Grace

by Chris Keniston

  "I guess she thinks khakis are boating attire."

  Chase opened the driver's side door. "She was right about one thing, business casual doesn't really fit in with working a feed store."

  "No," she chuckled, "it doesn't." Buckled in and the engine started, Grace backed out and turned south out of town. "I spoke with Brooks this morning. Seems the idea of selling the foreman's house is growing on him."

  "Good." It was growing on Chase too.

  "It's not far outside of town. You'd be able to get back and forth to work without losing much time."

  "Getting around here doesn't take much time no matter what. Even out to the ranch. It's over sixty miles but in a big city that's going to take a hell of a lot longer than just under the hour it takes on these empty roads."

  Smiling, Grace stepped on the gas. "Or even less than that for some."

  With Miss Leadfoot driving, they reached the hospital project in no time. "Wow. It's like looking at Tara."

  "It does have that Gone with the Wind air, doesn't it? It always reminded me of the big house on that old TV show with Barbara Stanwyck. What was it called?"

  "Big Valley."

  "That's right."

  The place looked a bit rough around the edges. There were signs of construction—piles of materials inside a temporary chain link fence. Now that he took a second look, he realized the exterior had been scraped in preparation for painting. "When will it be ready?"

  "Good question. Getting contractors to come all the way out here isn't easy. Folks get tired of commuting from Butler Springs pretty fast and there's no real motel anywhere closer either."

  Which meant there wouldn't be too many folks around to help him either.

  "That's one of the reasons most of the work renovating the B&B was done by the family over a few months."

  "Even you?" For some crazy reason the idea of Grace wielding a hammer made his blood stir. Maybe it was some warped Green Acres fantasy. He'd have to figure that one out another time.

  "Even me. Raised on a ranch there's no gender bias. We all did our share, but with Meg and Adam's place, I wasn't around often enough to do much more than help paint the kitchen."

  "That's more than most people would do." Certainly more than his mother would ever have attempted. "There really is so much of nothing all around us."

  "Ain't that the truth."

  Now he wished he hadn't commented on the vast landscape. The last thing he wanted to do at the moment was point out the things that pushed Grace away.

  "Here you are."

  In the distance, he could see the small wooden structure taking form. Closing the gap, the wooden framed home was indeed a typical craftsman. Could his world possibly get any better?

  Chapter Fourteen

  No matter how many times Grace may have driven by the rickety old house and other abandoned structures scattered about the county, she never got over how easily anything left unattended could rot and fall apart in the baking Texas sun. "Definitely counts as rough around the edges."

  "Just needs some love."

  The way Chase grinned up at the massive front porch under the typical gabled roofs and broad eaves, with the same reverence and awe he might display in front of the Taj Mahal, made her do a double take. What the hell did he see in this tattered old house?

  “Are you coming?” Chase stood on the front porch.

  So absorbed in how unkempt the house was, she hadn’t noticed him sprint up the steps. “Yes. Of course.” She hurried up after him. The porch was at least ten or more feet deep and twice as wide. Funny, but as dilapidated as it had appeared from the front yard, standing here beside him, for a split second she could see dark green rockers to one side and a wooden porch swing at the other. She could almost picture someone on the swing sipping on a fresh lemonade.

  “Grace?”

  “Oh.” She shook the odd thoughts free and sidled up beside Chase. “It’s unlocked.”

  His hand already on the knob, shaking his head, Chase turned his wrist and pushed in the door. Inside, he scanned the room from left to right and his head shifted from side to side again. “Amazing. If this were any place else there would be holes in the walls, pipes missing,” he shrugged, “maybe even light fixtures gone, a little graffiti here or there, and I bet…” He crossed the room and disappeared down the hall before reappearing. “Yep. Kitchen is intact. Old and leaning, but intact.”

