Page 19 of Holding Grace

Thinking about the way I’d spoken to Grace that day, I wished, once again, that I could kick my own ass. Thank God Levi had been there to calm me down and make me see what I was doing before it was too late and Grace had run again, this time from me.

When I spoke again, my voice was rough with remembered tension.

“We weren’t mad, Grace, we were worried about you. We looked for you. I...” I broke off, wondering how much to say to her, how much to reveal... “after you disappeared, we looked for you. We went to the hotel where you’d been staying, looked for your car in case you’d broken down or left it in a parking lot somewhere. We looked Grace, for weeks.”

It was Grace’s turn to look puzzled. “But...why?”

It was the same question she’d asked me weeks before when I’d asked her to move back to Lark.

Why did we care? Why would we worry about her?

Had she truly felt no connection to me at all when she’d been in Lark? I’d wondered before, but I couldn’t believe it was true. It had been there – a spark, just a beginning – but it had been there, and I knew that both of us had felt it.

Did she really think I’d just gotten pissed when she left, and then forgotten all about her until I’d seen her again at Barney’s and blown up at her? That was so far from the truth it was laughable.

“We didn’t know if you’d left on your own. It was so unlike you to just take off, and we’d already thought that maybe you had something going on. When you disappeared, we thought there was a possibility that someone had taken you.”

Grace’s eyes widened and her hand flew to her mouth in shock. “I never thought of that,” she said so softly I could barely hear her. “I never, never thought of that. I thought you’d be mad – you had every right – but I never realized you’d worry or think... I’m so sorry.”

Every one of the texts I’d sent her, the one voicemail I’d let myself leave – all of them had told her. Told her that we just wanted to know that she was alright.

Had she not read or listened to even one of them?

“Did you read the texts I sent? Did you listen to the voicemail?”

Grace lowered her hand. “No. I didn’t. I didn’t want to see how mad you were at me, or if you hated me. I just couldn’t.”

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

All this time she’d thought I was angry at her, that I hated her. And I’d thought she didn’t care enough to just let us – me – know she was okay, or worse yet, that she couldn’t.

I wanted to ask her now. If she’d known, if she’d realized, would she have contacted me? Would she have reached out?

I didn’t ask, though. The truth was, I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer.

What would it feel like to hear that, even if she’d known I was worried out of my mind about her, she wouldn’t have done what she could to give me at least some small measure of peace? I still would have missed the hell out of her and wondered why she’d left, but at least I’d have known she wasn’t lying dead in a shallow grave somewhere.

I shook that thought away. It didn’t matter now, anyway, what she would or wouldn’t have done. She’d been on the run, terrified for her life. She’d done what she had to do. Agonizing over it now served no purpose other than to make Grace feel bad, which was the last thing I wanted.

Like she’d read my mind, Grace looked at me, eyes wide with guilt this time.

“I’m truly sorry, Michael. You must have thought I was the most awful person. No wonder you were so mad when you saw me again.”

My reaction had been far more about being hurt than it had ever been about anger, but I didn’t want to get into that now. Right now, I wanted to get us back on even footing.

“I never thought you were awful, far from it. It was a bad situation all around, but we’re through it. What do you say we put it in the past and let it stay there? In a few hours, you’ll be back in Lark, everyone – including Jamey – will be happy to see you, and we’ll start from there. Deal?”

As I had before, Grace took a deep breath, then nodded.

“Deal.”

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