His Saving Grace

by Lyn Cote

  “I think you’re trying to say that losing Tom could have ruined everything, but we’ve handled the changeover well. And now that I’ve brought us in our first new account, we know that we can go on. LIT isn’t going to suffer from losing Tom.”

  “That’s part of it.” He reached over and touched her hand. “I’m glad I went on vacation with your family. It was fun and I’m glad I got to know your dad better.”

  She closed her hand over his.

  He wanted to add, I liked kissing you. I have feelings for you. But this was too public a place for that kind of declaration. “I’m glad we got to know each other away from the office. I’m glad you’re here with me tonight.” Revealing this much shook him.

  “I’m glad you came to Wisconsin with us, Jack.” Her voice had softened. “But I warn you—you’re going to take another vacation next year.” She aimed her fork at him and then pierced a cherry tomato.

  Relieved, he chuckled. “You’re scaring me. Mrs. Groshky is one tough cookie.”

  “Eat your salad.” She tapped his hand and then popped the tomato into her mouth.

  He obeyed her. But from under his lashes, he watched her eat her salad. How could she be so fascinating? This was just Gracie!

  Later, Jack walked Gracie to her back door. The summer evening was still warm, the usual for July in Chicago. As they had strolled up through the backyard, he’d taken her hand. All the doubts he’d had about not knowing how to talk to Gracie had faded. How could I have known how easy it would be to fall for Gracie?

  But he had something he had put off asking her, something that would push him to make more changes. Will this work or is it going to be one big mistake? He had no doubt what Gracie’s reply would be. She would do what was right. He could trust her in that way.

  In the faint light from a small fixture beside the back door, she bent over her purse and dug inside for her key ring. When she brought it out, he reached for it.

  “Not so fast.” He pulled her into his arms and pressed his face into her fragrant hair. “This is pleasure, not business, remember?”

  He heard her sigh, a pleasant sound, especially when she relaxed against him, not pulling away. This is right. It feels so right.

  He bent and claimed her mouth, losing himself in the sensations of her soft lips and then a second sweet sigh. He ended the kiss and held her closer to him.

  “I have a favor to ask.” Jack breathed in the appealing scent that clung to her hair.

  “What?” She looked up.

  He cupped her face with his hands. The moment felt poetic. How delicate. How lovely is my Gracie. If only he had the courage to say these words.

  “What, Jack?” she whispered.

  He kissed her mouth once, twice, three times. Closing his eyes, he leaned his forehead against hers. “My dad wants me to have dinner with him tomorrow evening. He wants me to meet his fiancée. Would you come with me?”

  “Meet his fiancée?” She hesitated while he waited for her reply.

  Then her arms hugged him tighter. “Of course. I’d be glad to, if you’re going to give the woman a chance.” Her tone turned doubtful.

  He’d asked himself the same question. “I will—or at least I’ll try.” He rolled his forehead back and forth against hers, relishing their closeness. “Mom says she’s a nice grandmotherly-type woman.”

  “Well, good.” Gracie kissed his nose.

  Jack claimed her lips again. Gracie, you make me feel like I can do anything!

  “Hey— Oh, it’s you two.” A voice interrupted the kiss.

  Jack and Gracie both turned to see Troy mounting the back steps, but Jack didn’t release her.

  “Sorry to intrude.” Troy grinned at them. “I’m just returning from taking Annie home.”

  “You look different,” Jack observed, “from the last time I saw you.”

  “I feel different. Hey, thanks for pitching in and being so good to my guys at the lake. They told me all about you and fishing and swimming. Oh, and I had to hear about the North Star and dippers.”

  “I enjoyed it myself.” Jack held out one of his hands.

  “Great.” Troy shook hands and then passed around them. “Sorry I interrupted. Go right on with what you were doing.” He gave another grin. “Good night.”

  After he’d gone inside, Jack looked down at Gracie. “What gives?”

  “While we were away, he and Annie started going to counseling and working things out. She hopes to move back home by the end of summer.” Gracie traced the line of his jaw.

