There was a moment’s hesitation then, “Sure.”
Cassie emerged twenty minutes later with dark jeans from the men’s department that were sparely designed but seemed to fit well. She’d pulled a bright yellow sweater over them and dropped everything else on the counter. She stood still while the clerk cut tags off her outfit.
“Why didn’t you buy a jacket?” Grady asked. “Or slippers?”
“The jackets are all too short for me. So, it’s back to the tomato plant cover. And my feet are too big for the size range here.” She pulled on the green raincoat, looking bright and happy. That made him feel better. She grinned. “Good thing I brought my boots along.”
“You going to wear those to the wedding?”
“No, I’m going to have something sent to me One-Day Air.”
Of course. Whatever her problems were, getting whatever she needed wasn’t one of them.
The clerk took Cassie’s card and swiped it. Then as she studied the card, her fingers began to tremble. She looked up at Cassie in astonishment. “I thought it was you,” she breathed.
Cassie smiled as he imagined royalty would smile. “Thanks for not outing me. It was fun to shop in peace.”
“No wonder you seem to know what you want. And can pull it together out of odds and ends and look fabulous.”
Molly packed everything into two shopping bags, and Grady took them.
“Thanks, Molly,” Cassie said, leading the way to the door. “You were so much help. You’re an excellent sales associate.”
The young woman beamed.
* * *
CASSIE OPENED THE door for Grady, who walked out ahead of her.
His phone rang. “Do you mind getting that?” He raised his left elbow so she could reach into his hip pocket to retrieve it.
She ignored the warmth of his body through the pocket and took out the black iPhone. Ben’s face lit up the screen.
“It’s Ben,” she told Grady.
He moved toward the truck. “Ah, they must be home. Answer it. My keys are in the right side pocket. Want to get the door?”
She answered the phone as she dug for keys.
“Grady’s phone. This is Cassie.” She was distracted again by how warm he was. For someone who was perpetually cold when the weather dipped below 70 degrees, she felt the absurd desire to crawl inside that cozy pocket.
“Cassie!” As she aimed the key remote to unlock the car, she heard Ben’s voice as he apparently handed off the phone and said, “Corie, it’s your sister.”
“Hi, Cassie. You escaped the press?” She loved the sound of the word. Sister. She had a sister. She was a sister. Cassie opened the truck’s passenger door and watched Grady put her bags on the seat. She wondered for a minute if she was going to have to ride in the truck bed.
“We did,” she told Corie. She swallowed and asked, “Did you see me on the news?”
“Yes. How cool that you’ve started a trust for women needing clothing and transportation to job interviews. I can contribute clothes.”
Cassie couldn’t help the little glow that started in her heart. Sisterly support. “I meant the scene—”
There was a smile in Corie’s voice. “I know what you mean. I’ve made a few scenes myself, so it’s hard for me to criticize anybody else’s. Don’t worry about it. Nobody cares.”
Except for the millions of people who probably now saw her as a bratty diva and an abuser of the deaf. “You’re not embarrassed?”
Corie laughed. “No, we’re not embarrassed.” Cassie heard Ben’s laugh. “Listen, we’re all meeting for lunch at someplace called...uh...”
“The Bay Bistro,” Ben shouted into the phone. “Grady knows it. Can you be there in ten minutes?”
Cassie went to Grady, who was now placing her packages in the jump seat. “Can we be at the Bay Bistro in ten minutes?”
He straightened and tried to smooth his hair, mussed by the tight quarters in the back of the truck cab. “Sure.”
“Sure,” Cassie relayed, helping bring order to Grady’s hair with her free hand. It was thick and coarse. She resisted the impulse to run her fingers through it one more time.
His gaze collided with hers, seeming to ask her to. She dropped her hand and had to look away to concentrate on what Ben was saying.
“Great. Tell him he’s paying,” Ben said. “See you then.”
She smiled at Grady. “He says you’re paying.”
“Tell him he still owes me for the night I went into the river after a DUI and he watched me.”
She tried to but Corie had reclaimed the phone. “Cassie?”
“Yes.”
“We all think it’s fun to be related to someone the press is making a big deal over. So don’t worry.”
“But it’s a bad big deal.”
“This family will turn it into something good. It’s what we do. See you in ten.”
“Right.” Well, right on the “seeing her in ten” part. Turning this press nightmare into something good was going to require a miracle.
* * *
GRADY DROVE THE three blocks to the edge of downtown, then turned down a side street to the old mill that had been converted into shops and a restaurant. The Bay Bistro was on the third floor. Cassie, he noticed, looked worried.
“Forget the news,” he advised gently. “They’re your family. They don’t care.”
She turned to him with open disbelief. “That’s what Corie said, but of course they care. How can they not? When I met them in Texas, I kept everything to myself, hoping it would just go away. I didn’t know then that someone had recorded it.”
“Again, I’m sure it’s not a big deal to them.”
“Jack has to be disappointed. He worked so hard to get us all together again, and his little sister turns out to be a monster diva who yelled at a deaf woman! And the whole world knows about it!”
