The Love at First Sight Box Set

by Romance, Smartypants

  “Fine.” I crossed my arms and smiled up at him. “But you owe me a back massage for whatever just happened back there.”

  He grinned. “Deal.”

  Chapter 49

  Grace

  “You dirty little sneak," my brother said as I filled my plate in Dad's small kitchen.

  I rolled my eyes.

  "Don't roll your eyes at me, it's incredibly rude."

  Picking up the tongs, I dumped some asparagus onto Grady's plate. "You couldn't even see my face."

  He pointed his fork at the microwave mounted above the stove. "Reflection in the door."

  I grimaced, grabbing another roll from the basket. Grady nudged my shoulder as I spun around and set the edge of my butt on the counter. Dad was watching TV, so there was no chance he'd be able to hear us.

  "Keeping my relationship off the table for public consumption is not the same as being a dirty sneak."

  "Really?" Grady snapped a stalk of asparagus in his mouth. "So, when I saw him entering the garage apartment around midnight the other night, that was … what?"

  "He works late sometimes."

  "And the fact that you never go anywhere in town together …"

  "We like the restaurant choices in Knoxville better. There's no crime in that." The words tasted like garbage coming out of my mouth.

  He pursed his lips.

  I glared at him. "There are other people to consider, okay? We're being conscientious."

  My brother snorted. "You're so full of shit it's a wonder your eyes aren't brown."

  I set my plate down and crossed my arms. "What's your point?"

  "Have you told him about the curse yet?"

  "Ha. You're funny." I took a violent bite out of the unbuttered roll. "And what am I supposed to say? Oh, it's fine if the truth of our relationship is detrimental to your business and will probably get my dad fired from his job, we're destined, Tucker, let's just ignore all the people who are affected by it. Let’s also ignore how crazy I sound."

  Grady kicked his foot out and dragged a chair away from the small kitchen table, folding his body down into it and gesturing for me to sit across from him. Our dad's apartment wasn't roomy by any standards, which was why we could hear the television like it was propped up next to us. But at least in here, we had some modicum of privacy, and as that was the hallmark of my life for the last two-ish weeks, I huffed out a breath and sat across from my brother.

  "I tell you what, Gracey, I thought this whole thing was horseshit until I saw you go ass over teakettle for him."

  I slumped in the chair. "Tell me about it."

  Grady studied my face. "So why aren't you happier?"

  "I'm happy," I said immediately. "I am. It's hard not to be, because he's so … we're so …" I tried to find the right words. Words that didn't sound crazy.

  "Nauseatingly perfect together?" he supplied.

  "Yes," I exhaled. "It's the truth, Grady. And it's not like we don't disagree on things. We disagree on a lot. He drives me insane when he drives under the speed limit, but he's never in rush to get anywhere, you know? And he's always so put together! Just once, I want to see him in a dirty shirt or make a mess or burn something he's cooking."

  "What a jerk."

  I gave him a look. "You know what I mean."

  "I really, really don't."

  "Fine." I played with the tines on my fork. "It's like … the thing we’re hiding is so amazing that I can accept the need for discretion."

  Sort of.

  Almost.

  So what if all I wanted to do was hold his hand while I sat in his truck, not drive my own vehicle the roundabout way to his house, just in case so-and-so saw me go the direct route.

  People survived worse, I constantly reminded myself. At least I had Tucker. I just … wanted to be able to show it.

  He shook his head. "And his ex-girlfriend, whoever she is, Flower McWhatever, she's going to blow up people's lives because he moved on?"

  I thought about Magnolia, my last sighting of her in the Piggly Wiggly, and smiled at Grady's butchering of her name. "Not her, not really. Her dad struts around Green Valley like a peacock though. I met him a couple of weeks ago and it wasn't an experience that I need to repeat anytime soon."

  “And his eyes are shifty. Never trust someone with shifty eyes.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “How do you know?”

  Grady shrugged. “I met him once too.”

