No matter what, she was still my twin.
"Thank you," I told her.
"You're welcome. Just warn me next time, okay?"
I smiled. "Okay."
"What are you going to do?"
"Give her time to breathe, I guess. Whatever that means."
"One tip," Grace said slowly. "Maybe give her a little hint that while you're respecting her need for space, you’ll still, you know, be waiting for her."
"The mantra of every pathetic stalker," I muttered.
She slugged me in the shoulder.
"Ouch. Fine. I will."
"Good." Grace hitched a thumb over her shoulder. "I'm gonna go back. You want help packing up?"
I shook my head. "I'm gonna stay out here today, I think. I'll be back by dinner."
"Love you," she said.
"You too."
Grace walked back toward Tucker, and I pulled out my phone, staring at my screen like it would give me answers.
After a few minutes, it was still dark. I was still missing her. I still had no freaking clue how to handle this. Maybe suffering in silence wouldn't help either of us. But neither would pushing her.
An idea unraveled slowly in my brain, and I decided to go with it.
Me: I'm going to call, and I'd like you to send me to voicemail. If you ever choose to listen to that message, I'd humbly ask that you wait until you're ready. Whatever that looks like for you.
I didn't wait for Magnolia to answer, but she still had the settings on her phone in such a way that I could see when she read my messages. I took a deep breath and hit the call button. My stomach flipped painfully at the sound of her recording, which picked up immediately, as I'd asked.
You've reached Magnolia MacIntyre. Kindly leave a message and I'll call you back just as soon as I'm able.
"It's me," I started. I took a deep breath before I said anything else, praying with every dull thud of my heart that someday she'd listen.
Chapter 23
Magnolia
Clothes were armor.
I'd realized it years ago without even being able to put a name to the thought. But when I was in middle school, in those etiquette classes with that awful teacher that Daddy had fired, all I knew was that when I was dressed my best, I felt invincible.
Oh sure, some backwoods, off-the-grid-living crazy might've told me to strap a knife to my thigh or something if I really wanted to feel safe, but the honest to God truth was that when I slipped into my favorite outfits, I walked taller (which was a big deal, as I wasn't all that tall), and my chin stayed high like someone was pushing it up (also a big deal when you had a daddy like mine), and it felt, just a little bit, like nothing could pierce me through those clothes.
In all my adult years, I'd had one public slipup after Tucker broke up with me, and it involved a basic white T-shirt and—I shudder to even think it out loud—black cotton leggings, but we just put that incident into the sea of forgetfulness where it belonged.
After I got home from the Camping Trip That Shall Not Be Mentioned, after I sent Grady's phone call to voicemail like he'd asked, I hardly stopped to think about what I was doing. Clothes were stripped off and left in piles on my immaculate bedroom floor. The water in my shower turned straight to scalding, and even though it was not the correct day of the week, I washed my hair because I just knew that I'd be changing things up a bit early.
Two hours later, the clothes—reeking of bonfire and Buchanan insanity—were tossed into a load of wash, my lips were slicked with my favorite lipstick, my hair was straight and falling around my shoulders, and I'd slid into my favorite magenta dress. It hooked high around my neck, clung to my chest and torso, and floated in a glorious cloud down past my knees.
Oh, what a luxurious and ridiculous choice it was too, in January, in Tennessee.
But I had no plans to go anywhere, and if I wanted to strut around my fifteen-hundred-square-foot home wearing a halter dress and stilettos, then there wasn't a single damn person in the world who could stop me.
Ruthlessly, I locked down any thoughts about what had happened. Behind a steel door with an impenetrable deadbolt.
There was work to be done, and allowing the past twenty-four hours to cycle on an endless loop in my head would serve no one.
My dining table—a beautiful mahogany showpiece that my parents kept aside for me when Momma's parents died—was gleaming with the late morning light streaming into the front windows of my house. Today, it would serve as my office.
There would be no lounging on the couch to answer emails and sort through ads.
No. Today, I would scrape back every shred of sentimentality and keep my work under a bull’s-eye.
That was the kind of armor I was talking about.
If I was still wearing those same clothes and sitting on a soft, inviting surface, Lord knows what might've happened.
If I'd looked down and saw the soft pants I'd slept in, I might have thought about Grady's hands. There was no protection in those clothes, nothing to shield my thoughts, because his hands had been big and strong. Incredibly sure of their path along my body.
When I opened my laptop, I refused to notice too closely that my fingers shook.
You walked in through the door, and I swear, something shifted into place inside me, Magnolia.
My hands curled into helpless fists, and I pinched my eyes shut.
Not a single part of me wanted to think about him as he'd said those things. Not really.
No part of me was ready to listen to whatever voicemail was now sitting on my phone, dangling like a damn carrot on a string, ready to lead me down a path toward ugly tears and puffy eyes and nowhere good.
"Get out of my head, Grady Buchanan," I whispered.
It was almost sad to realize that even the imaginary version of Grady, the one I was conjuring like a pesky ghost, respected me enough to do as I'd asked.
