The Long Road Home (These Valley Days, #1)

by Bethany-Kris

  Alora’s head snapped up to Sonny who continued surveying the parking lot.

  “Or that this,” Gracen said, cutting a finger between them in the air, “is the first time we’ve spoken since that phone call, in fact? Because unless he’s told you those things, none of the rest really matters. Congrats on the wedding, though.”

  Gracen smiled, but neither of the two people in the parking lot noticed. Sonny and Alora had other things to consider, now.

  “Have a good night,” Gracen said before slipping into the driver’s seat of the Civic and shutting the door.

  It felt good to say it.

  To finally get something out.

  It hurt at first, too.

  She didn’t dislike Alora.

  Barely knew her, really.

  Gracen’s chipped shoulder wasn’t about the fact Sonny had a fiancée. Her scars went a bit deeper than just the skin’s surface. However, she wouldn’t in the same breath pretend like they didn’t exist for the sake of anyone else’s comfort and peace of mind.

  She was way past that.

  Chapter 17

  Gracen stumbled through to Friday in the worst way. She blamed the random run-in with Sonny and Alora earlier in the week for the reason why she lost her focus and found her wits end when closing rolled around.

  “Take the weekend off,” Margot said, her rhythmic sweeping of the salon continuing even when Gracen didn’t lift her head from her hands to say she’d heard her speak. “Just do it. It’s not like you cancel appointments all the time, anyway. Nobody’s gonna mind. It’s a day. One day, Gracen.”

  Delaney’s bright idea for Gracen to chill that weekend—except for her visit to Mimi on Sunday afternoon—came up after a smoke or two went missing from her friend’s purse. Maybe Margot had also found Gracen smoking one of said cigarettes in the back after her last appointment of the day.

  She was grateful that Delaney and Margot were there to listen to Gracen’s partial breakdown over a parking lot meeting that should have never happened, but their solution for her to take a day off didn’t exactly fix what was wrong. Not that Gracen had the answer to that problem, either.

  It wasn’t her fault.

  The whole week just went straight to shit.

  “And do what, Margot?” Gracen asked. “Instead of being over here doing something, and making money, mind you—no, I’ll sit over there and look out the window to see what’s going on over here. Right, okay.”

  No dice.

  It was going to rain all damn weekend, also. That put any hikes or jogs off the table. Showers and dampness were one thing, but Gracen didn’t want to be soaking wet like a drowned rat just for some exercise and a decent picture.

  Margot didn’t have anything else beneficial to add to the conversation, so she went back to her work of sweeping while Gracen continued moping in her swivel chair. Gracen, who didn’t want to look more pathetic than she already did holding her head in her hands, flopped further into the seat while she piled a messy bun of her long blonde hair high.

  It was that moment when Delaney came back into the salon from the rear rooms.

  “Margot’s trying to help,” Delaney said as she crossed the floor, “and you’re being a bitch.”

  Gracen side-eyed her best friend all the way to the cash where Delaney popped open the register. “Margot can tell me if she thinks I’m being a bitch, thank you.”

  “I think you’re being a bit of a bitch,” Margot deadpanned before disappearing into the back.

  “See?”

  From the register, Delaney opened a hand in the direction Margot had gone. Just as fast, she returned to counting the small bit of cash in the register, so they could close it before leaving. Delaney passed Gracen a silent look that practically screamed and what about it?

  “One day off work isn’t going to help—”

  “First of all, you’re off on Sunday, too. That’s two days. And nobody’s saying that it’ll fix everything, but you know what isn’t helping you, Gracen?” Delaney interjected before Gracen could finish.

  Her defences jumped sky-high at the question because Gracen had an idea what the answer might be, but nobody liked facing the reflection in the mirror on bad days.

  More than anything, Gracen wanted to tell Delaney—and Margot, whenever she got out from the backrooms—to drop it. She hated that her ex had any control over her life to begin with when she’d accepted it was over a long fucking time ago. Even if that control came in the form of something like a run-in which put her in a bad mood for the rest of the week.

  She didn’t want it to be like that.

  Anger was worse when bitter.

  “Well, do you even want to know?” Delaney asked.

  Gracen sighed, rolling her head sideways on the chair to survey Delaney finishing her job at the cash register. “What’s not helping me? I think I have a lot of that figured out, Delaney.”

  “What doesn’t help,” Delaney continued like Gracen hadn’t said a thing, “is the way you get up day after day and forge on ahead like everything else that bothers you isn’t also happening. You’re more than happy to let the whole world burn down around you as long as you can grit your teeth and smile through it. You don’t always have to do that, Gracen. Nobody else gets through life doing that to themselves. You can say fuck it, for a while. Or fuck you, for that matter. If somebody needs to hear it—and you shouldn’t feel like you have to pine and whine about it for days, either.”

  Right.

  Like with Sonny in the parking lot.

  Except it’d been a couple of days since then and Gracen didn’t feel a whole lot better about the things she’d said. Mostly because the words hadn’t been exactly what she thought he should hear from her, not entirely, so the whole thing still felt unfinished.