  It was the floors that had caught Grace’s eye. The original narrow oak planks were dusty and tired but she had a feeling a good cleaning and buffing might be enough to bring them back to life. She could easily see the gleaming floors under a couple of love seats, an easy chair, a few dark wood pieces for contrast and lacy sheers at the windows. Instead of dingy gray that might have once been white, the walls boasted a buttery yellow with bright white trim. She could see it all so vividly that, for a few seconds, she forgot she was standing in an empty room.

  “I love it.” Chase beamed.

  “All you’ve seen is two rooms. How can you know you love it?”

  Casually hefting one shoulder, he shrugged and turned. “Feels right.”

  “Thought women are supposed to be the ones with intuition,” she muttered and followed him down the hall past the kitchen and into the first bedroom on the left. Nothing very big, but not really small either.

  “Could make a good office or guest room,” he said before moving on.

  Across the hall, the room at the end had to be the master. Clearly several feet larger, the room had windows on two sides, lots of fresh sunshine, and when Grace blinked she saw an antique four-post bed with a wedding ring quilt and a big gray dog asleep at the foot. Squeezing her eyes tight, she focused on the space between the windows and blew out a relieved breath at the empty space.

  “Something wrong?” Chase moved in close. “You look a little pale.”

  “Nope. All is well.” She stepped back. The last thing she wanted with her mind playing tricks on her was for him to reach out and touch her in any way. “Lots of doors.” Taking a broad step forward, she opened one door. “Wow, this is pretty nice for a house that’s at least a hundred years old.” The closet wasn’t grand by today’s walk-in standards, but considering a lot of these old houses didn’t have closets at all, this one was positively royal.

  “And here’s another.” Holding the door open, Chase leaned in to look. “Not as big, but still technically a walk-in.”

  “Don’t tell me there’s a third closet?” Turning to the opposite wall, her hand reached the knob seconds before Chase’s fingers folded over hers.

  “Oh,” he said softly, “sorry.”

  “No problem.” Her gaze locked with his, his hand remained clasped over hers. She should have said something, moved out of the way, pulled her hand back, anything. A simple blink to break the invisible connection would have helped, but she was rooted to the floor and had a hard enough time breathing, never mind thinking.

  “I, uh…” Chase rocked forward and for a split second she held her breath, thinking he would kiss her again. One thought prayed, yes please, and the other screamed not again. As her eyes drifted closed in anticipation, his hand lifted from hers and he took a wide step back. “Should let you open the door.”

  “The door?” She blinked. “Right.” Turning the handle and sucking in a deep breath, she steadied herself and pulled open the door.

  Chase’s eyes instantly narrowed, mirroring her confusion. “Is that supposed to be in the master?”

  “Every house I’ve ever been in, the heating and air units are usually in a hall, sometimes in the garage or occasionally in the attic, but no, never in a bedroom.”

  “I’m not an expert on forced air—”

  “We just call it central air.”

  “Okay, central air, but this one looks older than I am.”

  “Probably is.” Grace closed the door. “Remember, this place hasn’t been lived in for at least ten years. Maybe more.”

  Chase nodded and took a
step back, opened the other two closets again, then turned to face Grace. “I bet if we put a unit in the attic and turn that into a closet, we could have a small master bath put in.”

  “Oh, that would be great.” Grace scurried over to the second closet and, standing inside, used her hands to measure out the distances. “This one might be a bit tight, but it’s still a good size closet.” She closed the door and crossed the room to the first one she’d seen. “Yep. This would be the one. Room for a nice sink, and a decent shower.” She closed the door and spun around. “Where’s the main bathroom?”

  Chase shrugged. “Must be off the hall somewhere.”

  “You hope. We might have to look for an outhouse and a steel tub on the back porch.”

  “Not in this lifetime.” He chuckled, and lightly placing his hand at the small of her back, nudged her out of the room.

  With the door open wide, she could see a huge bathroom. “This is your lucky day.”

  “Why?”

  “The bathroom backs up to the big closet and…” She turned in the middle of the room. “Oh my God. Look at that tub.”

  “Needs a shower.”

