I felt woozy and hot and like I didn’t know how any of my joints worked anymore.
“Wow,” I whispered.
“Wow what?” he asked.
“Uh… You smiled. And it was just seriously wow. I had no idea you could look like that. I mean, you already look like…” I waved my hand awkwardly in front of him. “You know. But then you add the smile, and you look almost human.”
His smile was gone, and the familiar annoyance was back. “Jesus, Daisy. Get some sleep. You’re babbling like an idiot.”
I didn’t wait to watch him drive away. Instead I went back inside and closed the door. “Now what the hell am I going to do?”
Sleep deserted me abruptly, leaving behind a groggy, panicked confusion.
I was facedown on a bare mattress, a scrub brush still clutched in one hand. The room slowly came into focus as my eyes and brain returned to the land of the living.
Warner. Grr.
Tina. Ugh.
Car. Damn it.
Waylay. Holy crap.
Cottage. Adorable.
Knox. Grumpy, sexy, horrible, yet helpful.
The timeline of the last twenty-four hours intact, I pried myself off the mattress and sat up.
The room was small, but cute just like the rest of the place. Paneled walls painted a bright white, antique brass bed. There was a tall dresser opposite the bed and a skinny table painted peacock blue tucked under the window that overlooked the meandering creek.
I heard someone humming downstairs and remembered.
Waylay.
“Damn it,” I muttered, jumping off the bed. My first day on the job as a guardian, and I’d left my new charge unattended for who knew how long. She could have been abducted by her mother or mauled by a bear while I indulged in an afternoon nap.
I sucked, I decided as I raced down the stairs.
“Geez. Don’t break your neck or anything.”
Waylay sat at the kitchen table, swinging a bare foot while she chowed down on what appeared to be a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with thick white bread and enough jelly to cause instant cavities.
“Coffee,” I croaked at her.
“Man, you look like a zombie.”
“Zombie needs coffee.”
“Soda in the fridge.”
Soda would have to do. I stumbled my way to the refrigerator and opened it. I was halfway through the can of Pepsi before I realized there was food inside.
“Where food from?” I rasped. I was not an easy waker from naps. In the morning, I could bound out of bed with the energy of a sugared-up kindergarten class. But Post-Nap Naomi wasn’t pretty. Or coherent.
Waylay gave me a long look. “Are you trying to ask me where the food came from?”
I held up a finger and downed the rest of the soda.
“Yeah,” I wheezed finally as the cold caffeine and sugar burned my throat. “That.” I paused to burp indelicately. “Excuse me.”
Waylay smirked. “Chief Nash had a delivery lady drop off a bag of groceries while you were drooling all over your bed.”
My eyeballs felt gritty as I blinked. The chief of police had seen to delivering food that I’d been too unconscious to provide for my niece. I was not going to get a gold star in guardianship today.
“Crap,” I muttered.
“It’s not crap,” Waylay argued around a huge bite of PB&J. “There’s some candy and some chips.”
I needed to claw my way back up the scale toward Responsible Adult and needed to do it fast.
“We need a list,” I decided, scrubbing my hands over my eyes. “We need to figure out how far we are from civilization, how to get there, what supplies we need for the next day or two.”
Coffee. I definitely needed coffee.
“It’s like half a mile to town,” Waylay said. She had a smear of jelly on her chin and, besides her “my aunt is a lunatic” expression, she looked adorably childlike. “Why are your arms and knees all scraped up?”
I glanced down at the abrasions on my skin. “I climbed out of a church basement window.”
“Cool. So, we’re going into town?”
“Yes. I just need to take a kitchen inventory,” I decided, finding my purse on the counter and digging out my trusty notebook and pen.
Coffee.
Food.
Transportation?
Job?
New purpose in life?
“We can take the bikes,” Waylay piped up.
“Bikes?” I repeated.
“Yeah. Liza J dropped them off. Said we have to come to dinner tonight too.”
“You met our landlord?” I squeaked. “Who else stopped by? The mayor? Exactly how long have I been asleep?”