Page 27 of Save Me the Trouble
And Grace…she worked hard, too. She worked with the same kind of drive that I recognized: one that was trying to prove a past failure didn’t define her. Not that I’d succeeded at believing that for myself, but just because I hadn’t cured the illness of guilt didn’t mean I didn’t recognize the symptoms.
However, no matter how hard I tried, what questions I asked, I still had no idea what had happened. And part of me wished that didn’t bother me like it did.
Rising, I went to the couch and gently touched her shoulder. “Grace.”
She stirred, her eyes fluttering open, and for a moment, she looked at me with such vulnerability it made my chest tighten. Then, as reality seeped back in, she sat up and rubbed her eyes.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—” she began and sat, but I cut her off with a small smile.
“It’s okay. I should’ve let you go sooner.” I couldn’t stop myself from bending down, the back of my knuckle skating along her cheek to move the lock of hair from her face.
She trembled, and her eyes fluttered up to mine.
As the days went on, I found myself wanting to be around her more and more. I found myself hoping for her with every knock on my door in the morning, and then once she was here, counting the minutes after each meeting until we were alone again.
“I didn’t want to go sooner,” she murmured groggily and then stilled, realizing what she’d admitted to. There was a pause, a silence weighted with the shroud of heat that never seemed to leave us.
“Grace…”
“What got you into photography?” Her chin jerked to one of my photographs on the wall, grasping for a change of topic.
The question caught me off guard, and for a moment, I wasn’t sure how to answer—wasn’t sure I wanted to answer.I hadn’t talked about this in years. Not the details. But something about the way she asked—the way she looked at me—made me want to tell her. Everyone else, they asked questions about me to find a way into my life.Into my billions.But Grace…she was on her way out, so when the question came from her, it was as though she was begging for a reason to stay.
I straightened and walked over to the photograph next to the window. “I started after I lost everything,” I began, my voice quiet. “I was young and stupid. I’d just inherited everything from my father, and I felt like I had something to prove.” I cleared my throat. “I’m sure you’ve heard that part of the story.”
“Not from you.”
My head turned, catching her gaze in the window, watching her stand and take a few hesitant steps toward me.
“My father had just passed. We didn’t have the best relationship, but still, his death hit me in a way I hadn’t expected. I was always carefree. A little reckless. And with enough of a chip on my shoulder to earn me the reputation of being an asshole. One night, I was at a high-stakes poker game. One of the players…he’d been taunting me all night. He didn’t like my father either, but he kept making jab after jab and then started claiming I didn’t have the balls to run the company. That I was too weak. I wasn’t in a good place, and I let what he said get to me. I bet everything. My whole inheritance. And I lost it all.”
Grace’s expression softened.
“The first person I told was my grandmother. She was still on the board for the company, and she had the final vote that would decide if I was going to take over the company. So, she had to know what happened.” I forced myself to swallow. “I told her I clearly wasn’t ready. That maybe all the doubts my father had about me were right.”
“Killian…”
“My grandmother…she didn’t yell. She didn’t get upset. She told me to put my shoes back on and then took me to Kerry Park.” I paused, the memory of that day still vivid in my mind. “We sat there for hours, just watching the birds. The butterflies. I couldn’t figure out what she was trying to do. Finally, she turned to me and said that I had her vote. I was…in shock. I didn’t understand why; I’d just blown billions of dollars in a single card game.”
“What did she say?” Grace asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
“She told me that life is about perspective. That to the caterpillar, his cocoon might seem like an end. A proverbial digging of his own grave. But to us, we know the cocoon is essential to growth. That it’s not an end but the path to a new beginning.”
Grace silently moved closer, absorbing my words until we stood shoulder to shoulder.
“Yes, I’d lost a ton of money in the blink of an eye, but I’d also been willing to take a risk. And when that risk hadn’t gone as planned, I’d owned up to the mistake when I’d failed,” I said, smiling at the memory of my grandmother’s calm, steady voice. “She said that being willing to take risks…and being humble enough to apologize when a mistake was made were two of the most important qualities of a leader, and she wasn’t sure I had them…until that moment.”
I adjusted the frame on the wall and then faced her. “She told me that what I thought was my end was instead the start of a very different beginning.” There was more to it—more to the loss than the money, but that was something I wasn’t ready to share.
“So, your grandmother gave you her vote, and you took over the company,” Grace murmured.
“I like to think my determination is my greatest strength,” I said and glanced out the window as a flash of lightning descended toward the horizon.
“What about your greatest weakness?”
I met her eyes again. The room seemed to shrink around us, the space between us crackling with an energy I could no longer ignore.
“I used to think they were both the same,” I said, my voice rougher than I intended.
