“It could be my fault, some of this. I told Linden about the hotel safe, and even if he’s not involved, I’d like to help.” When he still hesitated, her eyes widened. “You don’t trust me, do you? After all this, you don’t trust me.” She sounded angry—and something else Jared couldn’t identify.
“I do trust you. I just don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I won’t. We’ll go to some motel where they won’t think to look for us. We’ll register separately, under different names. We might be able to convince them to let us stay without a credit card if we can get some cash. Then we’ll wear disguises. If worse comes to worst, we’ll give them the Buddha.”
“Oh, Cassi, you’ve read—”
“Too many novels. I know. Well?”
“Okay,” he said. “But we go to the store to buy our disguises first, and put them on before we go to the motel.”
Cassi laughed. “You’re as bad as I am.” She bit her lip thoughtfully. “We need more money. Cash. But if we use an ATM—”
“They’ll track us.” He grimaced. “I don’t see how we can get cash otherwise. I could go to Larry’s or one of my other friends here, but if they really searched my hotel room, they might think of that.”
“We go to Renae’s,” Cassi said without hesitation. “I still have enough cash to pay for another taxi, and if we hurry we can get there before the banks close. Even if we don’t make it in time, they have a teller machine. They’ll give us cash, and we’ll pay them back later. Then tomorrow we’ll catch a plane to New York—on a different flight than the one you’ve already scheduled.”
“We?” Doubt and hope battled within Jared. He wanted to be with Cassi, but he felt guilty at the danger he was putting her in.
She shrugged. “I’ve always wanted to tour the Empire State Building and visit the Statue of Liberty.”
“But—”
“They’ll be looking for a man traveling alone. Besides, there’s a promising auction there on Saturday. Linden was thinking about sending me.”
It wasn’t quite the answer Jared had hoped for. Something more along the lines of “Oh, Jared, I just want to be with you” would have been more appealing. Then again, Jared wouldn’t put her in danger simply because she liked him. As it was, if he told her no, he didn’t know if he could make it stick. She knew her own mind.
“Okay, Cassi,” he said finally, hoping he could keep her safe. He wasn’t quite sure how she felt about him, but he knew he was more attracted to her than he had ever been to anyone in his whole life. Was that love? Was it even possible to know after only a few days? Jared didn’t know.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
As the taxi neared Renae’s, Jared leaned over to whisper in Cassi’s ear. Goose bumps arose on her neck and she was glad that her hair, released now from the straw hat, hid the reaction. All too vividly, she recalled their kiss on the beach. His lips had been tender, his face sincere, though Cassi knew he was just playing a part. The intensity of her own emotions had surprised her.
That was why she was staying with Jared. He needed her. At Venice Beach he would have been caught except for her, and maybe she could help him again. She would never forgive herself if something happened to him, something she could have helped avoid. The main reason, of course, was that she wanted to be near him, but how could she say such a thing to a man she had only met last Saturday? No, it was safer not to expose her feelings.
“I just thought of something,” Jared was whispering, his breath hot on her neck. “The hotel might have an address for Renae. We could be traced.”
Cassi shook her head and whispered back. “The room was in my name. They didn’t know she was staying with me. Even when she went into labor, they didn’t have her name.”
“What about Linden? Does he know her?”
“He only knows her first name and that she’s a friend of mine from high school. He can’t trace us on that, can he?”
“I guess it depends on who he’s working for.”
Cassi bit her lip, her thoughts racing. Because of her, Linden had known where the Buddha was likely to be. The more she thought about that, the more she suspected his involvement. His preoccupation with the Buddha had been too apparent—and his reluctance to tell her the reasons. The bottom line was that her trust in her boss had been shattered, and she didn’t know if she wanted to pick up the pieces.
If he was responsible for the break-in at the safe, how could he have used her that way? She’d considered him a friend and had admired him for years. It didn’t make sense.
