Chapter 11
To my surprise, I open the front door and run directly into the arms of Grayson Lane.
“Are you okay?” From beneath the soft glow of the porch light, the smooth skin on Grayson’s forehead is etched with deep ridges of concern.
“We have to find Mom.”
“She’s fine.” He puts a hand on either side of my face. Grayson’s face is so close to me I can feel his sweet breath on my skin. “She’s in the car. Are you okay?”
I nod, but a lone tear sliding down my cheek betrays me. The feel of it is so foreign to me that I flinch when I flick away the wetness.
That’s when Grayson does the unthinkable. He tilts my head up, leans down, and places a kiss on either side of my face.
“You’re safe now,” he whispers in my ear, then pulls me close.
My body eases at the softness of his words and I want to hold him, wrap my arms around the width of him, and believe that all is right in my world because Grayson deems it so. But I know that all is not right and I’m still scared. I push him away.
“We need to call the police.”
“I saw two police cars fly around the corner.”
“I can’t go back in there. Not tonight.”
“Shh,” he says and pulls my head to his chest. “I’ll get a few things for you and if you want, we can come back tomorrow morning and get more. You and your Mom are welcome to stay with me.”
“No.” I pull away from him suddenly. “I can’t impose.”
“You wouldn’t be imposing. I could use the company. Where’re your shoes?” We both look at my bare feet for a second, then Grayson says, “Stay here.”
In a few seconds he returns with a pair of sneakers and the jacket I’d worn on the plane. I’m sure I look perfectly ridiculous with my pink tank top and pajama bottoms with puppies printed all over them. I slip into my sneakers, then Grayson takes hold of my hand and walks me down the front stairs and to the car.
Mom gets out of the back and gives me a hug. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Mom.”
We hug each other for a whole minute, both of us in shock over what happened.
Grayson uses his cell phone to call the police and let them know our location, meanwhile, neighbors peek out their windows. The whirling lights of the cop cars are visible from our vantage point.
“I’m going to walk to the corner to see what’s going on,” I say. “Stay here with Grayson.”
Mom nods and gets back in the car.
When I get to the corner where a few of the neighbors have gathered, I see two guys being handcuffed. I recognize Deep Voice when he says, “I ain’t do nothin’, man!” as he’s being put into the back of the car. My God, they’re just kids.
I hurry back up the street to where Grayson is standing. “What did they say?”
“They want to go in the house to make sure it’s clear, then take a report from you two at the station.”
“They have them in handcuffs already,” I say and shake my head. “Wasted youth.”
“What?” he says.
“Those guys. They were just kids, fourteen, maybe fifteen.”
“They broke into your house, Callia,” Grayson says. “They could’ve hurt you.”
“I know, but it’s a shame that they’ll have to pay for the rest of their lives for a stupid mistake they made when they were kids.”
Grayson looks at me and I see irritation flash through his golden eyes. He folds his arms in front of him and shrugs. “So what do you want to do?”
“Why are you so annoyed all of a sudden?”
“I’m not annoyed,” he says, clearly annoyed. “I don’t understand your sudden sense of justice. Here are the cops now. I think we should let them do their walk-through, then grab some things for you and Mother Cole and do the report later tomorrow.”
“Fine.”
“Fine,” he says and he storms across the street to the house like he couldn’t get away from me fast enough.
And they say women are moody.
Chapter 12
A car to Mom is like a rocking chair to a baby. As soon as she’s in one, she’s drifting off to sleep. Even after the scare of our lives, Mom has the ability to relax and let her dreams transport her. I, on the other hand, am still on edge. And it doesn’t help that there’s tension between Grayson and me. Something I said or did bothered him. I’ll stay the night at his place, but after that…
After that, what? Go back to the house, after we’ve already filed a report against those boys? Sure, they might be good kids who made a poor decision, but does that mean I need to put myself in their midst again anytime soon? What if they’re not good kids and I’m being a soft-hearted nincompoop?
