Amazing Gracie

by Sherryl Woods

  “Well, I have. I suspect we can thank Max for that.”

  “Is that supposed to thrill me?”

  “It should if what you’re really interested in is her happiness. And then there’s Bobby Ray.”

  “What about him?”

  “Just look how he’s pitching in today. Last night was a turning point for him.”

  “If it was, it’s because of you.”

  She waved off the comment. “It doesn’t matter why. All that’s important is that he’s obviously trying to change. Then there’s Delia. She has a whole new lease on life. I’m thinking of asking if she wants to come over for a few hours every afternoon and have tea with the guests, shower them with a little of her southern charm.”

  Kevin groaned. “Which means I’ll have to drive her over. I’ll never get in any good rest time in my hammock again.”

  Gracie winked at him. “Oh, I think I can come up with an incentive for you to do that, something a whole lot more interesting than lounging around in that old hammock of yours.”

  He looked fascinated. “Oh, really? I do love my hammock, you know.”

  “Believe me, I’ve noticed. Not to worry, though,” she said. “Pretty soon there won’t be anyone left for you to worry about anyway. You won’t need to do all that mulling and pondering you do out there.”

  “Obviously you haven’t heard about Bo and the others.”

  “Actually, I have. You’ll get them straightened out one by one.”

  “You mean that you will. You’re sneakier than I am. My guess is they won’t even know what hit them.”

  She grinned at him. “Is that a bad thing?”

  “Not necessarily,” he said, gathering her close once again. “I certainly haven’t figured out what hit me, but you don’t hear me complaining.”

  “What do you think? Is it working?” Helen whispered.

  “I can’t see anything,” Delia protested. “Stop hogging the window.”

  “Hey, they’re my mom and dad. I should get to look,” Abby grumbled from behind them. “Has he kissed her yet? I don’t want to miss that.”

  Kevin stood back and watched the three of them jockeying for position at the attic window. It was the only one that had a decent view of the shady spot in the backyard where Bobby Ray and Marianne were engrossed in conversation.

  “You all are pitiful,” he declared, drawing three guilty looks. “Why can’t you give them some privacy?”

  “We are,” Aunt Delia insisted. “That’s why we’re up here instead of down there with them.”

  “I thought you didn’t approve of this any more than I do?” he said.

  “I didn’t.” She shrugged. “Could be I was wrong. Marianne seemed surprisingly pleased to find Bobby Ray here. Maybe the others are right and there is hope for the two of them.”

  “I’m amazed Gracie isn’t up here with you since this is her pet project,” Kevin said.

  Actually, Gracie was the reason he’d come up to the attic. He’d been relatively certain that she was the one scuffling around up here and he’d hoped to steal a few more minutes alone with her. Those kisses he’d managed before lunch hadn’t been nearly enough to tide him over until dinnertime. That neediness inside him was getting worse by the day.

  “Over there,” Abby said, gesturing across the hall. “She’s going to make that her office. She’s in there measuring.”

  Actually, she was in there daydreaming as near as Kevin could tell. She was seated by one of the floor-to-ceiling windows, staring out to sea.

  He stood in the doorway and observed her for several minutes, undetected. The room was oddly shaped and small, but filled with glass on all three sides. It had a clear view of the river in any direction, which made it seem bigger than it was. The branches of a huge oak tree were close enough to touch. Gracie looked as serene as he’d ever seen her. He wondered how she’d feel if she knew this particular room’s history. It had been closed off for decades, though naturally he’d broken into it every chance he got as a child.

  “Hiding out in your tree house?” he asked eventually.

  She glanced up at him and smiled. “It does feel like that, doesn’t it?”

  “I hear you’re going to turn this into your office. Won’t the climb to the third floor be a nuisance?”

  “It’ll be worth it.”

  “It’s awfully small.”

  “I won’t need much more than a desk and a filing cabinet.”

  “I’ll bet it’s a far cry from what you had at Worldwide.”