What if he could somehow trace her? What if the taxi driver was found and questioned? Her heart thumped heavily against her chest as she considered the possibilities.
A glance out the window told her they were traveling through a residential area a couple of blocks from Renae’s house. Abruptly, she leaned forward and tapped the taxi driver on the shoulder. “Excuse me, we’ve changed our minds. Please stop here.” She pointed to a corner house on the left. The driver hit his brakes and came to a stop. Cassi fumbled in her purse for the money. As she handed the driver the rest of her cash over the seat, her other hand slipped down and retrieved the paper she had given him with Renae’s address. “Just in case we change our minds and want to visit after all,” she said with her best innocent smile. The driver hadn’t used a GPS, and she hoped that if questioned later, he wouldn’t be able to remember Renae’s exact address.
They waited until the driver was gone before resuming their trek to Renae’s. The air was warm, typical for June, yet the hottest part of the day was gone. The close-set houses around them had landscaped yards and a few children were out playing, giggling together in their carefree games.
“Do you have a house or an apartment?” Cassi asked.
“I own an apartment near work,” Jared said. “I’ve been meaning to get a house out of town and use the train to commute into work, but . . .” He shrugged and gave her a lopsided smile.
Cassi knew only too well what he was thinking. It had been hard for her at first to decide to buy a house since she had always expected it was something she and her husband would do together. But that husband hadn’t come along, and now that she’d been in her house for a year, she was grateful she hadn’t waited. It was lonely at times, but the neighbor children made it less so, and she kept busy with work, scouts, and church activities. It was second best to what she had planned for herself by this age, perhaps, but immeasurably better than her old rental apartment and the group of younger singles she had left behind. She was happy with her life.
“I have a house,” she said. “Much like these. It’s nice getting away from the main part of the city.”
“I’ll have to come see it sometime.”
Cassi nodded and wondered if he was saying it to be polite, or if he actually wanted to visit. Why couldn’t men say what they really meant?
She glanced at her watch. “Plenty of time left. Look, there’s Renae’s house now.” She pointed to a house in the middle of the block. Even from several houses down they could see the huge homemade sign announcing baby Jared’s birth, though Cassi thought she remembered the nurses at the hospital advising against tempting would-be robbers who were looking for prescription pills. Four children tumbled on the front lawn in what appeared to be an exciting game. Cassi and Jared quickened their steps. Soon the children saw them and ran toward them on the sidewalk.
“Oh, Jared, Cassi, people are bringing us food tonight! We’re waiting for them,” Janet said, reaching them first. “This afternoon they brought a cake and cookies. All because Mommy had a baby. I wish Mommy could have a baby every day.”
Cassi and Jared laughed. “Don’t let your mother hear you say that,” Cassi said, picking up the little girl.
The noise level increased as the other children arrived and excitedly pulled Cassi and Jared into the house. Jared picked up Sandy, whose legs were too short to keep up.
“Mommy, Daddy, look who’s here!” Scotty yelled the minute they were in the door.
“We need some help,” Cassi said hurriedly, sitting on the sofa next to Renae. “We need cash fast, and we can’t use our credit cards or checks because we’re afraid they can be traced. I thought I could borrow some from you and pay you back after we get home. Can you do it?”
“Yeah, sure. If we have what you need. But what’s going on?” Renae gazed at Cassi anxiously.
“Okay, we’ll tell you—but isn’t Trent home? He’ll probably want to hear our story, too.”
“Yes. Scotty, go get Daddy in the garden and tell him I need him. Then all of you kids go into the toy room to play. I don’t want you to come out unless one of you is seriously hurt. I mean it! The Bartons aren’t coming with dinner for another hour. When they do, I’ll call you.”
“Aw, Mom,” the children murmured, but they did as they were told.
Trent arrived in seconds, and soon Cassi and Jared were telling their story. Renae and Trent shook their heads in amazement.