  “Where? How come I didn’t hear about this?”

  “Beeeecause you were off screwing your secret boyfriend?” he supplied oh-so-helpfully.

  My response was a pointed look.

  “No sense of humor, geez,” he mumbled. “I don’t know, maybe last week? I was meeting Jethro for a beer and J.T. was there.”

  Was my jaw resting on the table? “Who’s Jethro?”

  “Jethro Winston? He used to be a park ranger. Figured it’d be good to pick his brain about how to make my idea work.”

  “And you just … made friends and met him for a beer.”

  “Yeah.”

  Blink. Blink. “And J.T. was there, and you met him too.”

  Grady shrugged. “Unfortunately.” He clucked his tongue, sounding very much like the woman at the Piggly Wiggly. “It’s a nasty business, that’s for sure.”

  I rubbed my temples. “What is?”

  “J.T.,” he said slowly. “Small town politics. The law firm. Why is this so confusing to you?”

  It felt like he started speaking a different language. He had friends. And was meeting people for beers and knew park rangers. He’d been here for less time than I had.

  “How do you know all this already?”

  “Jethro was filling me in on everything.”

  “I’ve never even heard that name before and you’re gossiping with him?”

  He gave me a pointed look of his own. “His brother fixed your car, Grace. How do you not know this?”

  “I feel like I’ve been dropped into crazy world,” I murmured incredulously. “Is that why you’re being so twitchy about all this? Because you have one conversation with the locals and suddenly you feel like you’re the relationship expert?”

  Grady sighed. “I’m not claiming to be an expert in anything. A little insight is always a good thing, especially if it affects my sister, okay? There’s nothing wrong with being worried about you.”

  It shouldn’t have chafed so badly, that my brother seemed to slide right into Green Valley so easily. I still got curious looks and sideways glances.

  It did chafe though. It twisted something uncomfortable inside of me, tighter and tighter, like a laced corset binding my ribs into the wrong position.

  Probably because he was a man. And good looking. Beautiful men were welcomed with open arms.

  Beautiful women, for better or worse, were often treated with cautious reserve, especially by other women, until they’d proved their mettle. In LA, the way I looked was a commodity, something that could be valued and traded and judged.

  “Another reason you shouldn’t be slinking around in the shadows.” He laid a dramatic hand on his chest. “I have friends. You have imagined enemies.”

  “There’s nothing imagined about it.”

  He huffed. “Yeah, no shit. I mean, you’re not his enemy. But he’s no one to ignore, obviously.”

  His certainty made me study his face. I pointed my fork at him. "I don't want to risk that that man would put Dad's job in his crosshairs. It's easier to just …"

  "Hide?"

  "We're not hiding, Grady."

  My brother covered his face and groaned. "I swear, if you try and convince me that that's not exactly what you're doing, I'll jab myself in the eye with that fork. It's not fair to either of you, is the truth. Dad is a grown man, and if he gets fired because you're blissfully happy in a fated relationship, then he'd probably find a new job with a smile on his face."

  On cue, Dad laughed at something on the show he was watching. "Where'd you two go? The show's
on."

  "Be there in a second," Grady called.

  "So what do you expect me to do? Flaunt it in everyone's face? Consequences be damned?"

  "I never said flaunt," he said with lifted eyebrows. "But yeah. You two can't hide forever."

  "How very Gen Z of you. Happiness at any cost, right?"

  "If you need to turn it around on me, you go right ahead. But when you do, try to remember that it's because of me that you met the one-time love of your life."

  "Yes, thank you for making my car break down," I deadpanned. "It's not so easy as you're making out to be. And I tell you what, brother, I hope that when you meet your person, The One who will spin your head in circles, I hope she's got a mile and a half long list of complications that come along with her."

  He held up his hands. "Why do you think I refuse to make eye contact with a single member of the female species under the age of fifty when I go anywhere in this town? If I can just get my business going, I'll be able to hide out in the mountains and hike the trails in peace. I am determined to be the first person in this family to outwit whatever the hell it is making y'all crazy."