  She regarded him with a quizzical expression. “Is there some reason you’re trying to discourage me from using this room?”

  Kevin hesitated, uncertain whether to tell her the room’s sad history. Naturally, she caught on to the implication of his hesitation.

  “Kevin, did something happen in this room?”

  He nodded slowly, then settled on the floor behind her, drawing her back against his chest and wrapping his arms around her.

  “Tell me,” she pleaded.

  Kevin was reluctant to get into it and spoil the room for her, but now that her curiosity was aroused he doubted he could get out of it.

  “According to family legend, Great-great Aunt Anne—that would be Delia’s aunt—spent all her time locked away in here around the turn of the century,” he began.

  “Locked away?” Gracie asked, clearly horrified. “Who did that to her?”

  “It wasn’t like that. She chose to be here. She was watching for her husband to come home from the sea. Even after she was told his ship had been lost, she stayed here. She wouldn’t eat or sleep. Nobody could get through to her. She just waited, wasting away until finally she died of a broken heart.”

  Tears spilled down Gracie’s cheeks. “Oh, my, that is sad. How awful for her.”

  “They say her ghost still lives here and that sometimes at night you can hear her crying.”

  She turned to face him, eyes suddenly shining, the sad mood banished. “A ghost? I thought you said there wasn’t one?”

  “Because I don’t believe it.”

  “I want to stay here tonight and see for myself.”

  He stared at her. “Gracie, I don’t think she appears on command, if she appears at all. Never once, in all the times I was over here, did I hear a thing.”

  “You’re a man, for one thing,” she said dismissively, as if that were a logical explanation. “Oh, please. Stay here with me. We can have dinner right up here. There’s plenty left over from lunch. I think there might even be a bottle of wine in the refrigerator. Helen brought it so we could have a toast when we’re finally finished. Given how long the repairs are taking, I have plenty of time to replace it.”

  Kevin tried one more time to dissuade her. “Do you really want to sit around on a bare floor and wait for a ghost to turn up?”

  “Yes. Just think what it’ll do for business if I can claim a real, live ghost.” She winced. “Well, not live, actually, but you know what I mean.”

  “Something tells me Great-great Aunt Anne wouldn’t be thrilled with all the attention. She shooed away everyone who tried to come up here while she was alive.”

  Gracie’s chin jutted up. “Well, she’s just going to have to get used to me.”

  “Like all the rest of us, I suppose,” he murmured. “I’ll go kick everyone else out and bring up dinner.”

  She reached over and rested a hand against his cheek. “Thanks, Kevin.”

  Given his reluctance to deny her anything, it was probably a very good thing that this was all she’d asked for. Besides, an evening alone with Gracie in a room with an incredible view definitely wouldn’t be all bad.

  He walked back across the hall, where Helen, Delia, and Abby were still spying on Bobby Ray. “Okay, everybody out,” he ordered.

  “Not yet,” Helen insisted, waving him off. “I think he’s about to kiss her.”

  Abby elbowed her aunt aside. “Let me see.”

  Kevin snatched his niece up and tossed her
over his shoulder. “That’s enough.” He glowered at the two women. “You, too. Let’s go.”

  “What makes you think you get to boss us around?” Delia demanded.

  “History,” Kevin retorted. “Now, move it. I’m in a hurry.”

  “Why?” Helen asked, studying him curiously. “Does this have something to do with that little tête-à-tête you just had with Gracie?”

  “You bet.”

  Delia’s eyes brightened. “Oh, well, then, in that case we’ll leave right away. Never let it be said that I stood in the way of romance. Helen, can you give me a ride home?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Abby, you can come with us,” Delia said. “Spend the night, too.”

  “Can I really?”

  “Much to my surprise, something tells me your mother and father won’t mind a bit,” Delia said with a touch of irony. “I doubt they’ll even notice we’re gone.”

  “They’re going, too,” Kevin said determinedly.

