Beneath a Southern Sky - By Deborah Raney Page 0,30
like your new car, by the way,” he told Daria.
“Thanks. It’s not really new, but hey, it’s mine. Well, mine and the bank’s.”
“Yeah, don’t I know how that goes.”
After a moment of awkward silence, he said, “I’d better let you go.”
“Thanks so much for coming to my rescue, Cole. You didn’t have to do that.”
“My pleasure.” His mock salute turned into a full-fledged wave. “See you tomorrow.”
“You too. Thanks again.”
As she backed out of the parking space, she caught a glimpse of herself in the rearview mirror and was embarrassed to realize that she was blushing. Good grief. I’m worse than Jennifer. She replayed her encounter with Cole over and over in her mind as she drove home. He was so sweet with Natalie. And so thoughtful to help her with her packages. The sound of his deep, gentle voice warmed her heart at the same time it made her ache for a voice she would never hear again.
Sitting in the quiet of her living room that evening with crickets chirping outside the open windows, Natalie tucked safely in bed in her nursery, and the laptop open in front of her, Daria’s life in Colombia with Nate seemed an eternity ago.
That first July anniversary passed quietly. The date of Nathan’s death. Sometimes it frightened her that she was forgetting him. She could still close her eyes and conjure up his face, but sometimes she knew that all she was seeing was the photograph on her nightstand. The camera had locked onto a tanned, blond man sporting a handsome cleft in his chin and flashing white, even teeth. But she knew that the camera had failed to capture the split second before the shutter released, when Nate had hammed a goofy grin, or the moment after, when his expression had turned serious, trying to explain to her how to set the shutter speed. She felt panicked sometimes that she couldn’t see his face clearly in those daily memories anymore.
And his voice. She was losing that, too. She knew there were some cassette recordings Nate had made in Colombia, documenting his findings about the dialect and customs—things he’d wished Evangeline Magrit, the former missionary to the Timoné, had left for him and Daria. The tapes were stored away with the few belongings she had brought back from Colombia, but she hadn’t had the courage to get them out and play them yet.
She desperately needed to do that. Because sometimes, to her dismay, when she sat in the quiet of evening and her thoughts turned to Nathan, the voice that came from his lips in her memories was the voice of another man.
She didn’t want to admit it, even to herself, but she knew to whom that voice belonged. Colson Hunter. And knowing made her feel like the worst kind of traitor.
Eight
Daria hung up her jacket and went around behind the reception desk to put her purse under the counter. “Good morning,” she sang cheerfully to the staff gathered around the coffeepot.
Carla Eldridge and Travis Carruthers returned her greeting, but their response was subdued. Colson Hunter, who stood reading a chart in the doorway between the office and the reception room, ignored them all and started back toward his office. Daria noticed that he had a stubble of beard and heavy circles under his eyes. She wondered if he’d been called out for an emergency during the night. Maybe they’d had to euthanize a family pet. That always tended to sober this usually lively group.
She looked at Carla for an explanation, but couldn’t catch the technician’s eye. Halfway down the hall, Cole’s footsteps halted, and he barked to no one in particular, “I’ve got to have that vaccine this morning! Has anyone called the supplier? Daria, what time is Avery Knudsen bringing those hogs in?”
She scanned the columns in the appointment book that lay open in front of her. “I have him down for ten,” she told him.
“Well, that’s not going to happen,” he growled. “Call him and reschedule.” The back door slammed behind him before she could ask him what time he wanted to reschedule for.
Bewildered, Daria watched out the window as Cole trudged toward the barn, head down, shoulders hunched inside the upturned collar of his jacket. Without comment, Travis followed him out.
Daria turned to Carla, incredulous. “What is wrong with him?” She’d never seen her boss so surly. If it hadn’t been so unlike Cole, she would have been angry at his rudeness.