With the Father (17 page)

GRACE

 
“You snuck in late last night.”
Kate’s hair was still in a towel from the shower.

She leaned into the
mirror over her dresser and applied a layer of some fancy mascara that probably
cost more than all of the contents of my make-up bag combined. Her hip jutted
out in defiance, and reflective Kate gave me a sly smile in the mirror. “I
don’t sneak. I swagger.”

It was annoying and true.

Kate had never felt the need to hide her comings
and goings. Even as a teenager, when she’d tested all of our parents’ rules and
pushed every boundary, she had been an open book. So while I, at the age of
thirty-two, probably would have pulled my shoes off and crept up the stairs
like a thief, Kate clomped up her way up the stairs as if our dad wasn’t
sleeping downstairs. Who was I kidding, though? Even if she had been a thief,
she probably would have operated in exactly the same way.

“I feel like I haven’t seen you in days. What have
you been doing?” I said while silently chanting to myself,
Please
say Maddox! Please say Maddox!

The fact that I was rooting for Maddox was a
definite sign that times had changed. It was no secret that I’d never truly
liked him. He’d been Jonathan’s best friend since grade school and that had
made him a permanent fixture in my life, but we’d never seen eye to eye on anything.

He’d come back to our hometown after partying his
way through an Ivy League education with nothing to show for it but a mediocre
transcript and a healthy chunk missing from his trust fund, and I’d been less
than impressed. When Jonathan had offered him my former job, I’d been irritated
but had kept my cool. However, when he’d begun talking of making him a partner
last year, I’d about lost my mind. Afterwards, he’d given me the silent
treatment for a few days, but he’d never mentioned it again.

My opinion of Maddox had changed, however, after
Jonathan’s death. Without even being asked, he’d stepped right into Jonathan’s
role. The hours he’d put in during the last few months were more than I
could’ve or would’ve ever asked of him. Despite his still unvested interest in
the company, he seemed as determined as ever to see it continue to succeed. I
was ready to concede that I might have misjudged him, or at the very least,
sold him short in the past. In fact, I was even considering selling him the
business altogether. It wasn’t like I could or would ever go back there.

However, even during his smarmier days, I’d never
doubted his feelings for, or rather his fascination with, my sister. After
their little fling a few years ago, he’d pestered me for months, cornering me
every chance he got to pump me for information about where she was and who she
was with. Despite my general annoyance with him, I couldn’t help but wonder if
he wasn’t a perfect fit for her. They
were both
a
little wild, a little crazy, and a whole lot of fun when it was on their terms.
The truth of it was, though, my restless sister was a flight risk, and I
desperately wanted him to tame her.

She hadn’t said anything about leaving town again,
but she’d been here for more than five months. My dad and I wouldn’t be enough
to hold her here for too much longer. Every morning, I half expected to wake up
and find her already gone. If something, or someone, didn’t tie her down soon,
she’d be gone again. I honestly didn’t know if I could handle losing her again.
Not now. Not after everything that had happened.

She turned around and batted her
freshly-caked
eyelashes at me. “I spent the last two days at
the office and then had dinner with Maddox last night.
 
Afterwards, I went out and had some
drinks. I needed to think.”

Instead of the reprimand she was expecting, I
clapped my hands together and flopped down on her bed. “Yay! Come sit and tell
me.”

She flinched and staggered backwards into the
dresser. Wide eyes openly stared at me. “Who are you, and what have you done
with my sister?”

I picked up a high-heeled shoe, lying on the bed,
and chucked it at her. “You’re so funny.”

“Seriously. Where did Dad take you for dinner last
night because I think that maybe your meal was laced with crack? Haven’t you
heard, Grace?”

“What?”
 

“Crack is whack,” she said before bursting into a
fit of giggles.

“You would probably know.” I ducked my head,
knowing that she was going to be mad at me for lying about where I’d been. “I
didn’t exactly have dinner with Dad last night. He had plans. You know, he
hasn’t been around here much lately. Do you think he’s dating somebody?”