  Ten minutes later, he’d completed the first stage of evacuating the premises. He stuck his head out the back door. “Bobby Ray, I’m locking up. Is there anything you need from inside?”

  “Nothing,” Bobby Ray said, barely sparing him a glance.

  Marianne regarded Kevin with a bemused expression. “What about Abby?”

  “She’s gone home with Delia. She’s going to spend the night, if you don’t mind.”

  Still looking dazed, Marianne shook her head. “No, that’s fine.”

  “Can we go to dinner then?” Bobby Ray asked her, brushing back a stray curl and tucking it gently behind her ear.

  To his amazement, Kevin saw her nod, then he closed the door and locked it. Bobby Ray could handle his own romance. Kevin had plans of his own. Still, it astonished him that Gracie’s instincts about those two had apparently been right. The woman had good instincts. Amazing instincts, in fact. She’d managed to set up a cozy, intimate dinner for the two of them without him even realizing what she was up to, hadn’t she?

  He snagged the leftover sandwiches from the refrigerator along with the bottle of wine and a couple of glasses. At the last minute he tucked the portable radio under his arm, then climbed the stairs to the third floor.

  He found Gracie exactly where he’d left her. She’d opened the front window and a soft, salt-air breeze was stirring, scented with roses. There was a nostalgic expression on her face he found troubling.

  Lowering himself to sit beside her, he put the food and wine aside. “Everything okay?”

  “Sure.”

  He debated with himself, then finally broached the subject that had been nagging at him lately. “You’re not getting homesick for Cannes, are you?”

  She seemed surprised by the question. “Cannes wasn’t my home. It was where I worked.”

  “You lived there, didn’t you?” he pointed out dryly.

  “That’s not the same as it being home.” She looked up at him, her expression filled with sadness. “That’s what I realized when I decided to leave. I didn’t have a home to go to.”

  “So you ended up here?”

  “Funny, isn’t it? I’d only been here once before in my life for less than week and yet I was drawn back. I wonder why that was?”

  “Instinct?” he suggested. “Maybe even all those years ago it felt like what home should feel like.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Or fate,” he suggested.

  Her gaze flew to his, lingered, while the atmosphere around them seemed charged with electricity. “Could be,” she agreed quietly.

  “Does it feel like home now?” he asked, his heart in his throat as he waited for her answer. Despite the evidence of her enthusiasm for this restoration, what if it was no more than a passing fancy. What if she’d concluded that this was all wrong for her, after all? What if she decided that she needed to travel the globe to be happy? Was there anything he could say that would make her stay? Or would he have to let her go?

  Instead of answering him, she slipped into his lap and rested her head on his shoulder. “Now it does,” she told him. “Now it feels like home.’

  Kevin agreed. This house, far more than Greystone, had always felt like home. Once he had attributed that to Aunt Delia’s warmth, but he felt it now, too. Perhaps it was the house itself that drew him with its history and family secrets. There were some, he knew. Secrets that people once spoke of in whispers. It was the hidden truths—not Great-great Aunt Anne—that haunted the place.

  And yet something told him if he ever discovered what those secrets were, he wouldn’t find them half as troubling as the silence.

  22

  “They were over there, dancing until two in the morning,” Bessie Johnson told Delia. “You should have seen them. First they had something fast on the radio and they were laughing like a couple of fools. I’m telling you, Delia, Fred Astaire never did moves like those two did. Then the music turned all soft and dreamy. It was all I could do not to cry, they looked so much in love.”

  “Good,” Delia said with satisfaction. “Things are coming along nicely. Are they still over there?”

  “Kevin’s car is still out in front of the house, so I imagine they are.”

  Delia chuckled. “Perfect. Not that I much approve of such shenanigans outside of marriage,” she said, perfectly aware of the irony, “but something has to jump start those two if we’re going to manage a fall wedding.”

  “Maybe you’ll just have to settle for a Christmas wedding,” her longtime neighbor suggested. “You can’t have everything your own way.”