“Big fuss over nothing.”
She huffed a breath. “Grady, I’m the piece of the family that’s been missing and I...”
He heard something in her voice somehow deeper than the words she was saying. He turned to her as he pulled into a spot right in front of the mill and shut off the engine.
“What if I’m a disappointment? What if they’ve been waiting all this time to get me back, they’re impressed to learn than I’m a model, then find out...I have all these...issues?”
“You have nothing to fear here, Cassie. The Mannings and the Palmers are the best people you’ll ever meet. Everybody’s got their issues, so they’re all tolerant of everyone else’s. Jack came back from Afghanistan with nightmares. Corie’s life was sometimes so awful that she became a thief. Just relax. All they care about is that the three of you are together again. Come on.”
He went around to her side to help her out, then caught her hand and hurried her so she wouldn’t have time to relive the cell phone video that had taken up permanent residence in her head.
He escorted her before him into the old mill’s elegant downstairs with shops off of a central atrium, then caught her hand again and ran for the elevators, doors closing as they hurried. If he could get her upstairs before the family arrived and distract her with the spectacular view and a glass of wine, she might get over her nervousness.
He was vaguely aware of her pulling against him as he shouted to the lone man inside to hold the elevator. But he thought she was just having trouble keeping up in her boots.
“Grady...” she said.
“Come on!” he encouraged, walking quickly. “If we get there first, I can tell the waiter that Ben intends to pay. He has a tab here.” He warmed to that thought above all else. “He’ll hate that. Ha!”
The man held the door from closing as Grady hurried into the car, drawing Cassie in beside him. He wrapped his arm
around her shoulders as she struggled to catch her breath. The door closed and the car began to rise.
He patted Cassie’s back as she gulped in air. He was happy with the day, glad to have the opportunity to help her relax before her family got there. He was anxious to see his friends, anticipating all of them around the table, talking and laughing while sharing the bistro’s outrageously delicious food.
So, he was completely unprepared for what happened next. Cassie caught his hand in a biting grip, her fingernails drawing blood as she let out a high-pitched, ear-splitting scream.
She began to shake him and point to the door. “No! No! No!”
“Cassie—”
“No!”
All right. No. No, what? He wasn’t sure, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out she wanted out of the elevator. The man who’d held the door for them did so again, his eyes a little wider this time as they reached the third floor and the doors parted.
Cassie gasped and ran out into a hallway that spilled right into the restaurant, only a few feet from the hostess’s stand. She stopped and noisily drew in air, her arms wrapped around herself, her cheeks crimson.
She looked mortified and somehow isolated. Her hands shook. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, then added grimly, “Remember that issue left over from my childhood I mentioned that I still deal with?”
“Yeah?”
“It’s claustrophobia.”
“Yeah,” he said. An inch of skin was scraped off his left hand. “I guessed that.”
CHAPTER FOUR
THE METHODICAL PART of him was remembering her tense behavior on the plane. That small space you couldn’t escape without a parachute had to be even more frightening than an elevator car you knew would stop in seconds. He regretted attributing her tension to a more normal fear of flying.
But deep down he knew some fears could not be explained or wished away, and he put both hands on her shoulders, saying quietly, “Just relax. You’re out now. We’re about to go into this big, airy room with views of the river, so there’s nothing to confine you or to be afraid of.”
While people wove around them into the dining room, her eyes were huge and turbulent, as though the emotional storm she’d just endured wasn’t quite over.
She nodded, expelling a deep breath. “Right. I’ll be fine in a minute.”
The elevator’s second set of doors opened and he glanced up to see most of the Manning-Palmer family. “Good,” he said quietly, “because here they come.”
“Please don’t say anything. Nobody knows.”
He dropped his hands and said firmly, “Don’t worry. Our secret.”
* * *
CHAOS REIGNED FOR a good ten minutes. Love, energy, laughter and pre-wedding excitement raised the decibel level in the corridor to deafening. There were hugs among the women, back-slapping among the men, and the children jumped up and down in joy. No one would have guessed that they’d all seen each other less than twenty-four hours ago.
The Mannings and the Palmers snaked through the dining room in a long parade as the hostess led them across the room to a table in a far corner set up for ten.
Sarah, Jack’s wife, began to suggest that couples sit opposite each other, but the children had already chosen places. Soren, a slender, fair-haired ten-year-old, grabbed a frosty pitcher of water and started filling glasses. Rosie, a year younger, with glossy black hair, wide brown eyes and a busybody attitude, took a basket of rolls and distributed them to the bread plate at every place.
Ben suggested to Soren that he not fill the glasses to the top and Corie handed Rosie the small tongs that rested beside the basket. “At the foster home,” Corie explained as they sat, “everybody helped put the meal on the table.” She smiled at the children. “Good job, guys.”
Cassie felt a new sense of comfort at being part of this warm, loud group, but also a new insecurity she hadn’t experienced when she’d been with them in Texas. Then, she’d thought her old childhood bugaboo had been beaten. Now, as she watched how confident everyone seemed, she realized she was a little broken. Jack and Corie had had more difficult lives than she’d led, yet she was the one with a leftover emotional tic.
