“Grace,” he said again, reaching out to her.
She shook her head, like she was trying to shake it all off. “I’m okay,” she said. “I’ll be okay.” She bent down and started picking up the scattered flyers.
Jax bent down, too, and stilled her hands. She looked at him and it almost knocked the wind out of him. There was so much pain and hurt in her eyes.
“I’m so sorry, Grace,” he said, leaning in and kissing her temple. “I’m going to find out who did this,” he promised.
And he was going to beat the shit out of the asshole when he did.
* * *
It took them a good thirty minutes to get the flyers in the trash, and the car chalk off the windshield. The black letters smeared, leaving thick streaks across the glass, and it took a good deal of Windex and scrubbing to get it all off.
Jax was fuming. If there was anything to send him into a barely controlled rage, it was Grace being upset. She’d looked so damn lost, so damn lonely. It tore Jax up, made his chest hurt painfully, and he wanted to take that hurt out on somebody. He would’ve done just about anything to prevent her from experiencing that whole episode.
Jax wanted nothing more than to go down to the Mirabelle Information Center and rip into that horrible hag. But Jax didn’t think this was Bethelda’s handiwork. Bethelda targeted a wide variety of people, but she only did it from the safety of her blog. Whoever did this to Grace’s car specifically didn’t like Grace.
So instead Jax headed to work. He went down to the station to file a report on Grace’s car. After that, Jax headed to Lock and Load Security.
Six of the places that had been broken into had an alarm system from the same company, which wasn’t saying much considering the fact that there was only one place in Mirabelle that provided the service. Lock and Load Security had been around for twenty years, and not only did they install security systems and locks, but they sold plenty of guns and ammunition for those who wanted to have that extra sense of security.
Jax had talked to the owner Ray Pittman last week, and he hadn’t found anything suspicious. Ray had been incredibly helpful and had given the sheriff’s office all the information they’d asked for. But something wasn’t sitting right, especially with the three houses that had been broken into on the beach. Ray was a good guy, and Jax didn’t suspect that he was behind anything. But whoever had done this was familiar with the system, and Ray had employees.
When Jax walked into the small shop his uneasy feeling intensified. Judson Coker was standing behind the counter. Jax had never liked the asshole. Judson and his pal Hoyt Reynolds had always picked on Grace, and they would forever be on Jax’s shit list.
“Can I help you?” Judson asked, giving Jax a disdainful look.
“I’m here to see your boss,” Jax said.
“Ray is in his office.” Judson indicated a hallway to the left.
“Thanks,” Jax said as he walked down the hall.
“Deputy Anderson,” Ray said when Jax walked into the office. Ray was in his late forties with bushy gray hair on his head and his face. He’d inherited the store ten years ago from his father-in-law. “How’s it going?” he asked as he stood from behind his desk and held out his hand.
“Good,” Jax said, shaking the man’s hand.
“Have a seat,” Ray said, letting go and motioning to one of the chairs in front of his desk. “What can I help you with today?”
“I need a list of all your employees. Everyone who has access to the system.”
Ray’s eyes widened. “You think someone here is involved?”
“At this point I have no idea. Your alarm system hasn’t been in all the places that have been broken into. Buts it’s been in the majority of them. I’m just trying to cover all my bases.”
“Understood. Let me get you that list,” Ray said, and tapped a few keys on his computer. He hit another couple of buttons before he stood up. “The printer’s out there,” he said, indicating the front of the shop.
Jax stood up and followed Ray down the hallway. Ray went behind the counter to a giant printer that started making a humming noise. Judson was still behind the counter, talking on the phone as he typed something into the computer.
“Huh,” Ray said, turning around. “I can’t say that we normally use this type of paper, but here you go.” He handed Jax the list, which was printed on a bright red piece of paper.
Jax’s hand shook as he held it. It was the exact same paper that all those damn flyers had been printed on.
“Son-of-a-bitch,” Jax said, looking up at Judson who was now off the phone. Judson just stared back, no visible reaction.
Ray looked back and forth between the two men.
“It was you,” Jax said, barely keeping his anger in check. It was taking everything in him not to leap across the counter and pummel the asshole.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, deputy,” Judson said with no small amount of contempt in his words or his gaze.
“What’s going on?” Ray asked.
Jax looked over at Ray, needing to take his eyes off Judson. “This morning, someone printed out an article of Bethelda’s about Grace and me. They made multiple copies on red pieces of paper just like this and covered her car in them. Is there a way to check the printing history?” Jax asked, looking at the computer.
“Yes,” Ray said. He looked at Judson who moved out of the way, an expression on his face that said you aren’t going to find shit.
Ray clicked a few buttons and shook his head. “The printing history has been cleared.”
“What a coincidence,” Jax said.
“Hold on, let me try something else.”
When Ray turned around something flickered across Judson’s face, but it was gone almost as soon as it had appeared.
Ray hit a few buttons on the printer and it kicked to life again. Some more red pieces of paper shot out. He grabbed them and sorted through them. His jaw bunched together when he got to the second page. He looked up at Judson and held up the piece of paper. It was the article all right.
