Page 41 of Forsaken Fate

I rose early, just after dawn. I dressed in jeans and a t-shirt. I wanted simple. I wanted to look like me again.

Grayson came into the room as I toweled off my freshly washed hair. He was dressed in a new suit. He leaned in the door frame and his eyes narrowed as he caught sight of me. He acted as if nothing had happened last night. Or maybe he didn’t remember.

“Where the hell are you going looking like that?”

“Maybe nowhere,” I said. “You said you don’t need me to come to Manhattan with you so I don’t have specific plans for the day. Will you be back home tonight?” I knew the answer but I wanted to hear it again.

“No,” he said. “I’ve got meetings tomorrow morning so I might not be back until the day after tomorrow. You’ll stay here?” He said nothing about what he tried to do to me last night. My guess was that at least that last bit he didn’t remember.

“I might go into town to do some shopping if you don’t mind.”

“Shopping for what?”

I wound the towel around my head and put my hands in my lap. I sat at the dressing table.

“Well,” I said. “I was thinking. You told Theo about how many boxes and things your mother has throughout the house. How do you feel about me taking on the project of sorting through some of it?”

I held my breath as he regarded me. This is what I’d been working for since the very beginning – unfettered access to Diana’s things.

Grayson took a breath and scratched his chin. “It looks like an old lady lives here, doesn’t it?”

I had to be careful with how I answered. Agreeing with him might seem like the safest choice but sometimes it wasn’t. If I did, I was essentially criticizing Diana. It could trigger him.

“Well,” I answered. I rose and crossed the room until I was standing in front of him. “It’s just that it’s your house now. You can do anything you want with it. It’s a beautiful house and the dinner party and the Gathering I think is just the beginning. We could ... you could start using this place to entertain. It could be grand. You could give everything your touch, not your mother’s.”

“And you want to help with that?”

“I could give it a try. Maybe start out small, like I said. We at least need to know what your mother had. Take an inventory. I could go room by room. Then you can decide what you want to keep or sell or donate. Whatever you think.”

Grayson nodded. “You’re not wrong. Why don’t you pick a room and start?”

I leaned up and kissed him and this time it was genuine.

“When I get back, hopefully we’ll have something to celebrate,” he said. “If my meeting with some of the packs I’m hoping will back me go well.”

I supposed there was a first time for everything.

“Sounds good,” I said. “You want me to plan anything special?”

Grayson shook his head. “I’ll let you know.”

He turned. He didn’t say goodbye. He didn’t kiss me again. He did none of the things a loving future mate would do. It wasn’t out of character. Grayson just left. I was shaking. I hadn’t expected that to be so easy. Grayson had actually directed me to go through each room of Diana’s house. I was so close! I wanted to start immediately. I wanted to tear every room apart until I found something, anything that could prove what she’d done to me. To my family.

But I had an appointment to keep. Once Charlie agreed to help me, I knew I had to go. It would strengthen my resolve and help me see the rest of this through.

I dried my hair quickly after I heard Grayson leave through the front door and grabbed my purse. I was almost out the door myself when Mary stopped me. She was the other impediment to my unfettered access to the house. I had to formulate a plan to deal with her quickly, too.

“Do you want me to call a driver for you?” she said. “Mr. Dorran said to have one at your disposal.”

Fat chance, I thought. I knew what she was about. Maybe Grayson asked her or maybe she was so used to doing what she thought Diana would want but I wasn’t about to tip her off on my destination. What I did today, I needed to do alone.

“I feel like driving myself today,” I said. “Grayson wants to change a few things with the house so I’m just going to do some window shopping.”

Her face went sour as I expected. I didn’t stick around for anymore conversation. I took Grayson’s Lexus since he’d taken a cab to the airport. The traffic was light heading north toward Lake Bliss. There was an old, abandoned rest stop off the main highway. Charlie’s contact had texted me to meet her in the campground behind it.

I stepped out of the car. It was almost noon. I slipped off my leather bomber jacket and tossed it in the back seat. I went back and forth on whether I should keep it with me. Would it be cold when the spell took hold? I finally decided to leave the jacket in the car. I adjusted my cross-body leather bag and headed around the dilapidated building where the rest stop used to be.

“Hello?” I shouted. The highway was a good bit behind me. There was no one else around.

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