“He is dating somebody. He didn’t want you to
know.” She waved her hand in the air as to dismiss his concern.

“Did he think I’d be mad? Because of Mom?” It had
been less than two years since we’d lost her. In fact, I probably would have
been upset if I’d found out a few weeks ago. But I couldn’t really cast any
stones now – my situation being what it was.

“That. And because you are such a hater of love now?”

“Hater of love? I’m not a hater of love. Who’s
been smoking the crack pipe now?”

She raised her eyebrows at me and nodded, clearly
impressed that I knew that crack required a pipe.

“I’m not a hater of love. That’s ridiculous.”

“Sure you are. You turn off any sappy love song
that comes on. Other than that one terrible movie that you made me sit through
the other night, any movie with romance in it is strictly forbidden. I’m
actually surprised that you haven’t organized a bonfire to burn all of Mom’s old
bodice-ripper novels. It’s completely understandable, though. Why wouldn’t you
be a hater of love?”

“I’m not a hater of love, and I don’t want to burn
Mom’s books,” I admitted in a squeaky voice. “I’ve actually been reading them.”
Her laughter echoed through the room.

“Well, if you wanted some tips, all you had to do
was ask,” she said in between snorts.

“Kate! I was married for ten years. I don’t think
I really need tips from you or Mom’s regency books.”

She continued to laugh at me, and I took a second
to just enjoy this moment with her. I couldn’t remember the last time we’d
laughed like this. Even before our lives were laced with tragedy, moments like
this one had become rare. I wanted to wrap it up and guard it close to my
heart. “I actually do want to talk to you about something though,” I said, more
serious now.

“Okay, well, let’s see … we were sitting at his
kitchen table, and then he slung me over his shoulder and threw me on his hard,
black leather couch. Seriously, that apartment is so cold and sterile. There’s
no way I could ever live there. I swear I felt a northerly blow through about
the time he ripped my underwear off – ”

“God, Kate! Stop. I don’t want to hear that shit.”

Her head swiveled on her neck, and she stared at
me with bulging eyes. “Did you just say ‘shit’?”

“Yeah, I did. I do not want to hear about your
panties being ripped off.”

Confusion took over as Kate caught up. “Well, I
was kidding anyway. None of that really happened. So what did you want to hear
about last night?”

“I don’t want to
hear
about your date. I
want to
tell
you about mine.”

“Oh,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “What did
you
do?”

 
“I
went to San Antonio with Paul on Monday.”
I was back
to wanting to spill my guts. Like after the

kiss
at the vet’s office, I wanted to tell her all about
it. However, this time it wasn’t because I’d shocked and humiliated myself.
This time I wanted to share –
needed
to share – how
completely, supremely blissfully happy the night before had made me. More than
that, I needed someone to tell me that it was okay to be happy when I still
felt like I owed it to the people I loved to be sad.

Her mouth made a perfect ‘O’. “For real?”

She looked happy. There was a big toothy smile on
her face, but there was something off about her reaction. I’d expected her to
jump up and down and squeal like I had when she’d told me about having dinner
with Maddox. Instead, she was subtly wringing her hands in her lap, and she’d
stopped bouncing. “So what did you think of Father Russell? He was nice,
right?”

“Absolutely.” I was still trying to gauge Kate’s
temperature and wondering why she was asking about Father Russell instead of
Paul. “You wanted me to take a chance, right?”
 

“Of course. Did you have fun?” Again, what little
enthusiasm she showed didn’t reach her eyes.

I forged ahead anyway. “Kate, I can’t believe I’m
saying this, but I like him. Like … like him, like him. And, I can’t figure out
how I can feel so great about him and so bad about being around him. I’m giving
myself whiplash.” I was gushing but I couldn’t help myself.

“You’re sort of giving me whiplash, too.” The air
left my lungs and the room at the same time.

