Finding Hope (Love's Compass Book 2) (13 page)

Lexi checked to be sure her scarf was in place. She’d chosen one that matched the green and brown blouse she was wearing. Now she was standing in front of the Chandler house, trying to work up the courage to go inside.

She reached for the doorknob and gave it a turn. As she stepped into the house, she prayed for strength.

As soon as she had entered the living room, her family turned to look at her. Welcoming smiles, hugs, and laughter made her feel at ease. While Patty’s eyes were full of tears, she kept them at bay as she took in Lexi’s scarf.

“You know I’m proud of you, Alexis.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

She heard Grams’ voice from the kitchen. “I’ll be right there!”

The amusement on Tuck’s face made Lexi pause. “What’s going on?”

“You’ll see.” He waggled his eyebrows at her.

When her grandmother entered the living room with a giant smile on her face, Lexi gasped.

Grams had shaved her head — every last silver strand of it. The light from the ceiling fan shone off the pale skin.

The older woman stood in front of her, hands on her hips. “Are you going to leave this old woman hanging? I showed you mine, now you show me yours.”

Lexi felt a tickle on her cheek and swiped at it, only now aware of the tears that were flowing. She laughed with a sniff. “Grams, you are something else.”

She took her scarf off to rounds of applause. She and Grams posed for several pictures.

Tuck snapped one with his phone. “I’m sending this to Lance,” he said, giving her a wink.

Lexi rolled her eyes good-naturedly and went to sit on the couch with Grams. Serenity came to join them, sitting on Lexi’s other side.

“It looks good.”

“Thanks. It’s taken a good ten minutes off my morning routine, too.”

Serenity laughed then. “I’ll bet it has!” She pulled some of her long hair around. “I have to admit, that’s almost tempting.”

“Yeah, well, if you shaved your head you’d float away after being used to having such long hair now.”

Lexi was busy answering questions about her health. Laurie had been curious about the oils so she was in the middle of showing them to her when Gideon came in from his room. He stopped in front of Lexi, hesitant, his eyes fixed on her head.

“Hi, Gideon! What do you think?” She rubbed her smooth head with one hand. “It sure looks different, doesn’t it?”

His gaze looked at her face and then back at her head.

“Sweetie, you can touch it if you want to. It kind of feels like a bowling ball now.”

Lexi wasn’t sure what Gideon was thinking. She watched as he reached a hand up to brush the skin. His face was serious and she wanted to think of a way to lighten his mood.

She giggled and pretended to shy away from his hand. “That tickles, Gideon!”

His eyes lit up as he touched her head again, walking his fingers across the top.

She responded with more giggles. “That tickles!” She reached for him and pulled him into her lap, running her fingers across his head. Before long, he was belly laughing and had Lexi joining him.

They played their new game a few more times before Gideon ran back down the hall to his room.

“He’s a great kid, Serenity.”

Her little sister beamed at her.

Patty came in from the kitchen. “All right, everyone. It’s time to eat!”

After dinner, Lexi helped Patty clean up the kitchen before going into the living room and sitting down for a while. Laurie joined her.

“If you want to come by the studio, I would love to take another set of portraits for you.” She nodded at Lexi’s head. “It’s beautiful, you know. A sign of the battle you’re fighting. And winning.”

“I’ll do that, thank you.”

Before the evening was over, they had settled on a day that coming week. Lexi was getting tired and said her goodbyes. She was scheduled to be at the hospital for her shift at six in the morning and it would be hard enough to get up and going as it was.

She climbed into her car and leaned her head back against the head rest. It had been a great evening — she’d needed that more than she had realized. She’d needed to be surrounded by family.

It would have been a perfect evening if Lance had been there.

The thought came out of left field and struck Lexi with such force that she sat up straight.

She missed Lance.

~

Lance’s phone buzzed and he picked it up to see a text from Lexi. He had hoped she might let him know how the family dinner went. All evening, he’d tried to keep busy watching television or doing anything else he could to pass the time. He tossed the remote control on the couch beside him and opened the text message.

“I just got home from dinner. It went pretty well. Thanks again for giving Tuck a heads up.”

“You’re welcome. I saw the picture of you and Grams. That was awesome. How are you feeling?”

“I’m good, thanks.”

There was a pause and then another text from her.

“I missed you.”

He tapped on the green symbol next to her name and waited as the phone rang. He leaned back into the cushions and let her voice wash over him. “Hey, you.”

Lance smiled. “I missed you, too.”

“How was your night?”

“Long.” He hadn’t been able to take his mind off Lexi, wondering how things were going. “But I got a lot of work done today and that always feels good.”

“Do you still miss being a cop?”

“During the day sometimes. But I don’t miss the late-night call outs.” He laid down on his couch, propping his head on the arm. “You have a shift tomorrow, right?”

“Yes. My schedule has been all over the place lately. I’m going to check and see what I can do about this weekend.”

“We probably won’t see each other much this week, then.”

Lexi was silent for a moment and he checked the screen to make sure their call hadn’t disconnected. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. You know, if you wanted to come by for lunch one day, that wouldn’t be a bad thing.”

He chuckled, a smile on his face and anticipation welling up in his chest. “I bet we can arrange that. How about Wednesday?”

“Wednesday sounds great. Can I text you about the time that morning?”