“You still want to deny it?” Jax asked.
“It wasn’t me,” Judson said, shrugging his shoulders. “I’m not the only one who has access to this printer. There are a number of people that work here. It could’ve been any of those guys. And considering the way that Grace got around in high school, I’m sure that they would want to spread that message.”
Must. Remember. To. Breathe.
Must. Not. Go. Crazy.
Must. Stay. Calm.
Breathe.
Brrreeeeaaaathe.
“Or maybe you should go straight to the source and get Bethelda to stop. It sounds like that’s where your real problem lies,” Judson said.
“Oh, I’d say that someone using company resources, my resources as it is, is most definitely part of a problem,” Ray said, taking a step forward and frowning at Judson. “Deputy Anderson, I promise you that I’m going to look into this situation thoroughly.”
“Thank you,” Jax said.
“You’re going to have to do a lot of looking. I think you’d be surprised about what the King women have done, or more specifically who they’ve done.”
“That’s enough of that,” Ray said, looking at Judson, his face flushing red.
“Do you enjoy pushing your luck?” Jax asked. “Because sooner or later it’s going to catch up to you.” And Jax hoped he was there when it did.
“Is that a threat?”
“No,” Jax said, shaking his head, “it’s a promise.”
And with that, he turned around and walked out the door.
* * *
The whole article and car situation put Grace into a deep funk. She tried to distract herself with baking and was somewhat successful with it, but more often than not it would all come rushing back to her, like a slap in the face. Her eyes would start to sting and she’d have to pull herself back from the verge of tears.
Grace needed a bigger distraction than
baking. She needed Jax. He’d worked wonders last night. He had a way of making her forget everything when his hands were on her. Of making all of her troubles disappear when he was just in the same room. She hadn’t told him about what happened at the grocery store, and there were several reasons why.
One, she hadn’t run to him for every single problem before they started sleeping together, and she wasn’t going to start now. Two, he would overreact. Three, he would tell Brendan and Shep and they would all overreact together. Jax might be capable of not doing stupid things, but Brendan didn’t share that quality.
So Grace had sucked it up and gotten over it. Sort of.
Okay, really she hadn’t gotten over the whole thing with Chad, Judson, and Hoyt at all. It was just that it had been pushed to the back of her mind while she dwelled on other things.
Grace really wished she could just not care about what other people thought about her. She’d been dealing with crap like that article her entire life. And it was more than just Bethelda behind it. Growing up, there’d been a couple of mothers who refused to let their daughters be friends with Grace. They didn’t like Claire. They thought all the stories were true, that Claire was a home wrecker that would try to steal their husbands. But that wasn’t, and had never been, Claire’s MO. Grace had never seen her mother date anyone, and Brendan said he hadn’t, either.
Both Grace and her mother were painted in these horrible, scandalous images that weren’t even true. That was probably one of the most frustrating things for Grace. Certain people continued on with this idea that she was a whore. They said she was jumping in and out of all these guys’ beds, but she wasn’t. Grace had been with exactly two guys before Jax.
After everything with Chad, good guys had been few and far between. All the guys at Mirabelle High School had believed the rumors that Grace was easy, and they only asked her out because they thought she would put out. After a couple of dates, Grace had given up on guys from school.
The first serious boyfriend Grace had was when she was seventeen. Eric Tanner was a student at Florida State University and they’d met at the beach. They’d been together for about a year when she gave him her virginity, and they stayed together for a year after that before she ended things.
When she was twenty-one, she dated Mark Abernathy. He was another good guy who worked for his father’s fishing company in Mirabelle. He was five years older than Grace, so he’d missed out on all the high school rumors. They were together for about eight months when she again ended the relationship.
What it all came down to was that Grace had been in love with Jax. She’d known it hadn’t been fair to continue dating either Eric or Mark when her heart belonged to someone else.
It hurt more than anything that within less than a week of Grace’s finally being with Jax, more than one person was out to try to ruin things. Was out there trying to take away from something she’d been dreaming of for years. It infuriated her.
And she wasn’t the only one it pissed off. Brendan had come by the café that morning, his temper barely in check. It had taken the combined efforts of both Lula Mae and Grace to calm him down and get him to go to work. Oliver stopped by for a late breakfast claiming that he wanted to see Lula Mae, though he spent a good twenty minutes in the kitchen with Grace and only five with his wife.
It wasn’t long before Shep was in the kitchen, drinking a cup of coffee and eating a muffin. Shep had claimed he’d only come for the food, but when he’d said good-bye, he hugged Grace hard and told her not to listen to worthless opinions from worthless people.
Grace was making bread when Harper came into the kitchen around two.
“So you saw the article?” Harper asked.
“It goes way beyond the article,” Grace said.
“Oh, dear, what happened?”
Grace told Harper about what she and Jax had discovered that morning. When Grace finished, Harper’s mouth was hanging open.
“You’ve got to be kidding me?” Harper asked, horrified.
“Nope.”
“I hate that stupid cow,” Harper said.
“Me, too,” a deep voice said from the door that led to the front of the café.
Grace looked up to find Jax.