I wasn’t imagining it. Kate was irritated.
Was
she irritated with me?
“I could say the same thing. What’s gotten into you?
Two days ago, you were all, ‘
Don’t think,
Grace.’ ‘Just feel, Grace.’ ‘Paul is so hot, Grace.’”

She sighed loudly.
“I meant it. He
is
hot.”

It couldn’t have
hit me any harder if I’d actually run into a wall with the writing
graffiti’d
across it. “Oh. My. God. You like him, too.”

“Please. He’s way
too nice for me.”

I wasn’t buying it.
Her eyes were darting here and there, and she was squirming on the bed. “Are
you kidding me?
Seriously, Kate.
During my life
– my entire life – I’ve only really liked two men. Two men. And
you’ve liked both of them.”

“Oh, for fuck’s
sake, Grace. For the one hundred thousandth time, I was not interested in
Jonathan. Except for that one day when I was eighteen and your friends plied me
with beer and got me drunk for the very first time in
my
life. Yeah,
that one day I thought he was cute. But give me a break. He was yours that day
and every day afterward. I had no interest in stealing him from you.”

“What about Paul?
Do you think he’s cute, too?” I really didn’t care how she felt about my
husband any more. All I cared about were the weird vibes she was putting off
about Paul. “Oh, wait, I believe you said that he’s hot as hell.”

“He
is
hot
as hell. And funny. And smart.
And thoughtful.
And
quiet. And a bit mysterious, too.” she said, listing off all of the things that
drew me to him, too.
 
,

I narrowed my eyes
at her and sat up, my back straighter. All of the playfulness of a few minutes
before had been squeezed from the room by the ugly truth now looming over our
heads. The reason that Kate was hesitating with Maddox was because she was
interested in someone else.
But not just anyone else.
She was interested in Paul.

“But what does it
matter, Grace?” she continued.
 
“He’s in love with you.”

“No, he’s not. We
barely know each other.”

She snorted. “I’ve
seen the way he looks at you. I’ve watched him hang onto your every word. Maybe
you’re just getting to know him. But he’s in love with you. Maybe he doesn’t even
realize it yet. But I swear
to
 
you
. If you want that man, all
you have to do is claim him.”

Could she be right?
I mean, yes, we had spent last night pretending that there could be something
more
,
 
but
a part of me still thought that’s all it was. Pretend. I let her words roll
around in my head for a minute. “He waters the grass,” I finally said.

Her forehead
scrunched in confusion, and she shrugged in exasperation. “He does what?”

“He waters the
grass.
At the cemetery.
He waters the grass in the early
morning, before anyone gets there. He rents a truck from Deluge Power-Washing.”

“So what? He also
locks the cemetery at night, too. It’s part of his job.”

“No,” I whispered.
“It’s not, Kate. He’s a priest, not a maintenance man. He only waters my family’s
plots.”

“Why would he do
that?”

“He said he
couldn’t stand to see me watch something else die.”

She threw her hands
up in exasperation. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about. He’s in
love
with you. In. Love. Do you really not see it? I’m sure he was in love with you
before … ”

My head snapped up,
and I met her eyes. “Do you think so?”

She rolled her eyes
and stood. She walked to the closet and began rummaging through her clothes.
The sound of hangers scraping across the metal bar was the only sound in the
room.
 
That and my
explosive heart.

Could she be
right? Was it possible that Paul had loved me even before everything had
happened?

Or was she just
trying to distract me? “But you’re in love with him?”

“Heavens no.
I
barely
know him,” she said with her back to me.

“But you’d like to
get to know him?”

She turned to face
me. Her face twisted in irritation. “You know, what? Yes, if he looked at me
like I was worth giving up the only life he’s ever known … if he thought
I
was
worth the wrath that he’s going to receive from this town, the bishop, and
maybe God himself … then, yes, I would definitely want to get to know him
better.” Her face softened before she continued, “But he wants you, Grace. I
know it.”