Page 59 of Grant’s Blaze

My fucking God, what a difference a day made.

Chapter Thirteen

Rio

The garage door closed, and I put Kendall into first gear. Clutch out, pressure down on the gas pedal in equal measures, and pull out of driveway. Thank God it was all second nature at that point, because I was blinded by the tears swelling my eyes and the emotions clouding my thoughts.

The streets of Naples Island were quiet at the early hour, but I was still mindful of the low speed limit. While the neighborhood was perfectly manicured and meticulously groomed, the residents here did not tolerate rule breakers.

But did they tolerate heartbreakers? Because one of those lived among them, and he might have been the biggest thief I’d ever met. Grant Twombley stole my heart in just under a year, and now, possibly my sanity as well.

I’d begged him not to leave me. Not to hurt me. Begged. Him. Yet here I was, driving to my house in the early dawn’s light, basically a rolling version of the walk of shame. Oh yeah, complete with tear-streaked cheeks and puffy raccoon eyes.

But I wasn’t heartbroken about how he’d marred my neck. Yes, that episode was scary as shit and had earned him a spot on his therapist’s couch as soon as possible—but I was able to wake him up, and I was, for the most part, physically okay. The marks on my skin would fade.

The dents in my heart were much deeper.

Dents that felt more like gashes. Hurt I’d never seen coming.

So where did we go from here?

The answer felt too huge to digest—even taking an eat-the-elephant-a-bit-at-a-time approach. All that accomplished right now was breaking everything down into other questions.

Was Grant going to take his mental state more seriously now? If so, did that mean we were on hold until he figured shit out? Would he only be satisfied seeing me if we had supervised playdates? Did I get to have any part at all in his recovery from this trauma? Did he respect me at least that much?

Only one thing was certain right now—and that was the uncertainty of it all. I didn’t have a single answer for any of those and certainly wouldn’t have them by the time I got to work. So I switched on an audiobook and focused on the things I could control: starting with navigating traffic as I got on the freeway to make sure I got to my destination in one piece.

By the time I arrived at the kitchen, the couple starring in my romance novel convinced me there were much worse things that could go wrong in a relationship than one bizarre nightmare. Maybe, just maybe, I was overdramatizing things. Hopefully Grant would call in a few hours, and we’d trade one-liners until laughing ourselves free of this morning’s dismal cloud.

Yeah, I liked that attitude as much as the old, comfy Chucks into which I slipped my feet before going inside.

The place was already bustling, just like yesterday morning. For a second, that had me curious. Had Hannah decided we needed to staff-up at an earlier time and forgot to tell me? Abbi and I used to open the doors at four fifteen a.m. It had been plenty of time to have everything ready and out the door for the lunch deliveries. If something had come up at the last minute, we were running around like chickens with our heads cut off, but there was no way to predict those situations no matter what time we came in. Eventually, we decided that it didn’t make sense to be coming in any earlier. I would talk with Hannah about it and listen to her thought process. That didn’t necessarily mean we would continue to do things the same way, but I would hear her out.

“Hi, Rio!” someone called when I came in the door.

“Good morning, boss lady!” another person shouted.

“Morning, Rio Grande,” called the youngest member of our team, Jorge. He was an adorable guy, originally from San Juan, in LA on a work visa and hoping to apply for citizenship in the United States. Everyone at Abstract got along with him really well, and Hannah told me he’d asked her out, but she’d politely declined. That was probably for the best—only rare people could be both work friends and lovers—but the more I got to know the woman, the stronger I hoped that fate had true love up its sleeve for her.

I still had mountains of paperwork to get to, so I got situated at my desk and dug in. I knew Hannah had her routine, and I would see her when she came out after she did her daily inventory in the walk-in cooler.

About a half hour later, I finally caught sight of her. More accurately, Hannah was eyeballing me. Intently. Determinedly. Unhappily. While making a direct beeline for me.

Well…crap.

I sat up straighter, forgetting the pile of invoices in front of me. This was probably—no, definitely—the first time I’d seen an expression on the woman’s face other than upbeat cheer.

“Hey. Morning.” I kept my voice very low and very unassuming. “You okay? You look upset.”

“Hi.” She forced a smile, and I didn’t like the feeling in my stomach. At all. “Do you have a sec?”

“Of course. Always. Have a seat. Just put my purse on the fl—”

“No. Not in here.”

“Okay.” I extended the word, grateful that it gave me a chance to push in a light laugh. “Then in your dome of silence, Special Agent Farsey?”

I wasn’t congratulating myself for the humor when she darted her eyes from one side of the room to the other as if expecting danger to spontaneously appear. “Can you come outside to my car?”