  "Y'all?" I teased. "Listen to you, sounding all southern."

  "My point, dear sister, is that you know how strong your feelings are for him. Whether their origins make sense or not, you're sitting on this big piece of the truth, and you're sitting on it alone. In the dark, because you can’t tell anyone that you’re even with him. It’s messed up."

  I set my jaw and refused to say anything.

  "Are you in love with him? Really truly?"

  Rubbing a hand across my forehead, I sighed. "You know I am. Sometimes I feel like it'll drown me because it's so big."

  "And you think it's a great idea to keep this from him?"

  I shook my head. "Telling him about the curse accomplishes what?"

  "The same thing that you two owning your relationship does. Those things, from what I can see, aren't bad. They're just complicated. But if you can't be honest with each other, or honest with the people in your lives, I don't see how you find yourself in a thriving relationship. All you're doing is sitting in secrets."

  Huh.

  It was a sticky, slimy truth that I didn't much like to hear.

  Resting my chin in my hand, I stared at the man across from me, and tried to reconcile him with the nitwit who used to stick gum in my hair. "You sound really smart right now. It's weird."

  "I am really smart. Everyone thinks that being a single guy means that you can't understand what makes a healthy relationship, but that's categorically not true." He shrugged. "I know you, Grace. And I know how much it'll eat at you to keep this in the dark for much longer, no matter how much you've convinced yourself that it's for the best. It’ll eat you alive, if it hasn’t already, and don’t even try to tell me differently."

  I hated being a twin sometimes. It wasn’t like we were psychic, but sometimes, moments like this, I wished he didn’t know me so well.

  “I like Tucker,” Grady continued. “But I don’t like that he’s not owning this.”

  Instead of answering, I rubbed my lips together. It felt disrespectful to complain to Grady about Tucker, when I’d never said anything to him about how this was starting to bother me.

  Because at first, it didn’t bother me. It made sense. But each day it went on, it felt a little bit more like we were doing something wrong.

  “Thank you for your silence,” my brother said. “I’ll take that as tacit agreement, and you know how much it thrills me to be right about things.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I just don’t feel like arguing about this when Dad is ten feet away.”

  Shaking his head, Grady took his plate and got up out of his seat. He dropped a kiss on the top of my head as he left the kitchen.

  Instead of following him, I stayed at the table and pulled out my cell.

  On the screen on my phone was a picture of me and Tucker that he'd snapped a few days earlier. Like I'd imagined us before our relationship was based in any sort of reality, we were sitting on the small deck behind his house, watching the sun set beyond the tall pine trees. His legs bracketed me on each side and my back was leaning up against his chest.

  "This is the kind of light that photographers have dreams about," I told him.

  "Well, we better take one then." He picked up my phone from beside us and flipped the screen to the camera. "Do you want to do the honors?"

  I shook my head. "Your arms are longer."

  Then he wrapped one of those arms across my chest to hold me tight to him, and it was so warm and strong, that I turned my nose toward his bicep with a small smile on my lips and my eyes closed. His handsome face was staring straight at the camera when he hit the button to take the picture.

  We looked happy, and in love.

  It was the kind of picture that I wanted poster size above my bed, spotlights aimed at it so that every detail would be visible to the naked eye.

  My relationship with him deserved better than to be sitting in the dark, built on a foundation of secrets, but as I stared at our picture, I couldn't figure out how to bring it into the light without hurting the people around us.

  How did I tell him that I wanted him to risk upsetting the feelings of the people in his life for me? I didn’t want to upset people. I didn’t want to hurt anyone.

  But I didn’t want to hurt either.

  Shifting our relationship into the light would come. I believed that.

  I swiped my thumb over his face and smiled. I could tell him about this crazy family curse, and if nothing else, that one secret wouldn't be hanging over us. Because the one thing I knew was that my heart was safe with Tucker Haywood.

