CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
I suppose it’s bohemian for a man to defend my honor with his fists. And I suppose someone more enlightened than me might have a problem with it. A truly evolved woman might have wanted Grady to find a solution that involved talking and planning rather than violence. Or really, if I was truly empowered, I’d have solved the problem myself without male help. Maybe I’d have gone to Tommy. I’d have made him a deal that didn’t evolve debasing myself. Or I’d have embraced my past, turning the word slut into something worth cheering.
If that’s what an evolved woman would do, I guess I’m not very evolved.
Grady simply beat Tommy into silence. I saw him on the street a few days later, and when I did, Grady’s bandaged hand was holding mine. He broke two of the little bones in his hand, but Tommy broke many in his face and ribs. After Tommy was gone, not so much as daring to look in our direction, Grady said it was a fair trade.
Your injured hand for his injured face?
No, he told me. My injured hand for ten years of doing the wrong thing.
I don’t know if Tommy will keep his mouth shut forever. With Grady by my side, I don’t know that I care. It matters to me what my friends think, but after a few weeks I realize I’m worth more to them than what I ever did behind closed doors. The same is true of my parents, who would be hurt but would surely recover. I never, ever want Tommy’s blabbing to reach Mackenzie, but even if it did, there are lessons there for my daughter to learn:
Take responsibility for your actions.
Don’t let anyone else tell you who you are, or what you deserve.
And never doubt the people who love you.
Grady was never leaving. He told me that the next day while we sat in the emergency room. I held his hand like a prize, shamefully certain that taking pleasure in something so caveman was wrong in a thousand different ways. Temporarily homeless, knowing he couldn’t go back to my parents’ given how we left things, he needed to leave Carl somewhere before going where he needed to go. Joe is an upstanding young man, and would have tried to stop him. But Grady wasn’t feeling like an upstanding young man.
Maybe Tommy will decide to blow my whistle. Let him. Grady’s faith in me will never waver, nor will my faith in him. The next time I’m feeling alone, the emotion won’t last. Because now I have Grady. Now we both have Grady. And now he has us.
I don’t understand what Brandon did when he bought Ernie’s house, but two weeks later I got a check from the escrow company for five thousand dollars. I wanted to give it back, but Brandon told me there were no refunds or exchanges. If I was a consultant on the deal and needed to be paid out of escrow, there was nothing he could do. The law was the law, and there were no takebacks.
I’m pretty sure it’s a lie. But Mom and Dad asked to take Mackenzie for a week at the same time as a travel agent called and told me that Brandon had sent her. Who was I to argue? Hawaii and Alaska were the only two states left on Grady’s list, and Hawaii sounded so much nicer.
Turns out, the auction for Ernie’s stuff — separate from the transaction that snatched the house and land from Tommy and gave it to Brandon and possibly Life of Riley — was far more interesting than anyone saw coming. Ernie hoarded crap, but he also seemed to have hoarded some rather valuable antiques. When we returned from Hawaii, tanned and happy, another check was waiting. Most of it went to repay Brandon. But he keeps telling us not to worry. He’s holding an asset — something that someday, he’ll help us sell.
Besides, he told Grady, it’d be great if we’d stop being so fucking proud and just accept the help of friends. “I have more money than I know what to do with anyway,” he told Grady. And even though that might have been an intolerable boast to the man Grady used to be, the man I’m in love with is changing, too.
We kept the stupid cat. It loves Mackenzie, thinks Grady and I are a couple of idiots.
My little house is too small for three, though, and even before Grady’s bandages came off we were dreaming about something bigger. But probably not here. My days at the Nosh Pit are numbered, by Roxanne’s decree if not by my own. Grady doesn’t want a job. I’ve never left town, and Grady still has Alaska in his blood. Travel would mean taking Mackenzie out of school. But what the hell. We’re young, she’s smart, and she’ll learn plenty before we crack a single homeschooling book.
By the time we found the auction check in my mailbox, we’d hatched our plan day and night — on the beach, in our little condo in Hawaii, in twenty or more open-air restaurants. We’ll need jobs because we have a debt to repay no matter what Brandon says. But Grady, who’s used to living on the road, has ideas for that, too.
When we get inside and settle, Grady picks up the phone to call Brandon. He’ll tell him our idea. He’ll arrange a plan to settle our debt. He’ll generally relay good news, because Brandon and Grady have always been close. I can’t hear Grady because I’m in the other room, but I’m sure the conversation will meander from there. And when there’s time, I have questions I’d like answered.
What the hell are we going to do with the stupid little shack and worthless land that Grady came home to unload then ended up saddled with?
Why did Tommy try so hard to get that property, anyway? Were we being played? Did he trick us into buying it out from under him, and is he now laughing through his smashed-in nose at the albatross we’ve burdened ourselves with? Was this Tommy’s hot deal — the one he needed a fake wife and fake kid for, to impress someone? I’m not even sure if Grady ever heard back from Bridget, who’d seemed to have the answers. If he thinks of it now, maybe he’ll ask her.
I don’t really care.
For the first time in my life, it feels like I have no cares because I know that everything will be fine, one way or the other.
But the minute Grady reenters the room with the phone clutched in his fist, I know something is wrong.
“What is it?” I ask, feeling my heart rate increase.
Grady’s head slowly shakes. “Brandon was at the police station when I called,” he tells me, his face drained of color. “He says that Bridget is missing.”
Find out what happened to Bridget in Trevor’s Harem. Turn the page for a sneak peek …