Page 28 of Deserving Cora
Cora would’ve laughed at the shocked looks on the other women’s faces if she wasn’t so surprised herself.
“It’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for,” Robert said with a chuckle.
“Right? How the hell do you know all that? Pipe, Owl, and Cora have only been here for like twenty minutes!” Henley protested.
“Owl called Stone last night. I was cleaning the lodge and heard them talking in the admin office. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I couldn’t exactly shut my ears off. Stone had the phone on speaker, and you know how he tends to talk rather loudly when he’s on the phone.”
“Right, okay, so our sneakster friend here has the deets, but we don’t. If there’s anything we can do to help, we’re more than willing,” Alaska told Cora.
“You sold yourstuff?” Henley asked again, obviously still stuck on that part of her random word vomit from moments ago.
Cora shrugged. “It was just stuff. I had to get money to be able to bid on Pipe.”
“Like, your electronics and other expensive things?” Reese asked.
She bit her lip. “No. All of it. My furniture, TV, dishes and cutlery, pots and pans, linens…allof it.”
Everyone was silent for a long moment.
“Holy shit, seriously?” Henley asked.
“It still wasn’t enough to win though,” Cora said, staring at the table.
“Tell us about your friend,” Alaska said firmly.
This was a topic Cora was more comfortable with. She told them everything. Not leaving anything out. How she was a foster kid with no family. How Lara took her under her wing. How she’d bailed her out more than once when she needed a place to live. How her parents were nice but distant. How they were disappointed in Lara when she’d become a preschool teacher instead of trying for a better, more prestigious job.
“She’s everything to me,” Cora said, still studying the table as if it was the most interesting thing ever. “My best friend and my family all rolled into one. When she met Ridge, I was skeptical about how perfect he sounded. I told her to be careful, but Lara’s a romantic. She’s dreamed about being swept off her feet all her life. I think she was starting to feel as if she’d missed out. Like she was too old to find someone to love her the way she wanted to be loved. So when Ridge showed up and acted like the man she’d always dreamed of, she was overwhelmed and all in pretty much immediately.
“We had a fight about him. Two days later, she didn’t show up for work and wasn’t answering my calls. She sent an email to the school about taking a leave of absence. The next thing I knew, I got a text from her saying she’s staying in Arizona for a while. Atext. After over two decades as best friends.
“I tried to call her immediately, but she never picked up. And the few texts I got didn’t sound like her at all. They were…unemotional. And as I told Pipe, there wasn’t any punctuation in them, and Laraalwaysuses periods and commas and stuff. She’s always worn her heart on her sleeve, so she also uses lots of emojis and exclamation points and gifs. But the texts I got were brief. Not one emoji. The one time Ridge allowed me to see her on a video call, she told me she loved Arizona and wasn’t coming back to DC, ever. But she also gave me a signal. She’s in trouble. Even if I’m the only who believes that with all my heart, Iknowshe is.”
“The guys are going to help though, right?” Reese asked.
Cora shrugged. “I don’t know. That’s what Pipe is doing now. Discussing the situation with them.”
“They’ll help,” Alaska said without a shred of doubt in her voice.
“Have they called their techie friend?” Henley asked.
Everyone looked at her.
“You know, the one who tried to help when Jasna was missing and when Reese was taken?”
“The one who actuallydidn’thelp?” Alaska asked. “I mean, he tried, but it was that mysterious unknown person who thought of using Reese’s tile to track her car. And they also told the guys where to find Jasna.”
“When Owl was talking to Stone, he said something about how he’d already contacted Tex—that’s the techie guy’s name,” she said to Cora, “and he was researching Lara’s boyfriend,” Ryan explained.
“Good. Okay, so I’m guessing you won’t be leaving today. That means we need to figure out where you’ll be staying,” Alaska said matter-of-factly.
“Are there any cabins open?” Henley asked.
Alaska huffed out a breath and shook her head. “No. We don’t have any openings for months. Unless someone cancels, but then I can usually fill that spot pretty easily.”
“She can stay with Gus and me,” Reese offered.
“Didn’t I hear you say you were having morning sickness really bad, and that you get up in the middle of the night to puke?” Henley asked.