“Absolutely. You know you can call me whenever you want, right?”

“I do. Thanks, Lance. The same goes for you.”

“Thanks. I’ll see you in a few days.”

“Have a good night.”

“You, too.”

He waited for her to hang up before turning his screen off.

Lexi had missed him and suggested they have lunch together that week. Oh, yeah. Life was good.

~

“Okay. What happened?”

Lance barely had the chance to slide into the booth across from Tuck Monday morning before the words had left his best friend’s mouth.

“Excuse me?”

“I can tell something’s changed and you know you want to tell me. Come on, out with it.”

Lance shook his head. “You’re scary sometimes. Seriously. Have you thought about a career with the FBI? Or maybe the secret service?”

“I’ve considered it. But I’ve heard their vacation packages are terrible.” Tuck gave him his best guise of innocence.

Lance wadded up a napkin and tossed it at him.

The waitress arrived with their drinks and they placed their breakfast orders.

As soon as she walked away, Tuck was pinning him down with that look of his, the one that almost always got suspects to crack under pressure.

Lance crossed his arms.

His friend stared at him, looking for clues. His eyes widened. “Lexi was acting differently at dinner. You kissed her, didn’t you?”

Schooling his features, Lance reached nonchalantly for his glass of orange juice.

Tuck threw his head back and laughed. “It’s about time, man.”

~

Lexi had promised to stop by Laurie’s photography studio before starting her afternoon shift at the hospital on Monday. She’d loved how the photos from the first session turned out and felt more relaxed this time around.

Laurie was a gifted photographer and had a way of making the subjects of her photos be themselves. She believed there was a time and place for posed photos. But an image showing the true personality of the person in it said so much more.

A bell above the door announced her presence. Laurie peeked at her from the other side of a backdrop she was raising back into position.

“Hey, Lexi! Right on time!” She finished her task and brushed some dust off of her pants. “How’s your day going?”

“My shift starts in an hour, but I’m off to a good start.”

“I don’t know how you deal with the different schedules. It would drive me insane. Does your body ever have a hard time figuring out when it should sleep?”

Lexi helped her move two larger props out of the middle of the floor and to a space against one wall.

“In the beginning it did. But now, unless something major is going on, I’m tired by the time I get home and my body has no choice but to sleep.”

Laurie got a beautiful wooden chair and placed it near a window at the front of the studio. Lexi remembered seeing a cabinet or a bookshelf near there but the space was empty now.

“Tell me where you want me.”

She watched as Laurie got everything set up. She brought out a couple of different lengths of cloth, expertly draping a brown one around Lexi’s body until it resembled a dress.

With a satisfied smile she gave a nod. “Perfect. It’s almost the exact same color as your eyes.”

Lexi thought the session went well. Laurie coached her and suggested different things to her, but none of it felt unnatural. Twenty minutes later, the session was finished.

“I can’t wait to see what you do with this.”

Laurie smiled at her. “I’ll process them and try to get some back to you by the end of the week.”

“That sounds perfect. I know you have a lot of sessions this week. Don’t feel rushed.” She reached out to hug her sister-in-law. “I’m very thankful for you.”

“I feel the same way about you.”

They said their goodbyes and Lexi headed to the hospital.

She was feeling pretty off today. Not only did she feel tired, but dizzy and a little euphoric. She’d read that the reduction in white blood cell counts could cause her body’s responses. She wasn’t overly concerned. Still, it was distracting.

Once she got to the hospital, she changed into her scrubs and headed to the break room.

By now, all of her coworkers knew about her fight with ovarian cancer. Most treated her normally. She had two coworkers come up to share their own experiences. A few of the others had looked at her as though they expected her to keel over at any moment.

Finnegan hadn’t spoken with her since she’d confronted him with the truth last week. When she ran into him, she got the polite hello. They went their separate ways, which suited Lexi just fine. Because if a man was going to be the focus of her thoughts, there was no doubt it was Lance.

His name brought a smile to her face and a bounce to her step as she left the coffee brewing in the break room and headed for the nurse’s station.

It was time to get to work.

~

Lance had his cell phone to one ear, his microwaved meal forgotten in front of him as he chatted with Lexi.

“I went over my schedule at the hospital. I had to pull a few strings and trade shifts with a couple of people, but I’m free to go to the renaissance fair.”

Thinking about spending the weekend with her made Lance’s day. “That’s great! I hope it wasn’t too much trouble.”

“No, it’ll be fine. I’ll work a double shift so I can get off at 6 a.m. Friday morning and won’t go back to work again until 6 Sunday night.”

He was glad they would have all day at the fair. But he hated it when she worked double shifts. “You’ll be exhausted.”

“Nah. I’ll go home and sleep a few hours. Then, as long as you don’t mind if I sleep a couple more on the way there, I’ll be fine.”

“I get to drive you down to Magnolia?” The thought put a smile on his face.

“I should have asked if you were going with your parents or your sisters. I didn’t even…”

“Lex.”

“Yeah?”

“I was hoping to drive with you.”

“Okay. I’m glad.”

Lance could imagine the blush creeping into her cheeks and wished he could see it for himself. 

They worked out a few more details. Lexi was hesitant to go in a full renaissance outfit and Lance didn’t even have one anymore. They decided to dress normally and go to enjoy the shows and demonstrations.