  Her light touch filled him with longing. “Really? How did that happen?” He stole a tiny kiss.

  “Annie said the counseling’s really helping. Both of them had made assumptions about marriage and being parents without checking to see if their assumptions matched.”

  “Do they match now?” Jack nuzzled the soft skin of her nape.

  “I guess that’s what they are working on now. Remember when Staramama came in and gave me trouble about Annie?”

  “Yes.” Jack buried his face into the soft hair behind her ear.

  “Well, Staramama has been causing trouble all along. She doesn’t like it that Annie wants to have an education and she has been interfering.”

  “I’m not surprised.” Jack pressed kisses along her hairline.

  “Anyway,” Gracie went on, trying to concentrate, “at Christmas Annie overheard her tell Troy that he should just get Annie pregnant again like he did on their honeymoon and that would keep Annie from going back to school.” Gracie sounded breathless.

  He tried to put together what she was saying. “What?”

  “Yes, I know. Anyway, that made Annie suspicious because she always thought that her getting pregnant on their honeymoon just happened.”

  Concentrating, Jack paused, his face buried in the cleft between her neck and soft shoulder.

  “So this possibility really steamed Annie,” Gracie continued. “And when Troy tried to persuade her not to go back to school, to have another baby instead, she thought what she overheard must have been true. That made her really angry, and that’s why she went ahead and applied and got a grant and started summer school.”

  Jack lifted his head, and with one finger he turned Gracie’s chin toward him. “Okay, but how has that changed now?”

  Gracie smiled at him as though he’d just won an award. “Good question. The answer is that at the first counseling session, Troy said something about his grandmother, and Annie confronted him with what she’d overheard.”

  “Oh, that doesn’t sound like a good thing.” Jack shook his head.

  “But it was! Troy was able to convince her that just because his grandmother said it was true, didn’t make it true.”

  “Ah.” Losing interest in Annie and Troy, Jack ran his fingers into the hair above Gracie’s ear, feeling its silky texture.

  She punched his chest, gaining his immediate attention. “Okay, that’s enough about my sister and her family for tonight. I’ll shut up.”

  “Gracie, I’m glad they’re working things out. Austin and Andy need both parents.” He bent down and kissed her.

  For a few moments, he lost himself in the rush of sensation that flowed through him, sensitizing him to everything about Gracie.

  Finally, she pulled away. “I should go in.”

  “Now?” he asked.

  She chuckled. “Yes, now. We have work to do tomorrow, remember? Vacation’s over.”

  He exhaled. “Yeah.”

  “You’re spending the day in Oak Park?” She pushed the door open.

  “Right. I’m meeting with the new client.” He took a step backward, though everything inside him yearned to stay with her.

  “Are you sure you don’t need me?” She paused in the doorway.

  Yes, I need you. I’ll always need you. “I’ll be fine on my own.” Then he held up one hand as though taking an oath. “I promise that I’ll be on my best customer-oriented behavior. And I’ll pick you up here at six to take you t
o dinner.”

  “Good.” She stepped all the way inside and paused again.

  “Good night,” he said, not moving.

  “Good night.” She stared at him and then slowly shut the door. The lock clicked.

  Jack walked out to his car and climbed in. The night was warm but not sultry. A cool breeze was now whiffling the leaves overhead. He didn’t feel like going home. Why not just spend a few hours at the office? He had some files on hard disks left from Tom that he wanted to scan to see if he should save the data or delete it.

  An hour later, Jack was staring at the screen of his computer in the quiet storefront office. What he saw there angered him beyond belief.

  How could Tom have betrayed him like that!

  Chapter Thirteen

  The following evening in a chic and very cosmopolitan restaurant, Gracie sat on the edge of her chair beside Jack and across from Cliff and his fiancée, hoping she was wrong.

  “I’m glad we made reservations.” Cliff glanced around the crowded dining room, agleam with lustrous white table linen and gilded silverware. “I thought business would be thin with everyone out of town on vacation, but I was wrong.”

