Lawless (King #3)(35)

“I’m so happy my boys have found you girls,” Grace said, despite my argument that Bear and I were not together. I wanted to argue but Ray shot me a look like she was telling me that I was fighting a losing battle. “I’ve loved Abel like he was my own since the very day Brantley brought him over to the house.”

“Brantley?” I asked.

“King,” Ray corrected. “My King. My fiancé.”

“Abel had ridden his motorcycle right up on my lawn after a downpour, leaving deep valleys all the way up to my plant beds, then he left a grease stain the size of North Carolina on my love seat.” She cupped her glass with both of her hands and looked into the ice like it was replaying the day she’d met Bear right there in her drink. “He was too young to be driving that damn thing, told him so myself, but by the next time he came to the house he was a natural. That boy was born to be on a motorcycle. The man and the machine.”

I’d only seen him on a bike once and it was driving away from the gas station and even though I was just a kid at the time I knew exactly what Grace was talking about when she said he was born to be on a bike.

“He was a funny one too,” Grace said.

“Funny?” I asked. Bear was a lot of things. Rude. Crude. Sexy as hell. INFURIATING. But funny was a side I hadn’t seen.

“Very. Used to tell me a new joke over my mama’s meatloaf on Thursday nights. The most ridiculous jokes that he probably heard around the club. Most of them the filthy kind you couldn’t repeat louder than a whisper and couldn’t say within ten miles of a church, that’s for sure.” She shook her head. “As he got older, slowly but surely, the light in that boy’s eyes grew dimmer and dimmer, by the time he rode off a few months back, there was nothing left in them. Broke my damn heart.” Grace wiped a tear that spilled from her eye. “He deserves better than to walk around this world alone and with his own broken heart.”

Ray stood up when the baby stirred on the monitor. “I’ll be right back,” she excused herself, and headed down the hall, emerging a few minutes later with a tiny little baby wrapped in a pink blanket.

“Isn’t my grand baby beautiful?” Grace asked proudly.

“Yes, she really is,” I agreed. She was a tiny little thing with a headful of chestnut curls. She yawned and opened her eyes, and I had a strong urge to want to hold her, but I didn’t want to ask. Ray didn’t know me very well and I’m pretty sure there was some sort of Mom rule out there about how long you have to know someone before they let you hold their babies.

Ray must have seen my warring expression, because she asked, “Would you like to hold her?” Before I could answer she gently placed the baby in my waiting arms. Her itty bitty hands and feet were wrinkly, her cheeks so chubby they pushed up into her huge eyes making them appear much smaller than they really were and slightly slanted.

“Not a kid person huh?” Ray asked, leaning against the counter, calling me out on my earlier lie.

“When it’s your turn I think Abel will be a really great father.” Grace chimed in. “Just like my Brantley is.”

“Grace,” I said, unable to take my eyes off the tiny little one in my arms, “I’m not just denying it for the sake of denying it. Bear and I aren’t together. I’m a problem for him, not any sort of solution.”

“Grace used to tell me the same thing and I used to deny it too. But it turns out I was wrong,” Ray said, leaning forward on her elbows.

Grace brushed her finger across the baby’s cheek, the contrast of old and wrinkled hands against plump and innocent skin was a beautiful sight that made my heart sing a little.

Just a little zap like a mini heart reviving machine.

“What’s her name?” I asked.

“Nicole Grace, but we’re going to call her Nikki,” Ray said, looking proudly over the baby in my arms. Grace beamed at the mention of her name as part of the baby’s name.

“I saw Abel this morning for the first time since he’s been back,” Grace locked eyes with me. “He still looks angry as hell, but I can tell that something is shifting and I just know the light will be coming back soon. Mark my words, my Abel will be back for good. So I’m gonna say right now that you’re wrong too, you just haven’t realized it yet.” She smiled at the baby and then up at me. The wrinkles around her eyes changing shape as her lips curled upward in a knowing smile. “I’m not a well woman, Thia. I’m feeling good now, but my time on this earth is limited.”

“I’m so sorry…” I started, but Grace cut me off.

“Oh hush now. Don’t be sorry. Just don’t hurt my boy and I won’t have to spend my remaining time alive hunting you down and making you pay.” She leaned back in her chair and I glanced up to Ray to see if maybe I’d misunderstood the meaning behind Grace’s words but Ray just stood there hiding a tight-lipped smile. “Now who wants lunch?” Grace asked, popping out of her chair and heading over to the refrigerator.

Ray stood on her tip toes and opened a cabinet, taking out some plates and setting the table, while I just sat there, baby in arms, with my mouth agape. “What the hell just happened?” I whispered to Ray.

She shrugged. “Congratulations, you’ve been threatened by Grace.”

“What does that even mean?” I whispered, not wanting Grace to hear me and not wanting to wake the little girl who had drifted off to sleep in my arms.