“What are you thinking?” Grayson says, finally acknowledging my existence.
“Nothing.”
“I think it’s psychologically impossible to think about nothing.”
“I was thinking about Plan B. Where I’m going to stay after tonight.”
“Callia, you’re welcome to stay at my place as long as you need.”
“Thanks, but I’m not a freeloader.”
We pull up to a stoplight and he looks at me. “You were going to stay with your mother indefinitely. How’s that not freeloading?”
“First of all, that’s my house, too. Second of all, Mom’s family. It’s not freeloading when it’s your family.”
Grayson gives a throaty chuckle. “Is that how it works?”
“Well, I mean, family can freeload, but that’s not what I’m doing. Mom wanted me home.”
“And I want you to stay in my home. For as long as you need. What’s the difference?”
“Why, Grayson? You know things aren’t good between us.”
“Callia, you and I used to be best friends. Now you want to act as though we mean nothing to each other.”
“Things will never be like it used to be. We were stupid little kids.”
“Maybe. But what we felt was real. And if it wasn’t, you wouldn’t be harboring this level of animosity you seem to have against me.”
“Animosity is putting it mildly.”
“It was my dad who needed to get out of town like he did. I was a kid; I went with him.”
“And he restricted you from ever using a telephone? From ever putting pen to paper?” Grayson is silent. “And let’s not even get into the necklace of yours I found in Carmen’s bedroom.”
“Yeah,” Grayson says, “let’s not.”
We sink back down into a well of silence.
A sign welcomes us to Richmond. Richmond. That’s where the guy I’d met on the plane lives. What was his name? Jeff Mead. It’s dark outside and so I can’t fully grasp the scenery but I have a good idea what I’ll find when the sun is high: motor courts, manicured lawns, trees cut into intricate shapes. Unlike wealthier neighborhoods, Richmond doesn’t have many homes where the shrubs are meant to obscure their existence. Although wealthy in comparison to the average American, residents in this community want to feel connected to their neighbors, so they keep the mechanical gates and high walls to a minimum. The difference between where Grayson comes from and where he lives now is the difference between hot chocolate by Carnation and hot chocolate by Jacques Torres.
We pull into a stone driveway. In my head, dreamy harps play and a chorus of angels sing one long, boisterous note, ahh, as the house comes into view. It’s a massive brick colonial complete with black shutters and columns so white it’s blinding. There are a few lights on inside and it’s the first time I wonder if Grayson has a girlfriend. A live-in girlfriend. It’s not possible my life could get any more complicated, is it?
Grayson bypasses the garage and pulls the car up the circular drive, stopping near the front door.
“Three-car garage?” I ask, letting the heat of the moment simmer into an amiable discourse. Bygones and all that.
“It came with the house,” he says, sounding more embarrassed than proud.
“It�
��s a lovely house, Grayson.”
“Thanks. I’ll give you a tour.”
“I’d like that,” I say. I’m making a conscious effort to be nice since he seems to think I have animosity toward him when it’s obviously the other way around.
Grayson grabs our bags from the trunk while I wake Mom. She is disoriented for a moment. Within a couple of blinks she recognizes where we are and gets out of the car.
The door of the house opens. I know as certainly as I know my name that I am too fragile for this. I see a female figure walk down the three steps of the house and head toward us and I can feel my gut twisting into knots. My nose begins to sting and there’s nothing much I can do about the tears that are about to fall. Why should I care if he has a girlfriend? Why should I care if he’s married? The least he could have done is tell me instead of bringing me here and essentially inserting a knife into my already wounded heart and twisting it deep inside me.
“Mother Cole, are you all right, sweetie?” she goes and hugs Mom.
I cannot see her face but she is plump with a short afro. Not what I’d imagine to be Grayson’s type at all. Still, she has a connection with Mom and that stings me, too. Why didn’t Mom tell me?