  “Shower?” A claw foot tub big enough for Sasquatch to soak in and this guy was thinking shower. “This is fantastic.” Without a moment’s hesitation, boots and all, she climbed into the tub and leaned back. “Oh yeah, definite heaven. Tub has to stay.”

  When she opened her eyes and looked up, Chase stood legs slightly apart, arms crossed, smiling down at her. “Guess we’re keeping the tub.”

  ***

  If he’d been unsure before, there wasn’t a lick of doubt in Chase’s mind now. He wanted this house very much. And he wanted Grace Farraday too. Not just the way a man wants a beautiful woman. This was about more than getting into her pants. This was about curling up on the sofa with your best friend on a cold night with a hot cup of tea. About sharing the last piece of breakfast toast because someone forgot to run to the store for a fresh loaf. About sharing the good, the bad, the big, the small, with that one special love of your life.

  Love of his life? Was Grace the love of his life? A woman he’d met less than a week ago? A woman who wanted to slay dragons and conquer cities. Big cities. A woman who wanted to be anywhere except here in Tuckers Bluff. A woman who didn’t seem to have one blessed life goal in common with him?

  “Come on.” Grace lifted herself from the tub and climbed out. “Let’s check out the rest of the house. Even if you’ve already made up your mind.”

  “Who said I already made up my mind?”

  “You mean besides when you said all it needed was a little love?”

  “Maybe I meant someone else’s love.”

  “You could have, but you didn’t.” Skipping the third bedroom, she doubled across to the kitchen. “Hell, you even got excited about these lopsided old metal cabinets.”

  Was there any point in debating her? “Don’t you think I should at least sleep on it?”

  “I think you should go back to New York and really enjoy your life, but what I think doesn’t count for much lately.”

  “Sure it does. I’m keeping the tub.”

  Grace let out a smile and laughed. “Pretty generous of you considering the house isn’t yours.”

  He looked over the kitchen, with surprisingly large windows, and pictured a little updating. Replacing a few cabinets, something traditional and fitting with the architecture and light. After years of living in the shadows of Manhattan’s skyscrapers, he realized he liked light. Lots of it. Out the back door he stepped onto a porch almost as large as the front of the house. Crossing to the railing, he kicked something that noisily slid with his foot. “What—“

  “That’s a dog dish.” Grace maneuvered around him and leaned over to pick it up. “No way this has been here for ten or more years.”

  Each glanced off into the distance, scanning the barren land as far as they could see.

  “Who else lives around here?” he asked.

  “You mean like someone you could run across the street to and borrow a cup of milk or a dish of dry dog food? No one.” She set the dish back down and froze. “Did you hear that?”

  Chase nodded. “Sounded like a growl.”

  “Is it my imagination, or did it sound like we’re standing over it?”

  Shaking his head, Chase reached over and, gently folding his fingers around her arm, pulled her slowly back into the house. “I think we’ve seen enough for today. When we get to the car I’ll give Adam a call.”

  “DJ too.”

  “DJ too. One or both of them can come out and see if they can find what’s growling at us. If it’s an injured animal, we don’t want to get too close.”

  “But the food? Did you see a bag of dog food anywhere?”

  Chase slid his hand from her arm to around her waist and circled her around. Leaving his hand at her back, he nudged her forward. “No, and I’m not going to look now. Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out later.”

  No reason he couldn’t add mysterious growls and twenty-year-old dog dishes to his growing list of things he needed to figure out—and fast.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “You don’t suppose it has something to do with the stray do you?” Aunt Eileen asked over the rims of her cards.

  Ruth Ann discarded two. “Maybe the construction crew has been feeding whatever it is?”

  “That makes no sense at all.” Dorothy held her cards against her chest. “There hasn’t been any real work at Brooks’ place for weeks. If the carpenters won’t drive to Tuckers Bluff for a day’s work, who the hell is going to drive all this way to feed the dog?”

  “If it’s a dog,” Sally May added.

  “What else would it be? No one feeds dog food to wild animals.” Dorothy went back to rearranging her hand.