“Hey, Princess,” he said as he rounded the island in the center of the kitchen and came up behind her. He put his hands on her hips as he leaned down and pressed his lips to hers in a quick open-mouthed kiss before he pulled back. “Hey, Harper.”
“Hey, Jax. You here to check up on your girl?” She gave him a smile.
“That and tell Grace something I found out.”
“What?” she asked, going over to the sink to wash the flour from her hands.
“I went over to Lock and Load first thing this morning. Ray Pittman had to print something off for me, and it printed on the same red paper as the flyers. Whoever did it works there and they’d cleared off the printing history on the computer. But Ray hit some button on the printer and it reprinted the article.”
“Are you serious?” Grace asked as she grabbed a towel to dry her hands.
“Yup. And you know who works there, and who just happened to be behind the counter when I went in?”
“Who?” Grace and Harper asked at the exact same time.
“Judson Coker.”
Grace’s hands froze and before she could say anything, Harper was talking.
“Oh, my gosh, I bet this has to do with them harassing us at the Piggly Wiggly on Sunday.”
“What?” Jax asked.
“It wasn’t anything,” Grace said, looking at him.
“Harper just said someone harassed you?” Jax asked, his mouth going thin and firm.
The kitchen was deafeningly silent for a moment.
“Is that Lula Mae calling my name?” Harper said, taking a step back before she turned and quickly retreated out of the kitchen.
“Care to explain?” Jax asked.
“Jax, really it wasn’t that big of a deal.”
“Apparently it was, Grace. I’m pretty sure Judson is connected to all of this, and what did Harper mean by them?”
Grace sighed heavily before she relented to his hard stare. “Hoyt and Chad were there.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want you to get upset. I knew if I told you, you were going to tell Brendan and Shep and—”
“What happened?” Jax asked, interrupting her. He was clearly furious, talking through clenched teeth.
Grace told him what had happened, his eyebrows drawing closer and closer together the further she got into the story. When she got to the part where Chad touched her, Jax looked like he was going to explode. When she told him what Chad had said to her, Jax had to close his eyes and take a deep breath.
“I’m going to kill him,” Jax said. When he opened his eyes he focused on her, and Grace saw something beyond anger. Jax was hurt. “You lied to me.”
“No, I didn’t. I just didn’t tell you,” she said.
“No.” He shook his head. “I knew something was going on last night, and I asked you if you were okay. You told me you were tired. You were upset. You were upset about this and you didn’t tell me. You lied to me.”
“Jax,” Grace said, reaching out for him as she took a step closer.
But it was then that Alice Myers’s voice came through the speaker on Jax’s uniform and echoed through the kitchen.
“Seventeen, what’s your location?”
Jax pressed the button as he took a step toward the door and turned his mouth into the speaker. “Seventeen, on Sandy Beach Drive.”
“Accident on Pine and Ninth. Possible injury. Ambulance on the way.”
“Ten-four. On the way,” he said as he let go of the button. “I have to go,” he said as he turned around and walked out of the kitchen.
Chapter Ten
Making Up: Apparently It Isn’t So Hard to Do
Grace pulled into Jax’s driveway just after seven thirty. She hadn’t ta
lked to him since he’d left her in the kitchen of the café, and she had no idea what to expect. He was angry and hurt. He’d been angry with her in the past, which was nothing new or different, but never hurt. She’d had her reasons for not telling him the truth, but she really needed to explain it to him. All of it. She just wasn’t sure how receptive he was going to be.
She was more that slightly nervous as she walked up to his house. She hesitated before she knocked, her stomach flipping uncontrollably. Jax opened the door a minute later wearing a pair of jeans, a white T-shirt, and a scowl.
“Hey,” Grace said cautiously.
He didn’t say anything, just stepped to the side to give her enough room to walk in. He closed the door behind her, and as she turned to face him she found herself pushed up against the wall and Jax’s mouth came down hard on hers.
She dropped her purse to the floor and her arms came up and around his neck as he kissed her aggressively. Apparently it didn’t matter how mad he was at her, he still wanted to kiss her, and damn could he kiss. After a minute, he pulled back and looked at her, running his thumb across her jaw.
“Why did you lie to me?” he asked.
“I’m sorry, Jax,” she said, looking up at him. “I should’ve told you what happened, it was just that…” She trailed off. She’d been thinking about how to explain things since he’d walked away from her hours ago, and she still wasn’t sure how to word it without making him even angrier.
“It was just that what?”
She took a deep breath and just plunged in with both feet. “I’ve wanted you for as long as I can remember. Waited to be with you. And now we’re finally together and it hasn’t even been a week and there’s already all of these strikes against us. I know it isn’t supposed to be easy, relationships aren’t easy, but yesterday those jerks were saying things. Saying that you were going to get tired of me and I just—”
She was cut off by Jax’s mouth pressing against hers slowly, tenderly. She moaned deep in her chest and let his tongue work its magic against hers. When he pulled back again, she was surprised to find that he had a slight twinkle in his eye and his mouth was quirked to the side.
Undeniable (A Country Roads Novel) Page 14
