Run, Hide - By Carol Ericson Page 0,25
to let them know we’re on the way, anyway.”
“Underwear.” Gavin giggled and finished off the flower with an orange flourish.
Cade paid the bill with cash. In fact, he and Jenna had enough cash between them to open their own bank. She’d handled things well on her own, but he didn’t want her to be on her own anymore.
They wandered around the town, which happened to be a hub of sorts for tourists heading to Vegas or the Grand Canyon or Utah’s National Parks, and picked up some clothes, toiletries and snacks for the drive.
On the road out of town, the flea market loomed ahead of them, a colorful mishmash of goods and humanity. Cade pulled into the dirt parking lot next to the booths. “Do you think we can find a car seat for Gavin here?”
“I think so. Looks like a giant yard sale, and people are always looking to sell baby items.”
They mingled with the people shuffling past the stalls and the wares displayed on blankets. The smell of popcorn and cotton candy wafted through the cold air.
Jenna pinched the sleeve of his jacket. “Baby stuff.”
They veered toward a vendor with toys arrayed on a table and tiny clothes hanging from a line. Cade fingered a blue one-piece outfit. Had Gavin ever been this small?
“How much for the car seats?” Jenna had ducked between the clothing and nudged one of two car seats with the toe of her boot.
A smile cracked the vendor’s weathered face. “For the little boy? Twenty-five for the blue one and forty for the gray one.”
“I’ll give you thirty for the gray one.” Jenna pinched a twenty and a ten in her fingers and held out the money to the old woman.
“Thirty-five.”
“You’re not supposed to sell used car seats.” She thrust the cash at the woman, who snatched it and tucked it into her pocket.
Jenna had become one tough customer. That flighty girl he’d met in Coronado had morphed into a responsible, no-nonsense woman.
Cade hooked the straps of the car seat around his arm and it bumped his leg as they meandered back through the flea market.
The smell of the sugar from the cotton candy must’ve intoxicated Gavin because he started yanking on Jenna’s hand and whining for candy.
“Gavin, you are not getting any candy.” She rolled her eyes at Cade and whispered, “I think he wants cotton candy and that’s a double no.”
Then he stopped the whining and started skipping and chanting. “Please, Mommy. Please, Mommy. Please, Mommy.”
“Would the little one like some homemade cornbread with honey?” A small, gray-haired Native American woman smiled and nodded toward Gavin.
Jenna stopped. “Oh, I suppose so.”
Cade chuckled in her ear. “It’s better than cotton candy.”
“You’re the child’s mother?”
“Yes.” Jenna peered more closely at the old woman’s cloudy, unfocused eyes and realized she was blind. “I don’t want to trouble you.”
“Little ones need something sweet now and then.” The old woman turned her head to the side. “Patrick.”
A young man stepped from the recesses of the booth, holding a paper plate with a square of cornbread drizzled with honey in the center. “Just one?”
“I think that’s enough for us to share. How much?”
Cade stepped forward and took the plate from Patrick. He sawed off a small piece of the cornbread, stabbed it with the plastic fork and fed it to Gavin.
The woman waved her gnarled hands. “Take it, but I’d like to read your cards.”
Jenna stumbled back against Cade. “Read my cards?”
The woman slid a stack of cards from the folds of her dress and rapped it against the table. The cards did not come from a regular playing deck. They were composed of some hard substance, and as the woman spread them on the table Jenna saw shapes and figures carved into the cards.
The old woman ran her fingertips along the ridges and grooves of the shapes. She must’ve had this set of cards created exclusively for her.
“Are those tarot cards?”
She caressed the cards with knotted fingers. “Some call them tarot cards. We call it an oracle deck.”
Jenna glanced over her shoulder at Cade and Gavin stuffing cornbread into their mouths, and Cade shrugged.
She slipped into the chair opposite the fortune-teller. “Can you tell my future with that deck?”
“I see—” she drew a hand across her milky eyes
“—many things.”
Who was she to deny the old woman a chance to practice her art? Jenna folded her hands on the table and took a deep breath. “What do I have to do?”
“Nothing at all.” The woman’s hushed tones caused