  “I don’t see why not. Somebody’s got to take charge. Who better than the boy’s own grandmother?”

  “Delia! I thought you’d vowed never to tell him,” her friend protested. “You kept it from his mother that she was your very own daughter. Why go blabbing old secrets now?”

  “Because it’s time,” Delia said. “There were so many times when I wanted to tell Mary Louise the truth. I could see she was so unhappy at home, that her mother deliberately made her life miserable, but I kept silent, like I’d promised. Now I want Kevin to know before I die. I don’t want that secret to die with me.”

  “You always said it should, that if you didn’t have the gumption to acknowledge your child, then you’d have to live with the consequences.”

  “Well, I changed my mind. Sue me.”

  “Oh, Delia, think this through,” Bessie pleaded. “Are you sure you’re not just being selfish?”

  “I’ve had more than fifty years to think it through. I should never have allowed my child to be raised as theirs by my sister and her husband. Back then, though, it would have been such a scandal and I didn’t want Mary Louise to bear the burden of my shame. Kevin will understand that. He will see it for the sacrifice it was. I know he will.”

  “You hope he will,” Bessie corrected fiercely. “What if he resents all the years you cost him of having a grandmother?”

  “He had a grandmother,” Delia argued.

  “One who paid as little attention to him as possible and treated his mama like dirt,” Bessie said with disgust. “You were the one he ran to, especially after his mama died. At least you’ve had Kevin in your life all these years. His mother wasn’t adopted by strangers and taken away from you. Isn’t that bond enough?”

  “Not anymore.”

  “He could hate you, you know. He knew how miserable his mother was. What if he blames you for not stepping in and making things right?”

  Delia sighed. “That’s just a chance I’m going to have to take.”

  His aunt was as nervous as a Junebug. She had been for most of the past week, Kevin noted. Every time he came into a room, she scurried out. Or, if they were at the renovation site, she made sure that someone else was in the room with them. Something was up with her, but for the life of him he couldn’t figure out what.

  More than once she opened her mouth as if she was about to say something, then clamped it shut again. He might not have Gracie’s
intuition, but even he could tell that Aunt Delia was torn over telling—or not telling—him something. Was she desperately ill? Sorry that she’d gotten into this bed-and-breakfast business? What?

  He finally caught her by herself in the kitchen at home. She jumped when he walked in, and her gaze darted around nervously as if she were looking for a quick escape route or else Molly’s protection. Fortunately for him, Molly had already left for the market. There was no one around to save his aunt or interrupt them.

  “Everything okay?” he inquired lightly.

  “Of course. Why wouldn’t it be okay?” she asked, already edging toward the door.

  “You tell me. And don’t try sneaking out of here.”

  She paused where she was. Her hands fluttered nervously before she finally seized the back of a chair to steady them. She fixed him with a steady gaze, bold as you please, but the grip she had on the chair gave her away.

  “I can’t imagine what you mean,” she said, though her voice hitched when she said it.

  Kevin resigned himself to guesswork. “You aren’t having second thoughts about what’s going on over at your house, are you? It’s not too late to back out. Gracie would be disappointed, especially after all the work that’s gone into it, but she’d adjust. We’d find another house for her. Maybe you and I could spend a few days every week in town so you could get together with your old friends. I know uprooting yourself after so many years to move out here with me hasn’t been easy.”

  “No,” she said adamantly. “I want Gracie to have that house.”

  “Okay, if it’s not the house, what is it? You aren’t sick, are you?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “You’d tell me if you were?”

  “Yes, darling, I’d tell you.”

  “Then what’s going on? I can see you’re upset. Don’t even bother denying it.”

  She sighed and a tear trailed down her cheek. “Oh, Kevin.”

  Horrified by the sight of his indomitable aunt in tears, he whispered, “Aunt Delia?”

  She brushed at the tear with a hankie, then sat down heavily. “I suppose now’s as good a time as any.”

  “Time for what?”