A fat tear pops out of my eye and I sniffle and wipe it away before anyone notices. But I’m too late. The woman looks at me and back at my mother.
“Oh, sweetie,” she says and moves in for a hug, “you must’ve been so scared.”
The woman cannot possibly be romantically linked with Grayson. She has bits of gray by her temples and is somewhere in her fifties. And her hug. Oh Lord, does this woman know how to give a hug. She is warm and soft and smells like cinnamon.
Grayson comes over and introduces us. “Uh, Callia, this is my housekeeper, Gail. She has a cottage out back. Gail, this is my old girlfriend, Callia.”
Curious, I think through my unsteady breaths. That he would call me his old girlfriend instead of ex-girlfriend. “Ex” seems so final, as though an axe made a clean, swift break of our relationship. But “old” makes it seems as though the only thing that separated us was time. And why girlfriend at all? Why not Mother Cole’s daughter? Why not an old friend from high school?
“Sweetie?” she says to me and I break my momentary spell and shake her hand. “It’s so good to have you here safe and sound. I adore your mother.”
We all look at Mom, who’s managing to sleep while standing in her housecoat and slippers.
“Nice to meet you as well,” I reply. “I think we’d better get her to bed.”
Gail slips an arm around Mom’s shoulder and guides her into the house.
“You must be tired, too,” Grayson says. “Not a great way to start your second day at work.”
“Oh, yeah, that.”
His eyes narrow. “Everything okay on the work front?”
“Why’d you call me your old girlfriend?”
He looks up and around as though he could find the answer to my question in the stars above us. “Because that’s what you are. You used to be my girlfriend. And now you’re not. Now you’re just an old person.”
I reach out to punch him in the gut but he’s too fast for me and moves out of the way. We both hear the clinking sound of metal.
“What was that?” he asks, squinting.
“I’m sure it was nothing,” I say. Nothing. Or the necklace he’d given me in high school that I’d tucked away in this very jacket while I was on the plane. Or nothing. Either, or.
“It sounded like something fell,” he said and for a second I thought he was going to get on his knees to look for it.
“Maybe it was a shooting star,” I say sarcastically and begin to walk away as though unconcerned.
Grayson gets back to the matter at hand and says, “Okay, what? What part of that sentence did you have a problem with?”
“None. I thought the wording was a bit curious.”
“I could’ve said ex-girlfriend. Would that have made much of a difference?”
“No, I’m being silly,” I admit. “Listen, Gray. Don’t get used to my being here.”
He drops his head, and then looks back up at me with a sly grin and raised brows. Even in half-light the man is so gorgeous he makes my heart palpitate.
“What?” I ask.
“You called me Gray.”
Did I?
“Yeah, so?” I say and play it cool.
“I like it when you call me Gray.”
“Lots of people call you that.”
“It only makes me feel good when you say it.”
Seriously. My body cannot take yet another emotion descending on it. “I’m not doing this,” I say. “I am so not going to fall for you again, Grayson.”
I start to walk toward the front door although I have no idea where to go after that.
“Is there a threat of that?”
“What?” I ask.
“Of you falling for me again?”
I roll my eyes. “What do you think?”
Grayson smiles and walks toward me. “I think I’d better start reading some of those Georgia Kinsey books. Get some pointers on romance.”
“You don’t have a prayer,” I say. “You were never one for romance.”
“That’s when I was a poor kid,” he says. “Now I’m a rich man. Imagine the things I can do to keep you happy.”
And I did imagine the things he could do to keep me happy. Not one of them involved spending cash.
Grateful Journal
It’s hard to reflect positively when your life is in shambles. Not much is going right for me. Let me rephrase that—nothing is going right for me. My new gig turned out to be nothing more than a sales job aimed at bilking low-income people out of what little money they have. That damned Boyetta Jones! I don’t know who I’m more ticked off at: her for giving me false hope, or me for allowing it. I left. Quit before I even got started. Didn’t so much as walk inside the building after she told me what that place was all about. But I didn’t tell Mom. I couldn’t. All she’ll do is worry and there’s no need for two people to do what one person can do just fine.
