Stay Sweet(60)

He has his music on. But he must eventually hear her, because he turns and glances over his shoulder, and promptly stumbles and falls to the ground.

“Jesus, Amelia! You almost gave me a heart attack!”

As he picks himself up, she sets down her feet and tries pushing the card into his hand. It takes him a second to realize what it is. “I can’t believe you were going to throw your mom’s letters away.”

“I already read through them.”

“Grady, I know you’re lying.”

Grimacing, he checks his elbow. It’s scraped raw and bleeding. “Can you please not look at me like you hate me?”

“I don’t hate you, but please, you have to read this!” She presses the card into his hands. “Molly gave your mom the ice cream recipes. They were her wedding present to your parents.”

Grady clenches his jaw. He rips out his earbuds, flings them over his shoulder, and begrudgingly takes the card from Amelia.

Her heart is pounding. “Do you remember seeing this ice cream maker around? Maybe in your kitchen?”

His eyes run back and forth, back and forth. “No.”

“Your mom wrote that the recipes were very special to her. You don’t think your dad would have kept them?”

Grady chews the inside of his cheek. He seems to be rehearsing what he’s about to say before he says it. “Right after my mom died, Dad moved her things into storage. They’re at our beach house in Dooley. I have no clue what he saved.”

“Dooley. That’s like, what? Two hours away from here? You could leave now—”

“Amelia. You just called me out for not reading my mom’s letters. So what makes you think I’m going to want to dig through her things?”

“I don’t understand. Your mom loved this place. And Molly Meade loved you enough to leave it to you. Don’t you feel an obligation to them both to see this through till the end?”

Rubbing his hand over his face, Grady says, “Molly didn’t leave the stand to me. She left it to my mom, and I guess she never updated her will. I only inherited it because all my mom’s assets come to me. It’s a technicality.”

“You think Molly didn’t know it would work that way?” Amelia shakes her head. “Technicality or not, it’s yours now.”

“Don’t you get it? Knowing how important this place was to my mom only makes this harder. It’s one thing not to please my dad. I don’t know if I ever will, and I’m starting to think I shouldn’t even try. But I can’t let down my mom. Not any more than I already have.”

“Grady, you have to go and see if you can find them.”

His eyes drop to the ground, where he kicks at the dirt. Amelia holds her breath until he looks up at her, eyes hopeful and needy, his hands twisting his headphone wires. “Will you come with me?”

“Grady, I can’t.”

“Please, Amelia. I don’t mean to ask any more of you. That’s why I haven’t chased you down. This is my problem, not yours, and you’ve already gone above and beyond. But I honestly don’t think I can go through her stuff myself. I’ll show you where everything is. You can go through the boxes, see if you find them.”

“I have plans tonight that I absolutely can’t miss,” Amelia says, though she suspects that if she gave Grady a night to sleep on this, he’d very likely change his mind. “What time can we get back?”

“Two hours there, an hour to search through her stuff, and then two hours back. So around ten?”

Amelia would miss the dinner, miss the interpretive sparkler dance contest. But she’d be back in time for fireworks. “Can you be ready to go in ten minutes?”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

“You have to drive like the wind. A safe wind, but the wind.”

“Promise.”

They run back to the house together. Grady jumps into the shower and makes sure Moo has fresh food and water while Amelia heads down to the stand to see Cate.

She’s never been more nervous in her life.

Cate has her fireworks haul spread out on the Head Girl’s desk. “This was a great call, Amelia. You look so cute, by the way.”

“Cate, I need to talk to you about tonight.”

“What? Did something happen?”

Amelia takes a deep breath. “I found Molly’s recipes. Or I think I did. The thing is, we have to go to Grady’s dad’s beach house to get them. It’s not far. It’s only over in Dooley. We’re going to leave right now.”

“You and Grady.”

“I’ll be back in time for fireworks.”

“Amelia, I cannot believe you’d . . . Wait. Is something going on between you two?”

Amelia shakes her head quickly. “No!”

“Because we all said—”

“Cate, nothing is going on between me and Grady! I swear!”

“Then why can’t you just go tomorrow?” Cate’s lips press together in a thin line. “Why do you have to go at all?”

Amelia hasn’t told Cate anything about Grady’s real mom. She would like to, but now is not the time. She doesn’t have any time. “I don’t want to have any regrets.”

“You’ll regret missing tonight,” Cate warns. Or maybe it’s a threat.