He closed his eyes and let the music carry him away from those memories. He’d gotten over his childhood. He’d found a home in the army. He’d made something of himself.
He buried his fingers in the stray’s soft fur. It licked his hand with a rough tongue.
He needed to find the local animal shelter, followed by the nursing home. Then he planned to get the hell out of Dodge before the urge to stay overwhelmed him. Because a guy like him didn’t belong in a place like this. This was Nick’s place, not his.
The music ended, and the choir director finally let everyone go. Matt stood up and slung his pack over his shoulder. Maybe the brown-haired woman with the amazing voice could help him. He’d heard her singing from out on the lawn, after the cat had stopped howling. The sound had called to him, and he’d followed it right into the church.
The choir members seemed thrilled to be dismissed. Probably because the choir director was a jerk, and they had shopping, and cooking, and a lot of other holiday crap to do. People in Last Chance would be busy like that, cooking big meals, wrapping presents, decorating trees, and stuff.
He found the brown-haired woman who’d spoken up in the cat’s defense. “Ma’am, I was wondering, could you help me, please?”
She was shrugging into a big dark coat that had a sparkly Christmas tree pin on its collar. She gazed at him out of a pair of dark blue eyes. She had very pale skin, a long nose, and a thin face.
“I’m not taking your cat,” she said in a defensive voice. “But if you’re looking for Ruth, she’s in the Golden Years Nursing Home up in Orangeburg.”
He frowned. “Where’s that?”
“You’re not from around here, are you?”
“No, ma’am. I’m originally from Chicago. Since I joined up, I’m from wherever they station me.” Except, of course, that wasn’t true anymore. He hadn’t re-upped this time, and he had nowhere permanent to go. He’d come to deliver Nick’s present, and then he had some vague plans for spending New Year’s on a beach somewhere-maybe Miami.
“Well, Orangeburg is about twenty miles north of here. But I need to warn you, Ruth’s been in the nursing home for the last year, and she’s pretty ill. I know because I work for her doctor.”
“I see.”
“Are you a friend of Nick’s?” she asked.
He smiled. “Yes. Did you know him too?”
“I went to high school with him. I had a bit of a crush on him.” She blushed when she said it.
“And you are?”
“I’m Annie Roberts.”
He blinked and almost said I know you. But of course he didn’t know Annie, except from the things Nick had told him. Annie had been Nick’s girlfriend in high school. They had broken up the night of their senior prom.
“You studied nursing at the University of Michigan,” he said.
“How did you-Oh, Nick told you that, didn’t he?”
He grinned. “He told me you were looking forward to going someplace where it snows.”
She frowned at him. “Why are you here? Nick died more than a year ago.”
“I know. I was with him when it happened.”
“Oh.”
He shouldn’t have said that. People always got that look on their faces when he spoke about this crap. No one back home really understood.
She squared her shoulders. “I’m so sorry. Are you a member of the Army Engineers K-9 team too?”
He continued to stroke the cat. “I was. As of yesterday, I’m officially a civilian.”
The words came out easy. It took everything he had to hide the emotions behind them.
“And you came here? Right before Christmas? Don’t you have a family someplace?”
He shrugged. “I have Nick’s last Christmas present-you know, the one he intended to send home to his grandmother. I need to deliver it.”
Her gaze pierced him for a moment. It was almost as if she could read all of his thoughts and emotions. A muscle ticked in her cheek, and she seemed to be weighing something in her mind.
She must have decided that he wasn’t a threat because she let go of a long breath and gave the kitten a little stroke. “Poor thing. She looks half starved.”
“How do you know it’s a female?”
“How do you know it’s not?”
He shifted the animal so he could actually inspect it. “Well, you were right. It’s a girl. Means she’ll have to be fixed. Is there an animal shelter somewhere?”
“Yes. In Allenberg. But it’s probably closed.”
His frustration with the situation mounted. “Uh, look, Annie, I just got in on the bus from Charlotte. I don’t have a car. And now I need to find a home for this kitten, as well as a place to stay for the night. It’s probably too late to go visiting at a nursing home twenty miles away.”
She buttoned up her coat. “Boy, you’re in a fix, aren’t you?”
“Is there a hotel somewhere?”
Her cheeks colored just the slightest bit. “Well, the only place in town is the Peach Blossom Motor Court. They would probably allow you to keep the cat.”
“I’ve heard about the Peach Blossom Motor Court,” he blurted and then remembered the story. “Oh, crap. That was stupid.”
Annie’s cheeks reddened further. “I guess guys in the army have nothing better to do than talk.”
“Yes, ma’am. And believe me, being in the army can be really boring at times. Guys talk about home all the time. I’m sorry. I should have kept my mouth shut.”
“Don’t be sorry. What happened between me and Nick the night of senior prom happened almost twenty years ago.”
“I guess he never told you about me, did he?” Nick asked.
She shook her head. “Why would he? He and I parted ways that night. He went off to join the army and see the world. I went off to college to see the snow. I guess I saw him that Christmas right after he went through basic training, but I wasn’t speaking with him at the time.” She hugged herself, and Matt noticed that she wasn’t wearing a wedding ring.
So the girl Nick had never forgotten was unmarried.
She gave him a smile that didn’t show any teeth. A few lines bunched at the corner of her eyes. She wasn’t young. But she was pretty.
And Matt knew that she was sweet. He had a lot of Nick’s stories filed away in his head. Nick had been a real good storyteller when things got slow.
Annie studied the cat sleeping in his hands and then nodded her head as if she’d come to a decision. “Look, you can’t stay at the Peach Blossom. It probably has bed bugs. It’s just an awful place. So you might as well come on home with me. I’ve got a perfectly fine guest room where you can sleep, and in the morning, we can figure something out. I’m sure I can find someone to run you up to Orangeburg, or I can do it myself.”
“How about a friend who wants to adopt Fluffy?” He held up the cat in his hands.
“Fluffy?” She gave him a funny look. “That is a stupid name for a cat.”
“Why? She’s kind of fluffy.”
“Yeah, but everyone names their cat Fluffy. There must be five Fluffys living here in Last Chance, and they all belong to single women. Please don’t name the cat Fluffy.”
“Okay, I won’t,” Matt said. “I thought you didn’t care about this cat.”
“Well, no, but you found it in a manger a couple days before Christmas, didn’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, then, it needs a better name than Fluffy. Something holiday-related, like Noel.”
He looked down at the slightly scruffy kitten. “That’s a pretty pretentious name for this particular cat, don’t you think? Of course, if you were going to adopt it, you could name it anything you wanted.”
She scowled at him. “I’m not adopting any cats, understand?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Annie should have her head examined. She could almost hear Mother’s voice outlining all the reasons she should send Sergeant Matt Jasper off to the Peach Blossom Motor Court. Mother would start with the fact that he was male, and then move right on to the worry that he was secretly either a pervert or an ax murderer.