“You’re staying here, in Macon Hills.” He waits a beat. “Like, for good.”
“Well, as for good as now can be, yes.” I can work from anywhere since I work for myself.
“Oh.” He seems to deflate a little. “Well, thanks for dinner,” he says. “If you were a girl, I’d try to kiss you goodbye. But since you’re not…” He grins at me.
“Fuck you, Grady,” I reply, but I’m smiling too. I know it because my lip still hurts when I do.
“Thanks for showing me your house,” he says.
“Thanks for letting me show you my house.”
“It’s a beautiful house,” he says, staring at my face. “Lots of potential there.”
There’s lots of potential here, too, with me and Grady. I just don’t know how to move it along.
“Thanks for trying to be my friend, Grady,” I say softly.
He nods but doesn’t respond. He stares at me for another beat, and then turns and leaves. He waves as he backs out of the driveway.
And in the back of my mind, all I can think is that the old Caswell place didn’t seem quite so empty when Grady was in it with me. And that is a dangerous way to think, particularly right now.
15
Grady
“How should I know where Evie is?” I tell Junior the next night as he works on his old car. He has been tinkering with it for years, ever since his grandfather left it to him. It’s not any closer to running today than it was when he got it sixteen years ago. I lean against the car and watch him. He has no fucking idea what he’s doing. None whatsoever. “I haven’t even talked to Evie today.”
“Uh huh,” he says with a grin.
Suddenly, his three little girls rush out the back door, with Barbara-Claire right behind them. “Junior, if you don’t get your ass in the car, you’re going to be left behind,” she calls as she dashes with the girls toward their sedan. The two oldest ones are wearing baseball pants and team t-shirts. The shirts just happen to have the name of my business, Parker Landscaping, written on the back, since I sponsor the team.
“Oh, shit,” I say. I set my beer down. “I forgot it’s game night.”
“We don’t have room for one more, Grady,” Barbara-Claire explains. “Unless you want to sit in Junior’s lap,” she adds.
I look toward my beer. I’ve already had three while we stood in the driveway. Junior did too. But he’s already in the passenger seat of Barbara-Claire’s sedan.
“I am not riding in Junior’s lap,” I say. And there’s no way I’m getting behind the wheel either. “You guys go ahead. I’ll get there.”
“Are you sure?” Barbara-Claire looks a little worried. “I didn’t know you’d need a ride. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault I forgot it’s game night.” Seriously, I have it on my calendar. I should have known.
She jerks her thumb toward Junior. “You can blame Junior if you want to. That’s what I always do.”
I grin at her.
She backs out of the drive and then lowers her window. “You know, you could always call Evie for a ride. She said she was going to the game.”
Huh. That might work. I pull my phone out and see that I missed a text from her asking if I was going to the girls’ game.
I dial her number and wait.
“Grady?” she says immediately. “Are you seriously going to reply to my simple little text by calling me? Really?”
Well, hello to you too, sunshine. “Come and get me, Clifford,” I say.
She says nothing for a moment. Then she asks quietly, “Are you okay?”