Page 29 of Tom's Chance
“No offense, Mom, but I really don’t need my mom with me when I’m picking out a dress.”
“I know, but humor me. You never went to your Junior or Senior Prom, and I don’t think you’ve ever been on a serious date. I know you studied hard and thought those events were frivolous. Let me have this one mother daughter bonding moment.” When Lorissa looked skeptical, Laurie grinned. “I’ll buy.”
“Deal!” Lorissa laughed as they started putting everything back into her closet. When they were done, they checked on Rose, and Lorissa was happy with the little dog’s progress. As she worked with them, Laurie had gone out to talk to her mother, and by the time they were ready to head out, Lois was in her glory as she was able to reach in and pet Rose, who was now awake and seemed to enjoy the attention.
Hours later, with both their arms loaded with shopping bags, and carry out food, Laurie and Lorissa were laughing as they entered the back door of Lorissa’s home and paused long enough for Duane to take the food from them. Instead of putting their things down, they took them upstairs to Lorissa’s room and put them on her bed. Back downstairs, Lorissa immediately went to check on Rose and Baby and was happy with the results. She took Rose down and had her use the puppy pad, and changed the kitty litter in Baby’s pen. After washing her hands, she went into the kitchen.
As they settled at the table, Laurie and Duane passed out the meals they’d picked up from a Mexican restaurant, and Lorissa turned to Lois.
“How did the afternoon go?”
“Good, Rose slept most of the day, and the babies didn’t even fuss, she allowed them to nurse. Baby and her babies were fine, I couldn’t even tell they were there.”
“Okay, now, I don’t want to spoil anyone’s dinner, so afterward, I’ll tell you what I learned earlier.” She took a bite of her rice and beans and was surprised when they said whatever she had to say wouldn’t ruin their appetite. She waited for a few more minutes as she ate, and then ate slower as she told them what Tom had told her earlier.
“Shit,” Duane said angrily. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to swear, but for someone to do that to theirwife, it just makes me sick.” He took Laurie’s hand in his, and brought it to his lips to kiss the back of it. He held it longer than was necessary, then finally let it go. Lorissa sighed in happiness for her mother, but felt a pang in her heart that she didn’t have someone like Duane in her life. She ignored the image of Tom as he flashed through her mind. She would visit that idea later.
“What aren’t you telling us?” Lois asked.
“Tom is looking into us going up to Denver to the hospital to see if we can’t get in to tell Mrs. Bickers that Rose along with her babies, and Baby and her kittens are safe. That they are alive. He didn’t want to be morbid, but he thinks that if she knows they’re safe and away from her husband, then it will either ease her mind to heal, or…” she left the rest of her sentence to fade away and the others nodded. It was Duane who answered.
“Or succumb to her injuries knowing her babies are safe.”
“Correct.”
“I agree with him.” Duane nodded. “I know it’s only animals, but to hear you say it, they were her children. She’s going to fight to live for them, or fight the white light calling her until she knows they’re safe. I don’t envy you or him one bit for what you’re about to do. I want you to know if you need me for anything, I’ll be there for you.”
“Thank you, Duane. Knowing you feel that waymeans a lot to me. We should be okay, Tom’s getting everything ready, and we’ll go up in a couple of days. At first, we were going to try to sneak Rose and Baby in to see her, but then if she has third degree burns over eighty percent of her body, they’re not going to let us into her room, let alone two animals. We’re going to go to see if Tom, who she knows, can tell her. Then because we’re in the area, he’s going to take me out to dinner afterward. I know it’s not a celebratory meal, but we do have to eat.” She saw the expression on Duane’s face and burst out laughing. “It’s not to that restaurant he told you about.”
“He told you about that?”
“Yep,” Lorissa said on a laugh and told them what had happened between her and Tom on the day she came into possession of Rose and Baby. The older people stared at her in shock, but she didn’t see any censure in their expressions, so she dropped the subject and helped clean up after their meal. That night, after checking on Rose and Baby one last time, she went up to her room, showered, then took care of the clothes she and her mother had bought earlier. She didn’t know whether she should have or not, but she left the tags on them for the time being. By the time she crawled into bed, she was exhausted and slept straight through until six the next morning.
CHAPTER 12
Three days later,Lorissa entered her back door and burst out laughing when she saw both Rose and Baby sitting there waiting for her. She had decided to let them out of their cages the day after her shopping spree, and after moving their babies to an area in the living room, she realized that every single time Rose wanted to go out to go to the bathroom, Baby wanted to go with her. She had also realized that since allowing them the run of the house, there were no bombs left in the litter box. She stepped back, opened the door and they ran out, and Lorissa stepped out to watch them. Ten minutes later they ran inside, and she made sure they had plenty of food and water. After they munched for a little bit, they literally ran back to their children and settled in to attend to them. As she figured out what she wanted for dinner, she ended up fixing a salad with plenty of rawveggies, and cut up the last of the chicken from a couple of days ago. Armed with the salad and her laptop, she settled in and looked to see how much it would cost to order a ‘doggie’ door to install for Rose and Baby to go in and out by themselves.
She was distracted by eating, and surfing the web when her phone rang, so she didn’t look at the number when it rang.
“Hello?”
“Lorissa?” Came a deep, sexy, gravelly voice over the phone that caused her to close her eyes and do a shimmy in her seat.
“Yes, who’s this?”
“Oh, sorry, it’s Tom.”
“Oh, hey. How are you?”
“Good, how about you?”
“I’m good.”
“That’s good. I’ll get right to the point then. I contacted Sheriff Jim and told him what I wanted to do, he put me in touch with the people at the hospital up in Denver.”
“Okay, what did they have to say?”
“That we can come up, there’s no guarantee we can come in and see her, but they feel if she heard a voice from home, it might help her. Because of the burns, they really can’t move her around as much as they’d like.”