Oh, lovely thing happened to us tonight. Our house was broken into by some infant thugs. Just as we were sitting down to pancakes (yes, pancakes as a late-night snack and—because I know you care even when rereading this twenty years from now—they were chocolate chip with a homemade honey cinnamon syrup). Mom and I heard them coming in through the downstairs bathroom. Scary stuff, but I was fully prepared to defend the house. Luckily, they left before I got a chance to whack them with the hot coffee pot I was holding. Anywho…guess who just happened to be in the neighborhood?
I’m at his house now. In his bedroom. We just made love and it was better than I’d imagined it would be. I’m sitting on the balcony overlooking the pool, smoking a cigarette and sipping champagne as I write this. He’s sleeping like an angel who just overexerted himself. Ha! Even in times of trial I still have a modicum of humor. None of that was true, except the being at his house part.
Okay, onto the grateful part. I’m glad that nothing crazy went down at the house. That could’ve ended in a hundred horrible ways. Mom is safe. I’m safe. After the cops did a walk-through, we were allowed to collect our things inside.
Mom and I are staying in guest rooms at Grayson’s gorgeous home. I’m glad he was there for us. I’m glad we’re here. Now I need to focus on getting away from him as soon as possible. As much as I don’t want to love and trust him again, he is kind, and funny, and gorgeous, and successful. So why have I been such an immature jerk who’s struggling with letting the past stay past? I get a feeling he’s into me. And you know what? I’m gonna go for it. If tonight has shown me nothing else, it taught me that life is short. If Grayson wants to make amends and start things anew, why not go with it? People make mistakes, right? Men can change. Right?
Chapter 13
With the rising of the sun comes the first full day of my all-out deception. But before I begin my ruse, I have a small missi
on to accomplish first. I pull myself out of the bed, not yet ready to face what’s ahead. I long to stay enmeshed between the cool sheets and plush feather down pillows that are several pay grades above what I’m accustomed to. I pull a robe over my pajamas, slide my bare feet into my sneakers, and run down the winding staircase with the silent speed of a squirrel. I get to the front door and notice an alarm panel. Damn! If I open this door without disarming the alarm system, it’ll probably wake the entire house, which completely defeats the purpose of me slinking about at oh-dark-hundred hours in the first place.
I weigh the pros and cons and decide to take the risk. I unlock the door, pull it open just a smidge, and wait. Ah—the sweet sound of nothingness.
The door shuts behind me. I quickly get on my hands and knees on the gravel driveway and hunt for the necklace. Where is it? I know it dropped somewhere around here. I have to find it before Grayson does. If I don’t, he’s going to wrongfully assume I’ve kept the fool thing all these years because I’m harboring some kind of childhood crush on him or something. Which I totally am not.
It isn’t here. It isn’t here! How could it not be here? I sit on the ground for a second and then it occurs to me: Maybe I didn’t drop it after all. Maybe we both heard something but it wasn’t what I thought it was. I take another look around and start to believe that maybe I didn’t drop it out here. But I dropped it somewhere, because it isn’t in my jacket anymore. I check my watch. I have to get dressed for work.
“Let the ruse begin,” I mutter, already hating myself for my deception.
I get up and push on the door. It doesn’t open. I push again. Nothing.
“This is not happening.”
It’s six-thirty in the morning and here I am, locked outside the house with a do-rag on my head, pajamas, and sneakers. But I’ll scarf down a gluten-free, sugar-free, fat-free brownie before I dare touch that doorbell.
I stand back and look up at the house for something to climb on. Yeah, and then what, Spider Man? Use your nonexistent toolkit in your nonexistent Spidey suit to open the window?
Sweet Secrets Page 7