“So you see, we just have to get the Buddha to my boss in New York, and we’ll be out of it,” Jared said. “I’d almost decided to use a security company to send it, but with all these people after the statue, someone might be staking them out, so I can’t trust anyone. Well, anyone but Cassi, and now you guys.” He handed Trent a credit card. “If you could loan me a couple thousand dollars, I’ll give you the pin and you can take out the cash on Thursday morning when we’ll already be in New York. It would really help us out. We have to buy plane tickets, pay for a motel tonight, and who knows what else.”
“You can stay here tonight,” Renae said quickly.
Cassi shook her head. “Jared has someplace he has to be tomorrow at nine, and we’ll need to be closer to the airport. Besides, we don’t want to put your family in any danger. I don’t know how they could trace us here, but they might.”
“Is there anything else we can do?” Trent asked.
“You could call the company I rented the car from and ask them to pick it up,” Jared said. “Have them send Cassi’s suitcase and bag to her house and charge any extra expenses to me. Tell them I had an emergency.” He drew out a business card and on the back scribbled the address where he had left the car. “I’ll have to remember to call the hotel and have them send my things, too. Unless they’ve been confiscated.”
“I can do it,” Trent said. “I’m only too glad to repay you for helping Renae yesterday.”
“Make sure you call from a pay phone,” Cassi said. “Just in case.”
Trent nodded. “I’ll go to the bank right now. I should be back within a half hour.” He gave them a wave and left the room.
Renae studied Jared. “You look tired, and your face looks horrible. Would you like some new bandages?”
Jared shook his head. “I don’t think so. Cassi did a good job of bandaging me.”
“Cassi bandaged you?” Renae arched a brow at Cassi.
“Well, I wasn’t going to let him bleed to death,” Cassi retorted. “Even my bandaging is better than nothing.”
“You will stay to eat at least, won’t you? One of my visiting teachers is bringing dinner, and if there’s not enough, I have some pork chops in the refrigerator that we can cook.” She winked at Cassi. “You like pig, don’t you?”
Cassi glared at Renae. “Some pigs aren’t what they seem. But I don’t think we’d better stay for dinner. What do you think, Jared?”
Jared was looking from Cassi to Renae, obviously mystified. “We ought to eat something. We haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
“Well . . .” Even as she hesitated, her stomach growled loudly enough for the others to hear.
“Oh, come on, Cassi,” Renae said. “You can start the pork chops now, and they’ll be done before Trent gets back.”
“I can make the pork chops,” Jared said. “I promise not to burn your house down.”
“Great—it’s decided.” Renae cast a doubtful look at their cooler. “Meanwhile, I think I’d also better get you something else to carry your statues in. That’s kind of awkward now that you’re not at the beach.”
“You shouldn’t be up so soon after having a baby.” Cassi objected. “In fact, I don’t even see how you can walk at all after that!” She wrinkled her nose, recalling the agony Renae had gone through only the day before.
Renae laughed. “After the first one I couldn’t walk without pain for over a week, but it’s not so bad after the first time, except the afterbirth pains are worse. I’m taking something for those. But you’re right. I shouldn’t be up too much. I lost more blood than usual. So you two go right ahead and do the cooking, and I’ll call for Scotty to get the duffel bags. Let me know if you need something.”
After making sure Scotty answered his mother’s call, Cassi followed Jared into the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator to search for the pork chops while he found a pan and some rice.
“You like to cook?” Cassi asked while Jared started to whistle softly.
“Don’t you?”
Cassi blanched at the question. Not only did she not like to cook, she hated to cook. At home she mostly ate frozen or canned foods, or ate out. When she did try to cook, she ended up with a lot of food burned to the pans and spent hours cleaning them. Consequently, she didn’t understand how anyone could enjoy cooking. The recipes always used words that made no sense at all, and she might starve to death before finding out what they meant. She had finally decided that cooking was an innate gift that you either had or didn’t have. And she didn’t.
“Not really,” she said, determining not to admit the whole truth of just how bad she was at it. “It takes a lot of time.”