  Something else to hang out rent-free in the back of Gracen’s mind. She really wished she’d been less honest with Margot and Delaney about the reason for her mood, but good friends who saw through the bullshit and called you on it were a rare find.

  “Maybe I was a bit of a bitch,” Gracen said as Margot exited the rear hall with a basket full of clean towels.

  “A bit?” Margot asked.

  “I’m sorry.”

  Margot shrugged one shoulder but winked before darting up the stairs with the basket of towels. Her voice echoed down the stairwell, reaching Gracen and Delaney. “I can’t work in these conditions!”

  Delaney cackled; slamming closed the register with a bump of her elbow against the edge. “That’s it for that—and you.” She pointed at Gracen. “Don’t come in tomorrow. Take the day.”

  “Delaney—”

  “Go for a drive upriver if you want to. Go see Mimi—”

  “Don’t use my grandmother to manipulate me into taking a day off work,” Gracen interjected, but she was already smiling.

  Delaney noticed as much. “It’s okay to take time away. To say you need to, you know?”

  She really didn’t, though. How many times in her life did it feel like the earth stopped moving around her because of this event or that only for Gracen to get up the next day and go on. Everyone else around her kept on like nothing happened, after all, and she had not found a safe place to land when she fell. That helped to motivate Gracen to do what always needed to be done. The skill of survival developed in many ways.

  “You make it work, push through, keep on,” Delaney said like an echo continuing Gracen’s internal thoughts. “Stop doing that. Deal with things, take time to do it, too. You have to take care of you first, and then maybe worry about everybody else.”

  She equally loved and hated that her friend could be right on the money when it counted; reading people was a skill held by the most special beings. Gracen would swear on it.

  “I’ll even call for your cancellations,” Delaney said, offering her final words on the matter as she gathered her bag and sweater.

  “Fine, I’ll take the weekend,” Gracen said, earning a thumbs up from Delaney, “but I’m not
making any plans. Frankly, I could use the extra sleep.”

  And wine.

  Or more No Boats on Sunday rosé.

  “Don’t make plans, then. Do nothing. That’s fine, too. Eat junk and binge something on TV,” Delaney replied. “The point is it’s gotta be about taking care of you. And then admit to yourself it’s a sad situation that you need a whole speech from your friends to get you to accept some self-care, Gracen.”

  Gracen sighed loudly in her station chair.

  “It’ll go a long way,” Delaney added, ready to lock up with her bag and shawl. The only thing left was to shut off the lights and set the main alarm. “Margot, let’s go!”

  “Yep!”

  Footsteps beat a fast path down the staircase until Margot stood on the bottom floor with her own bag slung over her shoulder. “I’ll get the basket tomorrow.”

  Delaney waited for Gracen to move. “Are we still wallowing, or ...?”

  Gracen had yet to leave the chair, but her purse was just a reach away. “What time does the liquor store close on Fridays?”

  *

  Gracen didn’t make it to the liquor store. In fact, Delaney had barely locked the door while waving off a walking Margot—who refused a drive from them every night—before her phone dinged with a text.

  Stupid question, it read from Malachi, but are you free this weekend?

  She’d called him instantly.

  “Why is that a stupid question?” she asked the second he picked up the phone.

  “Beautiful, all you do is work,” he returned just as fast.

  Didn’t even miss a beat.

  “I do more than just work,” Gracen tried to argue weakly while Delaney pointedly glared her way and nodded as if to say see, I told you so. “I have a life, too.”

  This shit was getting tiring.

  “Yes, you run and take amazing pictures, and eat a lot of good food with your friends,” Malachi said. All true things. “You do other stuff, too, I know, but the majority of your time is spent at that salon. Which is also fine—there’s not one thing wrong with being devoted to your work.”

  “Thank you. Could you tell Delaney and Margot that, too? I’ll text you their numbers.”

  Malachi chuckled. “I take it I’m not the only person to bring this up to you?”

  “Nope,” she muttered.

  “If I were to play devil’s advocate,” Malachi said, “when was the last time you took off a week or more?”

  “A week?” Gracen parroted. “More?”

  Never.

  “Weekend?” he offered back.

  Jesus.

  Even that was kind of hard to answer.

  “Okay, so maybe it wasn’t such a stupid question,” Gracen muttered into the phone as she followed Delaney toward the waiting Jeep.

  “Are we going to the liquor store?” Delaney asked.

  “Not if you’re driving to meet up with me,” Malachi said into Gracen’s ear, clearly hearing Delaney’s question in the background.

  “Who said anything about meeting up with you?”

  “With who?” Delaney asked, attention perked. “Who are we meeting up with?”

  Dammit.

  “Me, not you,” Gracen explained, and waved a hand to ask for a second.

  Malachi was talking again.

  “My boss has a hunting lodge out by Mount Carleton,” he said. “In the area, anyway. I’m heading there now because he guilt tripped me into a weekend.”

  “But what does that have to do with mine?”

  “He’s bringing somebody—and then mentioned I could do the same. Honestly, it’s just tonight, tomorrow, and we leave late Sunday morning, but you were the only person I thought of when he brought it up. It’s halfway for both of us, basically.”