The words spoken out loud, and his voice—low and rough and fervent—disappeared into a puff of smoke.
My shoulders relaxed, and I got to work.
I worked on some new ads, ordered lunches for a group coming in a few days, and followed up on some inquiries that came through the website, setting them up in the schedule as I found the correct openings. Tucker and Grady would be pleased as the weather started warming a bit, into March and April, because we'd have enough business to warrant some help.
The satisfaction it brought me to see brightly colored blocks of time on a calendar that had been fairly sparse at first was why I could close and lock and seal that steel door efficiently.
It wouldn't be hard for me to do my job because if I had to go into that office at five o'clock in the morning to avoid Grady until I knew what in blazes to do with him, then I would.
My phone beeped, and I lifted the screen to see a text from Daddy.
Daddy: Drove past on my way home last night, and it was dark at your place. Just making sure my daughter isn't dead in a ditch somewhere while trying to respect her boundaries as an adult.
With a roll of my eyes, I tapped out a response.
Me: Not dead in a ditch. Safe at home. I LOVE YOU TOO.
I probably should've put down the phone when my reply was delivered, but instead, I found that my thumb had snuck out from the orders of We do not think about Grady. It slipped silently across the screen of my phone until my voicemail box appeared.
His name was at the top, and for a solid minute, I stared at those letters and wondered how we'd gotten to this point. Where just the sight of a capital G with a few innocent lines and curves after it had my heart quivering and my stomach knotted in a big ole mess.
It was almost like I wanted to torture myself and see exactly how far my hot-pink armor went, because before I could talk myself out of it, I tapped on his message, and the sound of his voice flooded just about every sense that I was in possession of.
No matter that I couldn't see or smell him, or that it was impossible to touch him.
His voice had t
hat effect on me, and it was silly to pretend otherwise.
"It's me," he said. Then he paused, and the breath he let out was slow and deep, and I could imagine him gathering himself. "Magnolia, I hope—"
Ruthlessly, I hit the pause button and navigated away from whatever he'd been about to say next.
I wasn't ready to hear it.
And I refused—out of stubbornness or determination or self-preservation, however it might be labeled—to look too deeply into why.
Then I got back to work because that was all I wanted to do.
All I could do.
The alternative—shaky hands and knotted stomach and quivering heart—wasn't something I was ready for.
Chapter 24
Grady
"And you're sure there's nothing wrong?"
I swung the ax, relishing the satisfying thwack as it split the piece of wood.
"Definitely sure."
Another piece went up on the block, and I hefted the ax over my head.
Thwack.
A clean line down the middle, two pieces flying off to the side where they used to stand tall and straight. Just like my heart.
Aunt Fran cleared her throat, and I knew this conversation wasn't over.
"Sweetheart," she said, "I would just like to point out that we have enough firewood to get us through an entire winter apocalypse. Maybe two."
Grimacing at the massive stack, which I'd been working on for the past week after they had a big ole tree cut down in their yard, I knew she was right.
But what else was I supposed to do with myself?
The first week had been a learning curve for me.
For instance, I learned that you could not shower for four days and still catch the faintest whiff of bonfire in your hair because, sickly, you wanted to remember what it was like when you held her in your arms and you both carried that scent.
I learned that it was possible to go three nights without sleeping much before your body caught up and proceeded to torture you with dreams of her for a solid twelve hours.
I learned that Magnolia—holy hell, it hurt to even think her name—was more than capable of running Valley Adventures without catching a simple glimpse of me.
All those handy week-one lessons were what brought me around the bend and through week two.
Hadn't seen her once, but her fingerprints were everywhere.
I led three guided hikes (that was what forced the shower on day five), and at some point each morning before I arrived at the office, she had lunches ordered and ready to be delivered just on time. She had manila folders marked and tabbed with instructions. She had everything set out for gear in neat stacks along the new table she put at the back of the office.
One morning, I showed up about ninety minutes earlier than I needed to be there, just to see if I could catch her in the act, but she was sneaky, that woman I was in love with.
The calendar continued to fill. The office remained clean and tidy and well-organized without a single, solitary sign of her.
"Grady," Aunt Fran said gently. "You've been staring at the wood for a couple of minutes now, and I think maybe you need to eat something."
My shoulders slumped, and with a resigned sigh, I allowed my aunt—a foot shorter and probably a hundred pounds lighter than me—to herd my mopey ass into the house.
I was fortunate that she and Uncle Robert had a renovated garage apartment that they allowed Grace and then me to live in while we got our feet under us. I had privacy and space to myself without spending a penny on rent. That was what family was for, she told us.
And it was also so she had someone to feed, I'd learned. Aunt Fran didn't love having an empty nest, and my stomach was the grateful beneficiary of her cooking.
While I sat on a stool at their kitchen island, she bustled happily around the kitchen, first pouring me a giant glass of sweet tea and then fixing up a plate of the brisket Uncle Robert had smoked the day before.
"Who is it then?" she asked casually.
I set my glass down. "Who is what?"