  Sitting very straight on her cushioned red velvet seat, Gracie sensed undeniable but unseen tension radiating from Jack. She’d felt it in the car when he picked her up. But he’d merely passed off her questions and talked nonstop computerese about what he’d done all day on their new account in Oak Park. Jack talking a lot and only in technical language was always a bad sign.

  Dear Lord, I sense a change in him from only last night. What’s happened to make him so resentful again?

  Beside Jack’s dad, Gloria, Cliff’s slender fiancée, looked too young to be a grandmother. She had a golf-and-tennis tan. Her shoulder-length graying hair was highlighted blond and pulled back severely into a clip at her nape. Her linen pantsuit probably had all the right labels and she wore a chunky matching bracelet and earrings set that looked to be eighteen-carat gold.

  By contrast, Gracie felt that the strand of pearls she had inherited from her mother and her new summer dress of pale-yellow cotton with white buttons and belt screamed “discount store!”

  Cliff wore a well-tailored sport jacket. But Jack hadn’t changed from his work clothes, a pair of chinos and a casual knit shirt. That should have been her first warning. I should have insisted he change or refused to come along. This is going to be bad. She nearly buried her head in her hands.

  “Well, it’s nice to meet you at last, Jack,” Gloria said, when the two couples were suddenly alone after the waiter seated them.

  “Nice?” Jack crooked an eyebrow. “Maybe ‘astonishing’ would be a better word. My dad and I hadn’t spoken in years, until a few months ago.”

  Jack’s tone of voice was just this side of offensive.

  Gracie endured its aftermath, the awkward silence at their table that ensued while ice clinked in glasses and well-bred conversation hummed all around them.

  When no one broke the intimidating hush, Gracie took a bracing sip of ice water and made herself ask, “Gloria, how did you and Cliff meet?”

  “We met at a charity fund-raiser.” Gloria glanced at Cliff at her side, her affection showing in the way she smiled at him and reached for his hand. “I’m very much involved in the search for a cure for type I diabetes.”

  “Yeah, my dad goes in for that charity stuff. Good public relations.” Jack tossed this verbal grenade in a too-casual tone and leaned back in his chair, staring down his nose at his dad.

  Gracie had the urge to drag Jack aside and tell him to knock it off. Instead, she ignored him as the others were doing and smiled.

  “Type I? That’s the type that children get, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is.” Cliff’s steely tone showed how he was taking Jack’s behavior—not well. “Gloria’s second daughter was diagnosed when she was only eight.”

  Jack said nothing, just sat with his arms crossed.

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Type I is the one treated with injections, right?” Gracie’s new white pumps were pinching her toes, but she didn’t dare slip them off under the table. She had to be ready for a quick exit. Don’t push your luck, Jack, please.

  “Yes,” Gloria continued, “I can’t tell you what a shock it was to me to have it happen, though my husband had an older sister who died in childhood.” Looking down, Gloria swirled the water in her glass, making the ice chink-chink. “She had diabetes, but her family didn’t recognize the symptoms and they lost her to a diabetic coma back in the late 1950s.”

  “How sad.” Gracie leaned forward, drawn by sympathy to Gloria.

  “Yes, it was.” Gloria moved her focus to Gracie. “And since it can be hereditary, Ted and I watched our children for the symptoms. Unfortunately, our Debbie was the one who got the wrong gene.”

  “I’ve heard that they are making all kinds of advances in research,” Jack said, finally breaking his deafening silence.

  Gracie felt a rush of relief. Maybe Jack would calm down now. She chanced a look at him, but saw only his profile.

  “My mom, you know, has rheumatoid arthritis, another hereditary disease,” Jack commented.

  “Yes,” Gloria smiled a real, not just a polite smile. “She seemed like a lovely person when I met her.”

  “She mentioned she’d met you.” Jack hunched forward as though ready to throw a punch.

  Gracie moved forward on her chair, ready to put her hand over his mouth—anything to stop him from launching another attack.