  But still a two-hour drive.

  Gracen had made the trip to the mountain before and took the rural highway leading through it when traveling further to the Miramichi.

  “What’s going on?” Delaney mouthed to Gracen across the vehicle.

  She ignored her friend.

  Life never just fell into place for Gracen. The universe didn’t work in her favor like this. It took real effort for her to push past the suspicion and anxiety building in her heart that something bad was on the horizon because for a second, she felt good.

  “Believe it or not,” Gracen told Malachi, “but my weekend recently freed up.”

  Across the hood of the Jeep, Delaney grinned wide.

  On the phone, Malachi said, “I’ll text you the address.”

  Chapter 18

  The lodge in Nictau wasn’t quite as far out in the boonies as Gracen had initially suspected. But it might as well be. She’d driven to Mount Carleton’s national park to hike with friends more than a handful of times, so it wasn’t a new area to her. Usually in the daytime, however. Things probably looked a lot more familiar to her with the sun high in the sky than it did with the moon illuminating the rural road.

  At some point on the way to the mountain, the power lines would stop lining the roads and even the tar turned to chip sealed rock after a while. The national park didn’t allow overnight camping in the reserve, but there were lots of campgrounds and other available lodging for rent on the outskirts of the park’s territory. Luckily, the address provided by Malachi for his boss’s lodge was not that deep into the sticks.

  No complaints.

  She did like power and indoor plumbing. All good things, and inventions made for a reason, more often than not.

  The drive was still unnecessarily long, of course—more than two hours, and mostly in the dark by the time Gracen got on the road—but the navigational app on her phone had no problems getting her where she needed to go. After one lone store in a small town, sporting only a handful of houses and a graveyard with a single road to drive straight through, her phone informed her that she was only ten minutes away from her destination.

  Wonderful.

  What happened if her car broke down—even if that was an unlikely scenario—between now and wherever? The desolate road with towering trees on either side, not a lick of human life ahead of her, and a bright moon overhead concerned Gracen.

  Just a little.

  She’d never taken a trip—or even a long drive like this—alone. Maybe she was also trying not to overthink it. Not that it was working.

  Filling the Civic’s gas tank in the town after the valley had been a good choice, because she had absolutely no plans to pull over now. Certainly not in the dark, in the middle of nowhere, when it appeared like her phone was slowly running out of service with every new turn ahead of her. Besides, she had not seen a gas station—except the small store a few minutes back with a single pump that looked older than she was—since filling up the first time.

  Good thing her car didn’t eat gas like crazy. She had to count her blessings somewhere.

  Gracen had become so distracted with the passing trees that she almost missed the phone telling her to turn right to reach her destination. Jamming on the brakes to keep from missing what looked like an old dirt road wasn’t a problem; no cars had been following her since the last, tiny village at the end of Riley Brook.

  “What destination?” Gracen asked no one in particular.

  Her phone, maybe.

  Not that the damn thing answered back.

  Sure, there were telephone poles leading down the dirt road, lining the towering trees that went back beyond where Gracen could see in the dark. Was that a hill? Did the road go down where she couldn’t see?

  Jesus.

  She considered texting Malachi. She did not sign up to get lost out in the middle of nowhere.

  The barely-there bar of service when she checked her phone said she should be grateful for that fact that her phone managed to keep connected to the maps and giving her directions, but sending out a text would be nothing more than a gamble.

  Just drive down the road, Gracen told herself, and see what’s at the end. Worst case, you turn around, come back out to t
he road, and go back to Riley Brook where there’s better service.

  With that pep talk fresh in her head, Gracen finally turned the Civic onto the dirt road lined with telephone poles. Only one side of the road had the tall trees looming overhead while the other side was an expansive wheat field with grass grown as high as someone’s knees. She’d been right about the fact that it was a rolling hill, and once her car reached the crest of the road a good forty yards in, she could begin to see the winding path it took deeper down the land.

  And the lodge waiting there just beyond the line of trees at the very bottom. She noticed the spotlights on the massive eaves overhanging atop the entrance of the lodge where the road turned into a better graveled drive and circled around the front. The roof reached high to the sky. At least forty or fifty feet tall. Logs made up the walls and even the veranda that seemed to wrap around the front and extend down the sides were carved from the same kind of trees. Stained a dark brown, the lodge could probably disappear into its surroundings at nighttime without the lights high on the eaves. In the daylight, however, she bet the sight of the place was unmatched with the backdrop of trees and the Tobique River just a stone’s throw away.

  More interesting than the lodge itself were the vehicles parked at the entrance. The Cadillac SUV wasn’t familiar to her upon first glance, but it was impossible to miss Malachi’s black Suzuki parked on driver’s side of the other vehicle. Gracen followed suit with her own car, parking it alongside Malachi’s bike.

  By the time she had exited the Civic and grabbed her overnight bag out of the trunk, a familiar figure darkened the top of the stone steps leading up to two, French black doors. He stood there with an easy smile and his hands tucked loosely in his pockets as if he had all the time in the world while he waited for Gracen to make her way over.

  “Hey, beautiful,” Malachi greeted.