“When I was growing up, my mom made us learn to cook, and we each had a night to make dinner. At first I burnt things a lot and had to resort to hot dogs, but eventually I got the hang of it.”
“My mom always did all the cooking at home. She never asked me to help,” Cassi said. “Hey, I bet that with six kids your mom never had to make dinner, right?”
Jared smiled at her crookedly. “That’s right. My mom’s no dummy. She never did any dishes or vacuuming after we got older, either. Smart woman.” Jared’s voice was full of admiration.
“I guess I’ll have to have at least seven children. Then I’ll never have to cook dinner.”
“Ah, but who will teach them? And what do you do until they’re old enough to cook by themselves?” Jared added several dashes of garlic to the pork chops.
“Eat canned,” Cassi replied. “And teach them to read. Maybe put them in a cooking class. Or make their father do it.”
Jared shook his head. “You’re serious. You really hate cooking, don’t you?”
“When they were passing out the cooking genes in heaven, I accidentally got the cookie-eating genes instead. I burn pretty much everything.” Once it was out in the open, Cassi felt better, even though she knew the fact that she didn’t cook wouldn’t likely work in her favor. But it wasn’t as if Jared was actually interested in her as a woman, so what did she care what he thought? He was just an arrogant pig who knew how to cook pork chops. Which was cannibalism, if you thought about it.
“And I hate vacuuming, too,” she added for good measure. “I let it go for months, until you can actually see the dirt on the carpet.”
“With kids you wouldn’t be able to do that.”
Cassi took his comment as an insult. “Well, I don’t have any kids, do I?” She turned around and stalked from the kitchen, muttering under her breath, “I think I hear the baby crying.”
She went back to the front room to find that she hadn’t imagined hearing baby Jared’s cry. His eyes were clamped shut, his tiny mouth opening and closing in little sobs. Renae was nowh
ere to be seen.
“Shhh,” Cassi said as she approached the swing. She sat down in front of the infant. “It’s okay, sweetie. Mommy’s coming right back.”
Little Jared didn’t stop crying, even when Cassi turned on the swing and set him rocking. She looked around for Renae, her heart going out to the helpless baby. Finally, she could stand it no longer and carefully scooped him out of the swing and held him close to her chest. Immediately the baby stopped crying and opened his eyes. They were a deep blue, and seemed much wiser than any Cassi had ever seen.
“See? I told you everything was okay. You gotta trust me.” She bent her head and kissed the soft cheek cuddling him even closer.
Cassi was still sitting on the floor next to the swing, cuddling the tiny miracle, when Renae came back into the room with two duffel bags. “Scotty couldn’t find these, so I took the opportunity to visit the bathroom,” she said, resuming her prone position on the couch.
“He was crying,” Cassi said. “He wouldn’t stop until I picked him up.”
“He’s used to being snuggled inside my stomach. Babies always like lots of cuddling.”
“He’s so precious.” Cassi touched the little hand, and the baby instinctively grabbed her finger.
“You’ll have your own someday.”
Cassi looked up with tears in her eyes. “But I can’t teach him how to cook,” she said, knowing that to Renae, her comment sounded irrational.
Renae snorted. “So what? I can’t teach my children to appreciate art or make their beds. They don’t speak proper English, and I can’t help Scotty with his math. Does that make me a bad mother? We can’t all be talented at everything.”
“I guess you’re right,” Cassi said with a laugh that chased away her melancholy. “I never thought of it that way. I guess I could always hire someone to do the cooking.”
“Now you’ve got it.” Renae pointed to the duffel bags on the floor by Cassi, and then motioned for the baby.
Cassi settled him in his mother’s arm and retrieved the bags. “Thanks. This will work great.” She went to the cooler in the middle of the room, and laid the statues in the separate bags, padding them with clothing. She made sure that Jared’s gun was near the top of his bag, just in case. “Maybe I should change back into my clothes,” she murmured.
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