  But Jack opened his mouth and let the poison flow. “You noticed that my mom’s still living in the rundown little house she was left with after my dad dumped her. Now she’s having to spend a lot of her limited funds for remodeling. If my dad’s second wife hadn’t bled him nearly dry after their divorce, maybe my mom’s standard of living wouldn’t have suffered quite so much—”

  “That’s enough, Jack.” Cliff slid forward also. “I’ve made mistakes in my life and I’ve paid for them. Unfortunately, you and your mother also paid. For that, I’m deeply sorry.”

  Jack tried to respond.

  Cliff raised his voice, talking over Jack, “But if you’ve only come tonight to make my future wife miserable, I won’t let this dinner continue. I may deserve your spite, but she does not.”

  Feeling as though every eye were upon them, Gracie wanted to slink under the white linen tablecloth.

  Jack rose, almost knocking over his chair. “You’re right. I’m sorry, Gloria. I have nothing against you except your taste in men. Come on, Gracie, we’re leaving.”

  She wanted to remonstrate with him, but not in this public place. She rose with as much dignity as she could muster. “Thanks for the invitation, Cliff.” She shook his hand and then his fiancée’s. “And, Gloria, it was very nice to meet you. I wish you and Cliff all the best.”

  Jack had already turned and was stalking away.

  Gracie followed him grimly, her face flaming with an embarrassment she’d done nothing to deserve.

  What caused this, Lord? What do I say to him?

  Standing stiffly out front beside Jack, she wouldn’t look at him while they waited for the valet to bring up their car. She maintained her dignified silence as Jack seated her and then went around to the driver’s side.

  Their furious silence continued until they left downtown far behind them, since Gracie didn’t trust herself to speak and feared distracting Jack in heavy city traffic.

  Finally, Jack muttered, “Sorry, I didn’t intend to make you feel bad.”

  “How very inadequate, Jack.” Gracie couldn’t remember ever feeling so angry that her words burned fiery-hot as they passed over her tongue. “If you didn’t want to meet her, why didn’t you just cancel the dinner?” She glared at him.

  “He’s a manipulator, a controller.” Jack didn’t sound as though he had even heard her. “I can’t stand that. And I won’t be manipulated.”

  “How has he manipulated you?” Gracie threw her
hands upward. “I can’t understand you. Yesterday, you were fine. What happened in the past twenty-four hours to make you act like this?”

  Jack clamped his mouth shut. A sleek black sports car cut in front of them and Jack punched his horn.

  “You’ve just fulfilled a contract with his medical Board. That’s all. How did Cliff manipulate you?” Gracie heard the noise of a train rattling in the distance.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” He sped through a yellow light that turned red just as he entered the intersection.

  “Watch your driving.” Gracie glanced around for any police cars. “You’ll get a ticket, Jack.”

  “I’m fine,” he snapped.

  “No, you’re not. And you’re not talking sense. I thought you’d made progress since the beginning of summer.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” Jack repeated, tail-gating an orange delivery truck in front of them.

  She knew what he was talking about, but exasperation flamed in the pit of her stomach, too. “Fine. Please take me home.”

  “I promised you dinner.” Leaving only inches to spare, he surged past the truck and whipped back into the right lane. “We could stop and pick up something—”

  “I have no appetite,” Gracie snapped. Jack never drove aggressively like this! “I can’t eat when I’m this upset. Please slow down, Jack.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you,” Jack said, his voice dipping lower, sounding sorry for the first time that evening. He slowed, no longer riding the bumper in front of them.

  “Don’t you realize that when you hurt someone, you damage yourself as well?” Gracie turned to glare at him. “I know you profess to be a Christian, but I fail to see any of that in you tonight. Why can’t you see that this antagonism toward your father is eating up your life?”

  “It’s not eating up my life. I have a great life—”

  “You spend your life with your head stuck inside a computer, just like Mrs. Groshky said!” The words burst loud and harsh from Gracie. “You hide from life. You hide from me!”

  A moment of hostile silence passed. With relief, Gracie watched her neighborhood come into view—people sitting on their porches and children in bright summer shorts and tops playing in the park across from the church.