Page 51 of Keepsake
“Covering my brother,” he muttered. “Lord knows when he’ll turn up.” Kieran even took the shovel and began to clean out the gutter.
That was big of him. Though I’d known the Shipleys for years now, I was still astonished at their generosity toward one another. No wonder I was still dragging my feet on coming up with Plan B. There wasn’t anywhere I wanted to be other than here.
“Kyle really ought to be on shit patrol today,” Dylan pointed out.
“You can punish him tomorrow,” I suggested.
“Hey, Chewie?” Griff called to me from outside the barn. “Got a second?”
“Sure.” I followed him out into the morning sunlight. Music could be heard coming from the farmhouse kitchen, and I wondered if Lark was in there yet, making breakfast with Ruth and May.
Just the thought of her made my stomach flip over. In an hour we’d be headed for the Norwich market together. The car ride could be interesting.
“I got a question for you,” Griff said, startling me out of my thoughts. “What’s up with Lark?”
“Uh…” The question set off alarm bells in my head. I hadn’t meant to kiss Lark. I was fighting a powerful urge to lie about my feelings for her.
“Is she all right, do you think?” Griff asked while I panicked.
It took me a moment to realize that his query had nothing to do with a kiss in the barn. “You mean…because she has bad dreams?”
He nodded. “Looks like PTSD, doesn’t it? Just like Zara’s other brother—Damien. Did you know he did two tours in Afghanistan?”
I nodded. Damien turned up at the Gin Mill sometimes, and I’d seen his dog tags.
“The guy didn’t sleep right for two years after he came home. Told me he still sleepwalks sometimes. He woke up once on his couch, holding a kitchen knife.”
Yikes. “I can’t see Lark going allHurt Lockeron us.”
Griffin snorted. “I’m notafraidof her, Zach. I just don’t want to be the guy who brushes aside her issues because I wasn’t paying attention.”
“It’s not like that!”
Griff’s bushy eyebrows shot upward even as the irritation in my voice echoed between us. Heck, I don’t think I’d ever argued with Griff over anything before. Not even pizza toppings. “How is it like, then?” he asked quietly.
I took a deep breath and tried to be calm. If Griff made a big deal about Lark’s problems, it would only piss her off.It also might send her away, my subconscious prodded. The truth was that I liked being the one helping her. The only one.
Was I screwing things up just so I could be the one she hugged when she was scared?
“What if we gave her just a little more time to feel better?” I suggested. “It hasn’t been very long since she got back. She came to Vermont to get out of her parents’ way because they were too worried to give her some space.”
Griff rubbed his beard. “I hear you. And I asked her about it myself, and she said she was doing okay. But then she looked jumpy at the bar last night. Does she do okay at the market?”
“Yeah,” I said quickly. “She does all right most of the time.”Unless it’s really hot or crowded.Or loud.
“What, uh…” Griff shifted his weight. “Did she tell you much about what happened in Guatemala?”
The hair stood up on the back of my neck, as it did every time I wondered the same thing. “She told me she watched somebody die.”
Griff flinched. “That all?”
“Isn’t that enough?” I asked, trying to keep the irritation out of my voice.
“Sure,” Griff said slowly. “I just worry there’s more to the story, and maybe I’m sending her off to do work that’s hard on her.”
“I don’t think you are. If you really want to be sure, offer to send someone else to Norwich today. See what she says.”
“All right. She seems to trust you.” He gave my shoulder a squeeze. “But let me know if there are any problems.”
