Page 18 of Holding Grace

I laughed thinking about all the times I’d stuffed myself in that car. It was a great vehicle, but not for someone my size.

“I finally upgraded for some more space.”

Grace opened her apartment door, and I followed her inside, noting a few boxes and bags sitting near the door.

“Well, at least for today, space shouldn’t be an issue. I don’t have a whole lot of stuff.”

She wasn’t kidding. Even if I left every piece of furniture I owned behind, I’d still have ten times the number of boxes that Grace had. The reason she had so little was sobering. She’d been in hiding for more than two years, needing to be ready to move on at a moment’s notice. In that situation, the fewer possessions, the better.

Grace shrugged, her rueful expression telling me she knew the direction my thoughts had gone.

“In some ways, it’s been a good thing. You realize how little you really need when you get right down to it.”

Someday, if she gave me a chance, I’d give her the house of her dreams full of everything she could ever want, let alone need. But that was a conversation for another day.

“I can’t say I’m sorry there’s not a couch or bed that has to be carried down those narrow-ass stairs.” I eyed her slim build. “Especially since you’re too little to be much help.”

That earned me an eyeroll.

“Please,” Grace scoffed. “’Too little’. Whatever.” I loved the rare moments like this when Grace forgot to be nervous or shy with me and threw some sass my way. The more of them I could get, the better.

“Besides,” Grace went on, “I’m stronger than I look.”

That, I knew to be true – in all ways. Somehow, Grace had convinced herself that she was weak for running from her brother and her ex. In reality, she was as strong as they came.

In just two quick trips, we had everything packed up and were on our way.

“Thanks, again, for coming to get me.”

I glanced over at Grace, happier than I should have been to have her sitting in my passenger seat.

“Glad to do it.” Understatement of the year; I’d jumped at the chance. “Did you get the car transferred to Vanessa’s brother okay?”

Grace’s car, the same one she’d had in Lark, had been in rough shape. It had been all but guaranteed to break down at some point on the trip back to Lark, stranding Grace who knew where. Rather than chance it, Grace had sold it to Vanessa’s brother, an auto mechanic, for a few hundred dollars.

“I did. He was ecstatic to get it. He has big plans for it, which he told me all about and I understood none of. But he’s happy to have it and I was happy to get rid of it before it needed another repair. I’ll have to look for something in a little better shape once I get settled in. Thanks to Mercy, though, I’ll have a super short commute to work.”

I glanced at Grace again, glad to see the smile on her face as she said that.

Instead of coming back to work at the pub, at least right away, Grace was going to help my cousin, Mercy, with office work for the family’s business, Baron Properties. They did construction and property management, with Levi, Ace, and Rycker doing most of the heavy lifting, both literally and figuratively, on the construction side, and Mercy running the property management side.

Mercy’s assistant had eloped to Jamaica a few weeks before and decided he was never coming back to Kentucky, leaving Mercy in a huge bind. I’d felt guilty even asking Grace if she’d be willing to help Mercy out for a while, but she’d agreed readily. As part of the deal, Grace would be living rent-free in an apartment just across the street from the Baron Properties office.

“Thanks, again, for helping her out. She’s just the tiniest bit excited to meet you and put you to work. If she charges at you like a dog being reunited with its owner after a long absence, try not to let it freak you out.”

Grace’s quiet chuckle made me smile in response. I was exaggerating, but just a little.

Not to mention that I completely understood how Mercy felt.

“As for the car, Jamey said you can borrow Meg’s old one for as long as you need to. It still runs fine, and they plan to sell it eventually, but for now it’s just taking up space.”

I felt Grace go still at my mention of Jamey. Not sure what had caused her reaction, I waited her out. She stared out the side window silently as the moments ticked by.

Finally, she spoke, her voice hesitant. “He’s not still mad at me, then?”

Puzzled, I looked over at her. “Jamey was never mad at you, Grace. Why would you think that?”

“Well,” she shifted her gaze to her hand, pulling on the tiny loose threads around a ragged hole in the knee of her jeans, “the way I left, I just figured he’d be angry, that you both would be. You were both so nice to me, and then...” She broke off, shaking her head. “You were so mad when you saw me again at Barney’s.”

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