Clearing her throat, George looked up to find Effie staring at her with the eyes of a hawk. “Effie, I came here to talk to you.”
“About?”
“About what’s going on in your life and why you’re going to Cabo.”
Effie hesitated only a moment, her look of surprise coming and going in the blink of any eye. Obviously, she was used to playing cat and mouse as a former attorney. She knew how to keep her cards hidden.
“What business is it of yours why I’m going to Cabo? You’re a nosy little busybody, young lady, and I want you to leave my house. Now.”
As with everything she tried to do with Effie, it was all going left before she’d gotten out ten words.
“Effie,” Dex said, his tone soothing and calm. “We’d like it very much if you’d hear us out. We have something important to share.”
She eyed Dex, still in his uniform from the coffee shop, his broad chest covered in a crisp white shirt beneath his green vest, and heaved a sigh—one that almost sounded like admiration mixed with defeat. As though she were going to listen to them simply because Dex was so good-looking, but she refused to like it.
George almost laughed out loud at that observation and wanted to commiserate with Effie by saying, Girl, I feel that to my soul. He is good-looking, and smart, and funny, and he loves animals. He’s an all-around great guy. But she figured that wouldn’t go over well.
“You two sound like those Bible thumpers, always wanting to share the word. I thought solicitation wasn’t allowed here? What will the board think if they find out one of their employees is knocking on doors?”
Well, that wasn’t exactly too far off the mark, was it? Angels, Bible thumpers. Close enough.
“We’re not Bible thumpers,” Dex assured her. “We’re not here to convince you to believe in anything but yourself.”
She folded her arms together, skepticism written all over her face. “All right then. Say what you came to say and make it quick. I have packing to do.”
What could she say that would make this woman crack, show even an ounce of emotion and ease up on the hard-ass role she played so well maybe just a little? No one was this unfeeling.
Were they?
Her frustration with Effie’s situation, her inability to find a way to reach her, made her cut straight to the chase. “Effie, I know you’re dying.”
Her eyes went wide, but almost immediately, they narrowed. “How do you know anything about me, let alone something so damn personal?”
Dex blew out a breath with a pop of his lips, indicating she might have leapt before checking the water.
“Too much?” she leaned in and whispered.
He pinched his index and thumb together to indicate maybe a little. Yet, when he looked as though he might speak to cover for her blunder, she gripped his forearm.
This was her assignment, and her mess. “I know because I’m an angel, and we…we know things.”
Did that sound as “so there” to everyone else as it did to her?
As Effie gaped at her, jaw swinging, eyes wide with shock, Dex coughed.
“Still too much?” she whispered again, this time with a wince.
Dex sighed.
Yeah. Maybe too much.
Chapter 21
Dex held out a hand to Effie. “Please take my hand, Effie. I won’t hurt you, I promise.”
She blinked, clearly considering. And who could blame her. This delicious man was asking her to hold his hand. Even if he was the devil himself, who wouldn’t consider taking his hand?
Effie might be a hard nut to crack, but she wasn’t a fool.
With a hesitant reach, she let her fingers touch Dex’s. His glow appeared instantly, surrounding his body with a comforting warmth not even the hardest ass could resist.
Effie gasped and blinked again, but she didn’t sound as terrified this time around as she had before. “What…what’s happening?”
Dex smiled. “I’m an angel, Effie. So is George. We’re here to help you. Will you let us?” he asked, his voice whiskey-warm and soft.
“I…I don’t understand,” she choked out.
And then, something in George took over. Something confident and sure. Taking Effie’s hand from Dex, she smiled at the woman who’d once made her tremble inside. “Effie, there’s something you’ve been yearning for. Something you’ve wanted for a long time. To meet the son you gave up for adoption before you leave this earth. We want to help you do that.”
It was as though Effie’s entire façade cracked. As though she were made of stone and someone had hit her with a sledgehammer. She crumpled against George, her frail body shaking.
“I don’t know how to…” she whispered with a hoarse sob, tearing at George’s heart. “I don’t know how to approach him. I’ve thought about this for months. Months after I found him…but…”
“We’ll help. I’ll help,” George reassured her, swaying in a soothing manner.
She trembled against George, making her hold Effie tighter to ease her shakes. “But…but I leave for Cabo in two days. It has to be before I go. It has to be…”
That sounded odd, but maybe Effie knew something she didn’t. She didn’t know when her time would be up. Maybe, when you were dying, you sensed your time was near? If going to Cabo was one last hurrah, that would make sense.
“So you know where he is then?” George asked softly.
Effie began to cry against her shoulder as she nodded, surprising George. “I do. I had no choice, you know. I had no choice but to give him up. I had no one. I had nothing but a scholarship to college. The father was a silly mistake—a mistake who would never want anything to do with him anyway. A one-night stand, and I…I had no choice. I’m at peace with dying, but I don’t want to leave never telling him why I did what I did—I did it because I loved him. He was loved. It
