Rumor (Renegades #4)(26)
Author: Skye Jordan

Gracie. She hadn’t heard her mother say her name for so long, the word felt like a sweet stroke of her hand. Loss and love mixed, wrapping around Grace’s heart and freezing her in place.

“Oh, my, don’t you look beautiful?” Carolyn said. “What a pretty little dress. Come help with this project Josh brought. Look.”

She’d changed from her seductive, revealing work dress into one of her everyday simple knee-length flowy sheaths for the visit, but her mother’s mind was back on her project, lifting the black outline of a butterfly, its body and wings striped in colored tissue paper.

Josh stood and started toward her but paused a few feet away, his expression concerned. “Are you…okay? You look… Shit, are you mad?”

“Mad?” She didn’t understand the question.

“That I came to see her without telling you?” He took another step closer. “You were so busy, and I’ve gone as far as I can with the studio until the flooring comes in. I didn’t think you’d have time to get over to see your mom, so…”

A rough laugh bubbled from her chest. “So you came? And you brought butterflies?”

His brows pulled. His expression shifted from worried to defensive as he shoved his hands into his pockets. “She likes butterflies.”

“I know.” She laughed the words, but they sounded as mystified as she felt. “I guess I’m just…I don’t know…shocked. You come to visit her with time you don’t have, while here doing a favor for a friend, who also happens to be her own ex-son-in-law. An ex-son-in-law who has never so much as called her since she’s been here. Would never even consider visiting her here. And who sure as hell never had any clue she likes butterflies.”

Josh angled his head. “So…I still can’t tell if you’re angry with me or not, but…are you telling me that Beck knows your mother’s living here? He knows that she has…this problem?”

The change of topic drained Grace’s sense of wonder. “He knows,” she said, forcing her anger toward Isaac away so she could appreciate what she had right now—a mother who recognized her and a man who truly cared about them both. “He knows everything. And I’m not angry—not at you.”

She slid her hand down Josh’s arm and tugged one of his hands from his pocket, then threaded their fingers together. “She hasn’t called me Gracie for months.” She smiled up at him, not caring that her eyes had to be watery with tears. “Thank you.”

He exhaled, and his shoulders relaxed. But his gaze went hot and intense. “I want to kiss you so badly right now.”

She scraped her lower lip between her teeth. “I could probably find a way to satisfy that craving.”

“Soon, I hope.”

“Maybe.”

The doubt cleared from his eyes, and he grinned. “Such a tease.”

“You love it.”

“Hell yes.”

“Oooooh, look.” Her mother’s excited coo drew both their gazes, and she held up another suncatcher, this one with tracing paper in shades of blue and green. “This will match Henrietta’s new bedspread.”

Grace turned, her hand still in Josh’s, and they walked to the table. “Are you two making them for the whole house?”

“Three done, three to…” Her gaze caught on their joined hands, and her words trailed off with a look of confusion. Grace’s chest burned with that guilty-teenager sensation, and she drew her hand from Josh’s and took a seat next to her mom, hoping that hadn’t tipped her mother off balance.

“So you’ve had a good day?” Grace said. “You look so pretty tonight. Did Tammy do your hair this morning?”

Her mother nodded, setting the butterfly aside with a familiar distance in her eyes. Then she slanted an odd grin at Grace and sang, “I heard a rumor…”

Ah damn. Trepidation bloomed in the pit of her stomach. Carolyn always brought up rumors when her mind started slipping away. “Yeah?” she asked, keeping her voice upbeat. “Was it that I’m going to come bake sugar cookies with you Christmas morning?”

Her mother gasped and grinned. Grace’s heart lightened, and she took the moment for what it was—fleeting.

“With sprinkles?” Carolyn asked.

“Every color,” Grace confirmed.

“And icing?”

“Vanilla, your favorite.”

“Oh, fun.” Her mother clapped her hands like an excited little girl. “I can’t wait. I can’t wait to tell you the newest rumor…”Carolyn’s mind slid from one topic right into another without realizing the shift. “Not the cookies, huh?” Grace propped her chin in her hand. “Is it…” Grace thought about the other patients in the house and lowered her voice, “that Henrietta and Bob are still getting busy in the shower?”

“Pffft,” she said with a frown and a wave of her hand, “that’s old news.”

“What?” Josh asked, clearly scandalized over the suggestion that two of the housemates were often found having sex when left unattended.

Grace shook her head. “Evidently, people in their eighties get quite a bit of action.” To her mother, she asked, “What’s this rumor that’s got you so giddy?”

Carolyn darted a glance toward Josh, then leaned in to Grace and whispered, “I heard…Josh is in love with my Gracie.”

Grace’s smile froze. Tingles spread outward from her chest and made her almost as giddy as her mother. Though, this was old news as well. She’d known Josh loved her when she’d asked him to come live with her. She’d known he loved her when he’d moved away. And she sure as hell saw the truth of the rumor in his reddening face as he slumped in his chair, wiped a hand down his face, and muttered something that sounded like “Jesus fucking Christ, Carolyn.”

Grace bit her lip against the urge to laugh at his distress. And she couldn’t resist the urge to make it just a little worse. “That’s a great one, Mom. I’ve got another one for you.”

And she leaned forward and whispered in her ear.

Carolyn’s face lit up like the Christmas tree in the corner. “Oooooh, that’s so…delicious.”

“Okay,” Josh said, resting his head in his hand. “I’ll bite. What’s the new rumor, Carolyn?”

Carolyn leaned toward Josh this time. His gaze held on Grace, clearly dubious, but he leaned forward when Carolyn gestured him toward her. He was looking at the tabletop when her mother whispered, “I heard…my Gracie loves Josh more.”