High Plains Hearts by Janet Spaeth

you,” he said, his voice low in her ear.
    “Usually she’s not this crazed,” Tess said as her fingers finally closed around the elusive key. “I hope nothing’s wrong.”
    She opened the door, and the cat launched herself—not at Tess, but at Jake.
    “What in the world is up with her?” Tess wondered aloud. Cora had never acted like that. She reached out to prevent the cat from attacking Jake, but to her astonishment Cora was rubbing against his arms and shoulders.
    “Here, I’ll try to pry her off you,” she said. “She’s usually not like this. Actually she’s never been like this. I don’t know what’s gotten into her.”
    He tossed her the foil-wrapped package from the restaurant. “Maybe it’s something she’s hoping to get into her.”
    “Chocolate?” Tess asked. “She’s a cat. She can’t have—”
    Cora jumped down from his grasp and pawed at Tess’s knees.
    Tess opened the package and laughed. It held bits and pieces of salmon. “Would you by any chance like some salmon, sweetie?”
    “They’re fillets that fell apart before cooking and couldn’t be used,” Jake explained, “so I asked them to save them.”
    “That’s amazing. I didn’t know they’d do something like that.”
    “Well, I may not own the place, but I do know the owner, and he’s a cat lover from way back. He saves these portions all the time. You just have to know to ask for them.”
    He was extraordinary, no doubt about it.
    “This is so sweet of you,” she said to him.
    Jake cooed at the cat as he fed her the scraps. “Nothing but the best table scraps for this exquisite cat, right, Cora?”
    The cat gazed lovingly at Jake.
    Tess had to smile. “I have never seen that cat look so googly-eyed before, not even with a major dose of catnip under her belt.”
    “I’m just trying to buy her affections. She’s an amazing cat, you know. I think she has definite celestial connections, and, let’s face it, we can use all the help we can get on that end.”
    “I prefer to get my help through more traditional means,” Tess said quietly.
    “More traditional means? Like what?” The question seemed almost throw-away; he asked it so offhandedly.
    “Prayer.” The single word was barely more than a whisper.
    “Ah.” He nodded but didn’t volunteer anything else. He toyed with Cora’s ear thoughtfully.
    “It works.” She sounded more defensive than she had intended to so she tried to soften it. “It really does, you know.”
    “Oh, I believe that.”
    “I’m still somewhat befuddled,” she confessed. “Are you telling me you’re a Christian?”
    “Of course I am,” he said. “I’ve been baptized, confirmed, the whole nine yards. I can still recite the Apostles’ Creed from memory. We had to learn it in membership classes in sixth grade.”
    Her mind spun. She’d never been challenged like this before. Usually her conversations about religion were with people from Nativity, where everyone agreed on their terms.
    “Are you active in your church?” she asked, teasing a salmon-stuffed Cora into activity with a fuzzy ball.
    “No. Much of weekly trade comes from the post-church crowd, which begins early and lasts until shortly after lunch. I couldn’t make it to any of the services in town, I’m afraid, and definitely not to the ones at the church I grew up in.”
    She asked which church that was, and when he named the largest, wealthiest church in town, she nodded. It was known for the strength of the pastoral care and its outreach projects specially designed to reach generally underserved groups; those targeted to college students, young parents, and single mothers were the best known among their many programs.
    She had met the minister several times and had been impressed with the care he expressed about his congregation. She’d never seen him be depressed or sad for long; he was a man truly uplifted with joy by his knowledge of Jesus Christ.
    “Don’t they have midweek services there,