  Sally May’s expression contracted as though she’d just bit a lemon. “My niece in Dallas feeds the raccoons.”

  “Well your niece in Dallas is one pet away from an official title of Crazy Cat Lady,” Aunt Eileen softened her words with a smile.

  Grace studied her own cards, but her heart wasn’t in it. Last night, when her aunt had insisted that she needed a ride into town to play cards because the tendonitis in her ankle made driving painful, Grace resisted calling out hogwash. For as long as she had shared a home with her aunt, the woman had never once mentioned the words tendon or itis in the same sentence, and even fewer times had she not considered herself fit to drive anywhere in any vehicle at any time. But Grace had also been intrigued at the thought of escorting Chase to see the old foreman’s house. Now that she’d gotten her senses fired up by a mere heart stopping glance, and anxiety blooming with concern over a lost stray, she was just plain glad for the distraction. Even if playing cards with the ladies wasn’t working out so well. “I just wish DJ had been at the station when we got back.”

  “But he said he’d stop by on his way into town. That he’d be driving right back and it wouldn’t be long,” her aunt reassured. “I’m sure whatever it is, he’ll figure it out.”

  “I suppose.” Grace looked at her cards a second time, suddenly noticing she held a hand of hearts.

  “How many cards you going to want?” Dorothy asked her.

  “None. I’ll play these.”

  Four slightly slack-jawed heads looked at Grace, then each other, and four sets of cards landed face down on the table with echoes of “I’m out” bouncing off each other.

  “What have you got?” Sally May asked.

  Grace grinned. “No one anteed up, I don’t have to say.”

  “You want to live to see another sunrise, you’d better not pull any of that prissy lawyer malarkey.” Aunt Eileen skewered her with one of those motherly stares that Grace hadn’t seen in a long time.

  “Sorry. I couldn’t resist just a little teasing.” Grace leaned to her side, kissed her aunt on the cheek and laid down her cards face up. “Five hearts.”

  Over the next few rounds, she and her aunt took turns w
inning the pots. If all the games she’d played with the Tuckers Bluff Ladies Afternoon Social Club since she was a teenager had been for real money, Grace would have probably paid for law school twice over by now.

  “I wonder how much longer before Chase and Brooks talk money?” Aunt Eileen grabbed a couple of chips and tossed them into the pot. “I mean,” she turned to Grace, “you seem pretty sure he wants it.”

  “Every trial lawyer wants jurors as easy to read as he was. Yeah, I’m sure.” If she was honest with herself, she’d have to admit by the time they’d meandered into the hall bath, even she’d fallen in love with the dilapidated old house. “My guess is as soon as Brooks is finished with his last patient, Chase will be waiting.”

  “Apparently,” Ruth Ann lifted her chin and pointed toward the front door, “sooner than that.”

  Brooks, Toni, and Chase came in the front door. His hand across his wife’s lower back, Brooks led Toni to the opposite end of the Café. Chase turned toward the card-playing ladies.

  “Or maybe not,” Aunt Eileen muttered.

  “Good afternoon ladies.” Too damn good looking for his own good in crisp jeans and a button-down shirt, Chase came to a stop at Grace’s side.

  Try as she might, she couldn’t quite make out what the situation at hand was. His smile was bright and pleasant, but his eyes lacked the twinkle they’d held earlier today. Her heart tightened in her chest and she found herself hoping above hope that Brooks hadn’t said no to Chase. She knew how much he wanted the house, and that was reason enough for her to want it for him too.

  He leaned over and faced her. “If the game can spare you, would it be considered conflict of interest for you to offer a little legal guidance?”

  With four pairs of eyes staring at her, Grace wasn’t quite sure what to say. Turning, she glanced over her shoulder at her brother and sister-in-law. Toni waved, but it was Brooks who, with only the hint of a smile and a dip of his chin, gave her the answer she needed. “We’ll have to see.”

  The twinkle in his eyes returned and she couldn’t help smiling back at him. That blasted sparkle was seriously growing on her.