  Chapter 50

  Tucker

  “No hands where a bathing suit covers, and no tongue."

  "Now, you know there's no way we can guarantee that unless we're tying people up." Maxine eyed me over her coffee.

  "We'll have levels. Five bucks for a hug, ten bucks for a peck on the cheek, twenty bucks for a peck on the lips, and if either one of us feels uncomfortable, we ring the bell and their tickets get entered in a raffle for a grand prize, that way they don't feel slighted. Robert is donating a large screen TV for that."

  "Hmm."

  "It's the only way we'll agree."

  Calmly, she took a sip. "We? You speaking for her now?"

  "You're the one who paired us together. Did you expect us not to talk about it?"

  The words stuck uncomfortably in my throat, especially when those iron-gray eyes gleamed dangerously. It wasn't a lie. Wasn't even skirting the edge of a lie about me and Grace, but it felt like one. It felt like I was downgrading this wonderful, perfect thing into a cheap cardboard box.

  "Twenty dollars for a peck on the lips," she muttered. "Lord, it's ridiculous, isn't it? But every dirty old man and dirty old woman in Green Valley will stand in your lines, they won't care if they can get it for five bucks on a street corner in Nashville." She pointed a finger. "And I promise you, they will try to grab your ass, Tucker Haywood. I'd bet every red cent in my bank account on it."

  "Not if you tell them not to."

  She hooted. "Oh honey, the old biddies in this town won't listen to me if I had a bullhorn to their ears. We don't get much excitement anymore in our lives, so we take it where we can get it."

  "And that involves public groping?" I asked dryly.

  "Calm your feathers, Haywood. I'm just messing with you. There'll be a booth separating you, all you have to do is lean across it and peck some old women on their cheeks. You'll live. So will Grace."

  The thought of her having dozens of men lining up in front of her had my hands curling up into fists underneath the table. "I know we will."

  "I'm fine with your setup, and you two will probably make us a fortune."

  I held up my hands. "It was Grace's idea. I wish I could take the credit."

  "How's she doing?" Maxine asked, all innocence and wide, guileless eyes. Such utter horseshit. />
  I slowly raised an eyebrow. If she was trying to bait me, she'd have to try harder than that.

  "I hired her to take some photographs at my family reunion a couple of weeks ago." She sipped her coffee. "Girl's got more talent in her pinky than most people do in their entire body."

  Pride suffused me in a warm rush. It was the truth. While Grace edited the pictures from Maxine's family party, I had laid stretched out next to her on my couch, watching in awe as she worked. She saw things with that camera that most people didn't, which was probably true of any good photographer.

  There were so many good shots, laughter and smiles, nothing posed, nothing fake.

  "She got some great ones of my grandsons, even made my kids look like normal, well-adjusted people."

  I smiled. I knew exactly which ones she was talking about.

  But the one that should be blown up and framed was a shot she snapped of Maxine and her great-niece. The little girl was standing in front of Maxine, who was perched in her walker, a plastic bubble wand held up to her pursed lips. The bubble was perfectly formed, still clinging stubbornly to the circular edge, and the child, no more than four or five, was holding her hands up, grinning happily in anticipation.

  "But of everything she sent me, the one with the bubbles was my favorite," Maxine continued.

  "Mine too," I answered without thinking. When I froze, her face spread in a triumphant smile.

  "I might be old, but I am not slow, young man. When I saw you walk into that library, I knew it."

  I rubbed the back of my neck. "Miss Barton."

  She waved a hand. "What do you think I'm gonna do, take out a billboard?"

  Sitting back in my chair, I regarded her steadily. Did I trust her with this? Yeah, I did. But that wasn't the point. If she saw through us that easily, then other people would too.

  It wasn't surprising, after just a few weeks with Grace, my feelings for her felt like they were tattooed on my damn forehead as obvious as they seemed. We'd spent two nights apart in the last fourteen days. And those two nights sucked. My bed felt empty. I'd tossed and turned more than usual without her anchoring me in place.