Aunt Fran didn't even blink. "The curse. Who is it?"
She scooped some mashed potatoes next to the brisket and popped them both into the microwave.
Exhaling a laugh, I could do nothing except shake my head. "H-How did you know?"
"Child, I have three sons who all suffered to varying degrees through it. I met your uncle just before I turned fifteen years old, and I know how he lost his mind over me. Lord knows we were just kids because he was just a few months older than me. But it was real." Her smile was soft as she said it, her eyes understanding. "And you have always been one of the happiest people I've ever known. Even when you were little, Lord, you just lit up the room, lit up everyone in it when you were around. You couldn't have been more than five the first time I remember thinking it. When you smiled, when you laughed, Grady, it was like you plugged that energy into the whole world."
I braced my elbows on the counter and sank my chin into my hands.
The microwave dinged, and Aunt Fran set the plate down on the counter, along with a fork. I smiled, just a little, at the fact that she used her fancy china with the flowered edges to heat me some leftovers.
"So," she continued, "I know something’s wrong when you singlehandedly chop up a hundred-year-old tree that's been the bane of my gardening attempts."
"It was a really big tree."
"I do not need that many shade flowers, and at this phase in my life, I can appreciate God's creation while sometimes wanting to rearrange things a little bit." She cleared her throat in a way that had me lifting my head. "And while your uncle is forever in your debt for all that work you did, Grady, you were working like the devil himself was chasing you."
It was moments like this when I missed my mom.
She wasn't Southern, so she didn't have the same turn of phrase that Aunt Fran did, but their energy was so similar. I missed sitting at my mom's kitchen counter in California while she listened to Grace and me prattle on about school or work or whatever it had been.
When I still didn't answer right away, Aunt Fran sighed, tsking her tongue in a way that cracked a wider smile on my face.
"There now," she said softly. "That looks more like you."
"It's that noise," I told her. "I swear, you Southern women have it down."
"Grady, we came out of the womb knowing how to cluck our tongue in a way that conveys every single ounce of judgment in our bodies."
I laughed, and I saw how it made her relax.
It's a weird thing to be smack in the middle of heartache and realize just how selfish it makes you.
While Magnolia and her happiness consumed my thoughts, I'd lost the ability to step back and see how my own mood was causing those around me to suffer too. And they suffered because they cared.
Grace checked in on me a lot, and each time, the worry lines on her forehead were a little more pronounced. Tucker was giving me space, which honestly was what I needed.
And because I was still a little selfish, I wasn't thinking about my timing when I spoke next. Aunt Fran took a sip of her own sweet tea.
"It's Magnolia," I said slowly.
Whatever was in her mouth came out in an undignified spray. Horrified, she covered her mouth with one hand, frantically reaching for a towel to clean up the mess.
"Lord, I am so sorry, I can't believe I just did that." She patted at the counter, her movements slow and deliberate. "I'm going to need you to repeat that, sweetheart."
"You heard me," I said dully.
"Oh, Grady," she murmured. Her face was so full of understanding, and I wanted to shove the heels of my palms into my eye sockets to block it out. I didn't want understanding as to how fucked up this was. How hard it would be to deal with. I just wanted ... I wanted her.
The tea was wiped up, but Aunt Fran kept dabbing the towel along the counter, probably so she had something to do with her hands while she processed that little nugget.
"Well," she said, "you'
re not the first to have a lot of complications."
I nodded. "I know."
"I suspect you won't be the last either."
"Something to look forward to with future generations of Buchanans, eh?"
She smiled. "I did have three boys. Eventually, someone will make me a grandma, and then I'll get to start this whole process over again."
"How old were your boys when you told them about this?" I asked. "Grace and I had heard about it over the years, but only as if it were complete and utter bullshit. Didn't exactly prepare us well."
Aunt Fran carefully folded the towel and set it down. "We kinda just told the boys as they grew up in different ways, using different words. When they were younger, we talked about how young Robert and I were when we met, and even though we didn't get married until he was twenty and I was nineteen, our boys grew up knowing their parents' love story. When they were older, some of that changed, how we talked about it with them. That they might meet someone and just ... bam ... feel that strike of lightning."
Lightning.
Yeah, that sounded about right.
"Levi had to be patient, as you know. Jocelyn, oh I love that girl, she wasn't quite ready for a boyfriend. Connor and Sylvia were a lot like Robert and me. They met, and that was that." She smiled. But it faded. "Hunter, he's never quite told us the full story, but ... he moved away because of what happened between him and—" Aunt Fran stopped. "Well, that's all I can say. What he did tell me, he told me in confidence, and I promised him that it was his tale to tell, if he so chose."
Her eyes were sad as she watched me process the fact that my eldest cousin moved across the country because he didn't end up with the person who made him feel those lightning bolts.
"So, he married someone else," I said. Those words, coming out of my mouth, felt like they'd done permanent damage. To every part of me. It was unfathomable. It was depressing. I wasn't sure I wanted to hear Hunter's story.
Steal My Magnolia (Love at First Sight Book 3) Page 19