“Hey.” Grady pulled a chair out for her and guided her gently down. “They’re much less alarming than the noise they make,” he said quietly, about to take the chair beside her when Jack shouldered him out of the way.
“You had her company all the way over on the plane,” he said, pointing him to the chair on the other side of him. “And I understand she’s staying in your loft.”
“She is. Turns out, she’s a great cook. I had crepes with blueberry compote for breakfast.”
Jack laughed. “Saved from your own bachelor cooking until the wedding. Thank you.” Jack accepted a menu from a formidable-looking fortyish waitress with a crisp black-and-white uniform and dyed red hair styled in a topknot and bangs. She distributed menus like she was dealing cards, listing off the details of the salmon special. She looked around the table and asked gravely, “Who poured the water?”
Soren raised his hand worriedly. “I did.”
She nodded. “Well done.” And walked away, promising to be right back to take their drink order.
Everyone laughed at Soren’s relieved smile. Ben ruffled his hair and caught Corie’s eye. She sat with Rosie at the end of the table on the opposite side. Their shared look spoke of love and happiness.
Cassie looked away and found Jack struggling for composure. He must have caught the look and was probably overcome to see his sister so at peace. She watched him reach for his glass of water, already empty, and handed him hers.
“Here,” she said.
But Soren had already foreseen the problem. “I got it, Aunt Cassie,” he said, coming around the table to lean over Jack, reach for the pitcher and refilling his glass.
Jack pretended to frown at him. “Am I going to have to tip you?”
Soren, his blue eyes alight with the teasing attention, spread his free hand as though the answer should be obvious. “Corie said I did a good job, and the waitress said ‘well done.’ And she’s a professional.”
Laughter erupted again and Jack grabbed him and gave his shoulder a gentle noogie while he giggled. Grady reached out to save the pitcher.
The waitress returned to take their drink orders. Soren went back to his place beside Ben and everyone got serious about studying the menu.
During lunch, Sarah, a slender woman of medium height, with light brown hair and blue-gray eyes, held up her Caribbean-blue napkin.
“Is this the shade you were talking about for the wedding?” she asked Corie.
Corie nodded, opening her napkin. “It is. In silk. Or charmeuse, it’s even more beautiful, with a softness you can’t quite get in paper. I wish we had time to make dresses for all of you. I think the best thing to do is just wear your favorite dressy dress. I’m wearing one I made for myself.”
“That pretty pink one with the quilted look?” Helen asked. A comfortably plump woman with a warm smile, she was Ben’s natural mother and Jack’s adopted mother.
Corie shook her head. “I’ve been designing a new line, something different—less street chic and more...” She smiled as she thought. “More...elegant. The two of you can just wear whatever dressy dress you have that you love the most. I’ll have to find something for Rosie. The guys are renting suits because neither has one! Helen knows the owner of the rental place and set up an appointment for them in the car on the way over.”
“I’ll try to find a dress in this color,” Helen said. “It’s so pretty.” She stuffed the napkin in her purse. “What else can we do to help? You must be overwhelmed with just a few days to plan while adding two children to your household.”
“I am, a little.” Corie sat quietly, everything about her remarkably calm. Cass
ie thought she seemed too small and fragile to be able to deal with so much, but she knew her sister had lost her father at twelve, escaped a cruel and negligent stepmother shortly after that, and finally found serenity because of an accidental meeting with a woman who ran a foster home and took her in.
Corie had spent the time since then working as a waitress while studying to be a designer, and helping her foster mother stay afloat financially. She so deserved to be happy.
“But,” Corie went on, “life with Ben is so much more wonderful than I ever thought I’d know. And the kids are going to be an adjustment for both of us, but I know it’ll work in the end. They’re both great.” She laughed lightly. “I hope you don’t mind that your dinner rolls were manhandled. Or rather, Rosie-handled.”
Helen dismissed that with a shake of her head. “Of course not. I think we all grew to love both of them while we were visiting you in Texas. They’re precocious and seem happy with their new lives. But they’re not going to leave you much time to get ready. Seriously, how can we help?”
“I’m not sure where to start,” Corie admitted. “I thought knowing I had a dress to wear was a forward step.”
Sarah took a notebook and pen out of her purse and smiled from one to the other. “You’re right. The dress is very important, and I love that it’s one you designed yourself. So why don’t Cassie and Helen and I divide the rest of the duties?” She made a few notes in her book. In her management persona, she was impressive, and they all waited quietly for her to give instructions.
“How many people?” she asked.
“Fifty, tops,” Corie replied. “Some friends of Ben’s from the police department. Some neighbors. That’s it.”
“Good. That’s manageable. Have you thought about where to have the ceremony?”
Corie made a face. “I called the church while we were still in Texas, and they’re already booked. And there’s so much going on in most of the venues around town because of New Year’s Day.”
Cassie got a sudden inspiration. “What about Grady’s house?”
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