breast to the fitted bodice that dropped into a low V, accenting her flat stomach. The flower motif was again scattered around the hem of the skirt. She’d never put on a dress that made her feel more girly.
With the salesgirl hovering near Austin, and Austin’s elbow resting on a low shelf holding an array of costume jewelry, Kenzie emerged from behind the curtain. He immediately straightened, appraised her with his eyes, and offered a heart-stopping grin. “Nice. Very nice.”
She spun, letting the full skirt make a wide circle, saw the hemline flowers blur together in a riot of color. Secretly, she wanted Austin to look at her, not the silly salesgirl vying for his attention. His approval mattered to her, even though she told herself it shouldn’t. “You sure?”
His eyes held hers. Her pulse fluttered. “The dress is nice, but frankly, you’d look good in a potato sack.”
Flustered by his reaction, she looked at the price tag hanging under one arm and flinched. “A potato sack would be a whole lot more affordable. And honestly, I can’t imagine where I’ll ever wear this dress again.”
Austin looked amused. “To buy, or not to buy—that is the question.”
“What would Shakespeare say about you twisting one of his most famous lines?”
“He’d say, ‘Methinks the damsel looks mighty fine.’ ”
She laughed gaily, studied herself in a wall mirror, weighed her options. Nothing in her closet at Bellmeade, or in storage at college, made her feel as good as she did in this dress. If she never wore it again, it would be worth the price to attend Lani’s wedding with Austin at her side.
Waiting for her to make up her mind, Austin let himself enjoy the vision of her, until he felt the familiar, and forbidden, stirrings within his body. He cleared his throat and turned his head. “Make up your mind, Kenz, because I need clothes too, and we’re an hour away from Bellmeade.”
“Right! Sorry.” She rushed to the dressing room, quickly changed from Cinderella dress into Kenzie clothes, went to the cash register, and paid for her purchase.
Once outside in the hot sun, they crossed the plaza to a men’s store, where, at lightning speed, he bought tan dress slacks, a navy-blue blazer, and a white polo shirt to wear under the blazer.
“I think you nailed dressy casual,” she told him.
“I’ll be the wallflower; you’ll be the garden,” he joked as they left the store.
They made their way to the parking lot, her walking ahead, him carrying the bags behind her. They were almost at her SUV when Austin stopped abruptly and stepped in front of her, turning himself into a human wall. “Stay back.”
“Why?” She tried to get around him, but cars hemmed her in on both sides, and he wasn’t budging.
“Wait!” He dropped the packages and moved forward slowly as he scanned the packed lot.
She didn’t wait but crowded against his back, still trying to see around him. “Austin, what’s going on?”
“Your car window’s been smashed.”
Shock and disbelief rocked Kenzie. “Smashed? How?”
By now Austin had turned sideways and was looking at a spiderweb of cracked glass, part of it forced inward, some scattered on the ground. She sidled beside him, crunching broken pebbles of glass underfoot. She looked inside and gasped. Both seats had been slashed with long vicious wounds that left the innards oozing out of the pale creamy leather like pieces of roadkill. She kept staring at the broken window and the shredded, brutalized seats. “Who…Why…?”
Austin put his hands on her shoulders and gently turned her to face him. “Look at me, Kenzie. Just look in my eyes.” Slowly, she let her gaze drift to his. Blue eyes rimmed with green. Chameleon eyes, serious eyes, well-informed eyes. “Whoever did this used a special glass-break tool. He kicked in the window, unlocked the door, and slashed the seats. He was in and out in less than two minutes.”
“But the car has an alarm. It must have gone off. Didn’t anybody hear it?”
“I’m sure it did, but in such a large parking lot, people generally ignore them. Eventually, your alarm wound down, and by then, the guy was long gone. Kenzie, I think we should call the police.”
“No! No police.”
He’d already pulled his cell phone from his shirt pocket. “Kenzie, this wasn’t a crime of opportunity. Look around us. The car on the right isn’t even locked.” She saw that all four door lock buttons were in unlocked positions. He gestured. “Look, there’s stuff lying all over that car’s backseat, easy pickings for a thief. In the next row, I see three vehicles with the windows down. Your car was targeted.”
Despite the heat, she shivered, not wanting to accept his conclusion. “Lots of people leave their windows down.”
“Your windows were closed and your car was locked. Someone likely knew this was your car when they attacked it. This means the cops should be involved. I’m calling 911.” He held up his phone.
She folded her hand over his to prevent him from punching in the three numbers. “If I was targeted, we both know who did it—Billy Hixson. He knows I had him disqualified from the horse show, and this is his way of telling me he knows and of getting back at me.”
“Even more of a reason to get the law involved.” If it was Billy, the guy was far more dangerous than Austin had realized. On the day of the competition, Austin had read Billy as a jerk and a bully. This attack on Kenzie’s car put a different spin on the guy. “Thinking you know and proving it are two different things. The cops might be able to verify it was Billy with a forensic analysis of something the vandal left behind.”
“Might,” she said. “I don’t want the police here. I mean it, Austin.”
Her blue eyes snapped like an electrical charge, and her jaw jutted. “Odds are that vandalism is a low priority for police.” He waited for a better explanation; the blazing-hot sun intensified his anger. “If any media gets wind that Kenzie Caine’s car was vandalized, it will be newsworthy. And trust me, my family has spent enough time in the news-cycle limelight over the past few years. I don’t care about me, but the last thing my mother needs is to hear about my car being attacked. She’s doing better these days. I can’t take away her peace of mind.”
Austin looked skyward, blew out a breath of frustration. He understood completely, but damn, he wanted the culprit to pay. Nor could he ignore the possibility of Kenzie being in harm’s way. However, she was right about one thing: police would give vandalism damage a low priority.
“So the guy who did this—and let’s say it was Billy enacting revenge—walks away scot-free. And you’re all right with that?”
“No, but in my experience, justice is a phantom, and I’ve walked away from worse hurts.” As she said the words, her blue eyes swam with tears, ripping at his heart. She gently removed his phone from his hand and slid it into the front pocket of his shirt. “Don’t you see? The only thing that makes this vandalism relevant would be my name offering a renewed source of gossip. Something like this could land on the police-blotter blurbs that newspapers from around here print routinely. I won’t take the chance.”
“I assume you won’t tell your father either.”
“No way. He can’t know. The only person I’m going to tell is my insurance agent.” She had dropped her purse but now picked it up and fished out her cell phone. “The SUV is mine, and so is the insurance policy. I pay for it. I’ll let my agent know where the car is and he’ll have a loaner car brought to us.”
“Will you at least look and see if anything’s missing from your car? I mean, if it wasn’t Billy—”
To assuage him, she carefully opened the center console, then the glove compartment. “Everything’s here. No thief did this.”
Austin wasn’t happy with her decision, yet he accepted it. “All right. Then I suggest we go back to the mall, sit inside one of those little cafés where it’s cooler, and get cold drinks. Whoever your insurer sends can meet us there.” Still frustrated, he bent down, snatched up their abandoned packages, and followed her as she made the call.
* * *
—
Jamey Taylor’s ranch-style home sat on copious acreage off a winding country road on the rural outskirts of the county. July’s intense heat had turned the front lawn brown, the only greenery sprouted from a generous well-watered vegetable garden planted at the side of the house.
Kenzie had call
ed the night before, and when Martha Taylor asked, “Can you come first thing tomorrow?” she’d agreed. That morning she and Austin quickly fed the horses and put off other chores for later. Kenzie had opted for a pickup truck as a loaner vehicle while her SUV was being repaired and had borrowed a horse trailer from Jon Mercer to make the trip with Oro.
Austin drove the narrow curvy road, parked in the driveway in front of the garage, and shut down the engine. “You ready?” She nibbled her bottom lip and remained seated. “You seem anxious.”
Knowing that a child was going to die unnerved her. Alive, one minute, gone in another. Like her sister. “I…I just don’t want anything to go wrong.”
“Not on our watch,” Austin said, and gently squeezed her hand.
Together, they checked on the golden palomino inside the trailer and walked to the Taylors’ front door and rang the doorbell.
A man and woman greeted them. “I’m Martha. This here’s Jim. We’re so excited about you helping to make our little girl’s wish come true.”
“We’re bringing Jamey home this afternoon,” Jim added. “We wanted the horse waiting here for her as a surprise.” He was a tall man with sandy-colored hair and green eyes, a wide mouth stretched wider by a smile. “Lani and the two of you are godsends.”
“Come in, come in,” Martha urged.
Kenzie and Austin stepped over the threshold and straight into Christmas. A corner of the room held a tree decorated with lights, ornaments, candy canes, and garlands of tinsel. Under the tree, packages lay wrapped and waiting. Above an unlit fireplace was a mantel draped with winter greenery sprayed with artificial snow, and three large red stockings, each stuffed to the brim with gifts, hung on fancy hooks. “Oh my!” Kenzie said. “Lani told me it was Christmas at Jamey’s house, but this is amazing!”
“Jamey loves Christmas, and we wanted to give her this one.” Her last Christmas. Christmas music played softly from another room, and Kenzie felt a tightening in her chest, thinking of another girl who would never see another Christmas.
The Girl with the Broken Heart Page 13
